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herself, and was to see no one, not even Maurice himself, during the whole dayshe herself desired this-and was to be taken to the house in the evening by her aunt. Maurice, Lawson, Grace, and an English lady of their acquaintance, were to occupy a box together, the two former arranging to meet the two ladies at the theatre itself.

CHAPTER XI.

LAWSON made a grimace and shrugged his shoulders. Maurice frowned, folded his arms, and leaned resolutely forward. He thought of the story of the opera he was going to hear, and felt as though Fate were amusing itself at his expense, even if he had nothing really to fear.

There were at least two persons in DresThe overture was soon over, and the curden who slept badly that night. The sleep-tain rose upon the not very magnificent lessness of Antonia was caused by natural scenery which represented the sacred grove. and healthy excitement, but that of Maurice Then came the chorus of Druids, which from a deeper cause. To-morrow night must, in all probability, separate him from Antonia for ever.

Was it even now too late to break with Grace? Was it even now too late to save her from the fate of marrying one who loved her not himself from treachery to nature, to the woman to whom he owed everything, whom he loved? Was it even now too late to confer happiness upon at least two persons out of three- to save three from misery? With these questions, in one form or another, his brain was racked all night, and ever with the same answer, It is too late!

But morning came at last. Grace went to spend the day with Mrs. Ford. Antonia shut herself up in her room, and would not see or speak to any one, and even took her meals in solitude. Signor Salvi smoked up and down the terrace nearly all day. The Signora ate, drank, slept, and smiled. The Professor taught even his most interesting pupils in rather an absent manner, and took much snuff. Mademoiselle Waldmann held a kind of levee all day at the Hôtel de Pologne. Maurice went to his studio, and Lawson accompanied him, but no work was done there. After dinner they smoked a cigar and went to the theatre.

On entering, the house was full-their own box alone was empty. Neither Mrs. Ford nor Grace were there, though it was late. But the following printed notice was lying on the ledge:

every one who ever heard a barrel organ knows. It was well done, and the voice of Herr Bauer told well; but the audience was cold—the inevitable result of a change of programme — and they missed their favourite, the Waldmann, who could not contrive to lose her popularity in spite of the contemptuous and capricious behaviour towards her admirers for which she was notorious. The familiar notes, therefore, called forth but little applause. The long scena between the two tenors which followed the chorus, in which the feeble-minded pro-consul tells his friend the story of his love for Adalgisa and his faithlessness to Norma, was worse received still, for Herr Schwarz was deservedly no favourite. When the scena ended, the irritation of the house was so obviously on the increase, that Maurice threw himself back in a state of despair, and Lawson was already making up his mind that he should have to send to Vienna the fatal word, "Fiasco." Then the march sounded, and the chief priest, the Druids, and the warriors entered upon the stage in procession, and heralded in chorus the approach of Norma herself.

Antonia Salvi came forward at last, slowly, calmly, serenely. Her loose robes suited well the dignity of her carriage, and she looked every inch the inspired priestess. But she was not the traditional Norma, nevertheless there was something wild and incomplete about her. All the musical part of Dresden had been anxious to hear her

In consequence of the sudden, though for months, and had made up its mind to not serious, indisposition of Mademoiselle welcome her enthusiastically; but the temWaldmann, Signor Bellini's opera of Nor-per of the house had become so bitterly cold, ma' will be performed this evening instead of that which was announced.

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that, though there was a slight attempt to applaud her entrance -an attempt which she barely acknowledged by the slightest of bows she proceeded to the altar in silence.

For some instants she stood motionless, with her eyes fixed on the ground. Then raising them, and stretching aloft the golden sickle, she began to sing.

That magnificent voice! The coldness

thawed in a moment before its divine secret - the secret of finding the straight road, in spite of every barrier of circumstance, to the very inmost heart of every man at once. Intellect has it not-culture cannot produce it: it is the golden harp, which is bestowed by the hand of nature alone. In less than a minute every one in the house was in sympathy with the singer, and not only with her, but with each other also. From the moment that she opened her lips there was no doubt of her success. Maurice leaned back with a sigh of relief, Lawson leaned forward with an expression of interest.

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It was, perhaps, not altogether unfortunate that Antonia' had to make her first appearance in an opera like Norma.' If the music had belonged to a higher class, the critical German audience would very likely have found her interpretation different from some special standard, and so, after the first enthusiasm, have taken to faultfinding, out of pure revenge for having been carried away; but as it was, there was nothing to distract attention from the singer herself, so that, without having to give up a single prejudice, every one present was able, with a good critical conscience, to yield himself to her sway.

ever.
The latter was more nervous now than

follow the example of the Waldmann, and
She felt more than half inclined to
cry off at the last moment, reckless of con-
sequences. But the first words of Antonia's
recitative

"T'inoltra, O giovinetta!

