powers of vocalization. Her career, like that of Gabrielli, was crowned with riches and fame.
132.—GALLANT HAYDN.
When in London, Haydn once visited the studio of that celebrated portrait painter, Sir Joshua Reynolds. He there saw a picture of Mrs. Billington, one of the best known singers of her day. Reynolds had represented her listening to the song of the angels. On being asked for his opinion of the painting, Haydn remarked: "Yes, it is a beautiful picture; it is just like her; but there is one strange mistake."
"A mistake! How is that?" exclaimed Reynolds, who could hardly believe his ears.
"Why," said the gallant composer, "you have made Mrs. Billington listening to the angels, when you ought to have painted the angels as listening to her!"
133.—ROSSINI AND THE ITALIAN SCHOOL.
It is the fashion nowadays, by the admirers of the modern school of opera, to deride the works of Rossini and the Italian school. They point out his lack of dramatic truth, his sacrifice of the sense to the music. Still there has perhaps never lived a man who could excel him as a writer of bel canto.
The faults of Rossini's music were faults not of the man, but of the time. Rossini was, in his way, a reformer. Prior to his time the composer had been at the mercy of the singer, but with Rossini a new era dawned. He wrote not only the framework of his music, leaving the soloist to ornament at pleasure, but the whole aria, note for note, and insisted that it should be sung as written.
Then he had faith in himself and his music. He knew he was ahead of the public, and he did not drop back to keep pace with them. When, at the first appearance of
