would sing again. Without waiting for a reply, he seated himself before the piano and began the prelude to Manon's air in the Cours la Reine scene and Clara, without rising, sang:
Aussi bien qu'une souveraine;
On s'incline, on baise mes mains,
Car par la beauté je suis reine!
Now her voice had lost the larmoyante quality, which evidently was a part of her bag of tricks for more emotional song, but it had acquired a hard brilliancy which was even more disagreeable to the ear. She had also, I remarked, no great regard for the pitch and little, if any, expressiveness, Nevertheless, Peter wheeled around, after an accompaniment which was even less sympathetic to me than Clara's legs, to exclaim:
Superb! I want her to study Isolde.
Peter doesn't understand, explained Clara, that you must begin with the lighter parts. If I sang Isolde now I would have no voice in five years. Isolde will come later. I can sing Isolde after I have lost my voice. My first reles will be Manon, Violetta, and Juliette. It's old stuff, perhaps, but it doesn't'injure the voice, and the voice is my first consideration. Now I wouldn't sing Salome if they offered me 500 francs a night.
Did you hear about Adelina Patti? asked Peter. She is a good Catholic. She went to a performance