T'inoltra

--

" e perche tremi?" tremble?" were uttered intentionally in a Approach, O maiden; why dost thou tone so kind and full of encouragement, that she looked up, and felt drawn to Ancination of triumphant Art was now pervadtonia as she had never felt before. The fasing every spot where Antonia stood. Grace herself felt it, and, forgetting the audience, became conscious only that she was about to sing with Antonia. With such support how could she fear? Then she even let her eyes leave the stage, and saw her friends. So she took courage, and did her bestand her best, was very fair indeed.

act, and then-for there was scope for a Then came the trio, which ends the first display of passion in it-Antonia let herself out, and sang and acted with her whole power. Dresden had never heard anything "Casta Diva". like it before, and the most gentle of comor rather Antonia's exe-posers would have been astonished to find cution, which was faultlessrapturously, and she retired from the stage contempt were almost terrible. When she was applauded so much in his own music. Her rage, her laden with bouquets. It was already a suc- concluded, all was silent for an instantcess of enthusiasm. such as had not been heard in the house and then burst forth a storm of applause within living memory. called over and over again to be applauded. It was no longer only a great success Antonia was rewas a triumph.

-

- it

Then Grace Owen entered. But she was painfully nervous; and the more so as she had been so unexpectedly called upon to take the part, at the last moment, after she had been led to consider herself safe, so that the few bars which she had to sing by herself were scarcely audible. Had she ap- curtain fell, to the room where the perMaurice and Lawson hastened, when the peared before Antonia's entrance, she would formers were waiting between the acts. probably have been greeted with something Antonia and Grace were worse than silence; but the prima donna Maurice hastily pressed the hand of the had put the house into a good humour, and former, reflecting in his own face all the both there. the youth and beauty of Grace gained her joy, the triumph, the love, that shone in even a little applause. This encouraged hers. He forgot, for the time, the existher; and, in her duet with the unpopular ence of the whole world save that of Antotenor, she acquitted herself better, though nia and of himself. On recollecting himself her heart did not cease to tremble. Mau- he went to the side of Grace, leaving Lawrice tried to catch her eye, but she was in son talking to Antonia. that state known to all who appear before spoke in Italian. an audience for the first time, whether as The two latter actors or orators ever, and heard no sound but that of her your ten thousand. It will be my greatest she saw nothing what- Lawson. "What a triumph, Mademoiselle!" said "You have gained the first of own voice-the most fearful sound for a boast all my life that I assisted at the first nervous person to hear. appearance of the divine Antonia Salvi."

The comparative failure of the duet made Antonia's return to the stage the more welcome. This time her appearance was warmly cheered, and now duet between herself and Grace. came the first

Italy," she said, laughing.
"Ah, it is clear that you have lived in
way we Italians talk, but we do not always
"That is the
mean what we say."

"You will soon find, I hope, that

my

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"You are doing yourself the grossest injustice, Mademoiselle- -you are eclipsed by none. But you are right in one thing she is very beautiful."

"I believe she is very amiable also; but I have not seen much of her."

"She is very amiable."

"She and Signor Maurice are very old acquaintances, it seems."

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They did not know each other very long before their engagement, but that has been rather a long one-more than three years. However, I suppose we shall soon be asked to the wedding now."

Antonia's face was one that by its changes of expression betrayed the slightest and most transient emotion; but now, the smile did not even leave her lips-she did not show by the quivering of a nerve that the life of her life was destroyed.

"I suppose so," she answered, calmly. She looked at Grace and Maurice, who were speaking together, and read in the honest grey eyes of the former full confirmation of Lawson's words.

act, on the scene where Norma is about to murder her sleeping children. There was a settled, hard energy about her delivery of the passage, which was almost unpleasant-her voice seemed, in its over-intensity, to have lost half its music, and there was apparent effort. In reality she sang mechanically, and as if asleep. Still, however, the peculiarity of her style was not inappropriate to the situation.

When, however, Grace entered, no longer nervous, but filled with courage drawn from the approving words of Maurice, to join her in the great duet, the hard dream passed away. The strange similarity of her own position to that of the deserted priestess came with a cold, piercing rush of reality into her soul. All her vehement nature, like a dying flame, flared up in an unnatural glow. There, not on the stage, but in the box before her, was the faithless foreigner who had amused himself with her and deceived her her, who now recognised herself and her genius, who was conscious at last of her own greatness, conscious, although her consciousness meant not pride, but despair - and there, smiling beside her, she stood who had really held his heart a true Adalgisa, pretty and tame and weak-fit consort for such a lover. She scorned them both. Now the world should know her, and Maurice should know her too, even as she knew herself. In a whirl of emotions, strained to their utmost and uniting in a single turning-point in her bursting heart-in a storm of love, hate, jealousy, and despair

-

she hurried through the few bars of recitative, and then, with an almost superhuman effort, she threw all that storm, all herself, into the air. Rapidly, energetically, recklessly, almost desperately, she poured forth the notes with the whole power of her voice in a style of which the composer had certainly never dreamed. Grace found it impossible to follow her. It was no longer à duet. Still, the effect was grand in the extreme. Her voice rang out clearly almost like a grand burst of desperate triumph it was no longer a song of tender, womanly sentiment, it had no reference to the words of the librettist, none to the idea of the composer-it was the real agony of living human nature rebelling against the feeble fetters of conventional art a war of passion and destiny. It was all hopelessly, utterly wrong, but there was no help for it-the applause must come. And again it did come, in a storm of cheering and a torrent of flowers. In The curtain rose again for the second the midst of it all stood Antonia, deaf and

"Their story was quite romantic," continued Lawson. He then told her the history of their engagement.

Maurice came up just as he finished. "Come, Frank," he said, "we must get back to our box unless we want to miss Mademoiselle Salvi's next scene. Antonia," he whispered to her, "I shall see you again this evening."

She bent her head, but did not answer, and he and Lawson went back to their places in the theatre.

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blind. A sharp spasm came over her face she placed her hand to her left side, and fell on the stage.

Grace sprang to her side with a scream, and she was at once carried to the dressing-room. Maurice and Lawson followed, and found her lying on a sofa surrounded by many persons-the Director of the theatre, the Professor, her uncle and aunt -all, in short, who could find room. A surgeon, who had been among the audience, was passing his hand over her heart. Her wreath of oak leaves had fallen off, and her long black hair floated down to the ground. Her hands were tightly clenched,

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Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II. By the Author of "The Heir of Redclyffe." (Macmillan & Co.)

DIVERS. Of the various works in which such | minster and the works proceeding at Blackmen are employed it would be impossible to fur-friars the assistance of divers has been found nish anything like a complete list. The recovery absolutely necessary; and equally so in the of wrecks forms, or did form, their principal oc- cognate works upon piers, docks, dock-gates, cupation, while by the application of a principle harbours, &c." Cornhill Magazine. of filling the holds of ships with india-rubber airbags, afterwards inflated upon calculations founded on those made by Sinclair, the mathematician of Edinburgh, in 1688, and contained in his Proposal for Buoying up a Ship of any Burden from the Bottom of the Sea,' they are able actually to raise vessels bodily from the deep. The operations upon the Royal George, whose wreck had for more than half a century THE title "Cameos from English History" is impeded the navigation of Portsmouth Harbour, a little fantastic; but it is explained as meaning and from which the guns, &c., were recovered, a series of detached narratives, like gems in full the vessel being blown up, and the pieces re-relief, which, by isolating the great events of our moved by the divers employed for some years, are among the chief victories of the diving art in its modern development. The immense amount of money recovered from the Royal Charter by their means has also evidenced their usefulness. Even after all hope of further salvage had been abandoned, a diver, upon his own venture, recovered in a short time some £300 or £400 from the Royal Charter wreck. Of the success of divers in repairing the bottoms of ships we had an instance at the siege of Sebastopol, when the Agamemnon was struck below the water-line, and would have had to be docked at Malta but that a diver went down and repaired the injury in such a manner that the ship again went into action. The blasting and removing of rocks and other impedimenta form also an important part of diving work. The rocks are blasted by means of charges of gunpowder placed upon them in canisters, which are connected with a voltaic battery worked from the barge or base of operations. The proceedings of Mr. Hicks at Menai Straits, before referred to, are examples of what may be done in this manner; while the deep entrances to the Birkenhead North Docks and the works in Portpatrick Harbour form a striking testimony to the great importance and success of such operations. In the construction of bridges - notably those of West

history from the less important connecting links, seeks to give greater prominence and force to the main results. The book is intended for young people, yet for those who have got beyond the extremely elementary histories that are written for children. "The endeavour," according to the author, "has not been to chronicle facts, but to put together a series of pictures of persons and events, so as to arrest the attention, and give some individuality and distinctness to the recollection, by gathering together details at the most memorable moments." How historical pictures are to be prepared without chronicling facts we must confess we do not understand, unless on the supposition that history has nothing to do with facts. Accordingly we find that the little book before us does "chronicle facts," and in a very vivid and picturesque manner. It contains a large amount of information in a concentrated form, and so skilfully and well is the adventurous, personal, and dramatic element brought out that any boy of intelligence will find these narratives as fascinating as the most exciting fiction ever penned. The work seems to have been carefully and conscientiously done, and we shall be glad to see the second volume, comprising the wars in France and those of the Roses, which the author promises us.

London Deview.

From The London Review.
A NATURALIST'S RAMBLES.*

our stage, only more coarse, clownish, and ex

The

aggerated. They were men and women in this
case, though more commonly the women's parts
men were dressed in the highly embroidered
are performed by men, in female costume.
robes and painted grotesque masks which are
familiar to every one who has turned over rice-
paper picture-books; and the women spoke in a
high falsetto voice, quite different from the fe-
male treble. They came in by the left door in
small parties, flourished about, and shouted,
passing slowly in front of the stage, and then
disappeared on the right side, and were suc-

the road. At the back of the stage, in the centre, was placed a table, behind which were the THE present volume hits the happy me- various sizes, which gave out a more or less musicians, some hammering upon tom-toms of dium between the professedly popular book of science—which is ordinarily a mere mass and producing sounds which might readily be resonant sound, others playing upon the fifes, of slovenly generalities and the too eso- mistaken for bag-pipes. Besides this there were teric scientific treatise. Being the record of three embroidered mats hanging down behind a long excursion into rarely visited parts, the stage, and these together constituted the by a man of experience, knowledge, and scenery, properties, orchestra, and all equip minute observation, it will be read with ments which their Thespian simplicity required. pleasure both by those who are, and those At the back of the stage a door on either who are not, specially acquainted with the side served as an entrance and exit for the various scenes in which Dr. Collingwood is actors, who always came in at the left hand proficient. Of China and the Chinese shores and retired at the right. The play appeared we English know very little. We have to be a burlesque, and the actors used the plentiful descriptions of the various settle-burlesque movements of the low comedians on ments established by our countrymen along the coast; and now and then we have some pictorial narrative of the inland progress of an embassy. It is only at considerable intervals that we meet with a book containing the observations, noted down with scientific accuracy, of a competent man.. Such a work is the one before us; and the chief fault we have to find with it is that Dr. Collingwood does not fully take advantage of the opportunities he had. His descriptions, whether of scenery or of living natural objects, want graphic power and amplifica-ceeded by another party, the same party again tion; while there are innumerable passages of unnecessary detail which might with propriety have been omitted. He does not consider it his sole business to deal with the scientific experiences of his journey. He gives us the impressions likely to be produced upon an ordinary traveller, and he describes whatever is likely to interest the ordinary reader. Why, therefore, should we have the Manilla tobacco-manufactories, for instance, dismissed with a few lines, which convey to us no picture either of the place or people? Here, however, is a fuller account of a Chinese theatre and its performances, about which we hear so much:

seemed to be no termination to the story, nor re-appearing after a short interval. There any limits to the endurance of the actors or crowd in front of the stage, behaving, however, spectators; for the latter kept up a constant with great decorum and even gravity, and showing little inclination to laugh at the antics of the players; and I could only judge of the actors' endurance, from the fact that the accompanying noise of tom-toms and fifes ceased not day or night all the time we were within hearing.'

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To the Englishman who is fond of his gun

or perhaps we should say to the Cockney who revels in the slaughter of sea-gulls and of pigeons at a shilling apiece-there must be something very fascinating in the description of some of these little-visited islands "There were two of these sing-songs, or open- in the China sea, where large birds may be air Chinese theatres, which were centres of gen-knocked down with a stick. Pratas, for eral attraction, placed, however, almost side by instance, is a little island about a mile and side, so that the proceedings of one thrust themselves upon the spectators of the other, and a half long, lying in mid-ocean between somewhat marred the effect of both. They were Hainan and Formosa. Here Dr. Collinggood types of Chinese theatricals, and con- wood landed; and very interesting are his sisted of spacious stages, open in front, and descriptions of the fauna of the place: erected above the level of the heads of the spectators, with attap coverings for the benefit of the performers, but nothing of the kind for the lookers-on, who either stood sweltering in the sun, or, if they preferred it, took shelter under the verandahs of the shops on the other side of

"The dominant and characteristic bird of

Pratas Island," he says, "is the Gannet (Sula alba). These birds measure 4 ft. 10 in. from tip to tip of wing, and 2 ft. 9 in. total length from beak to tail, which is wedge-shaped. The head, neck, back, and tail are fuscous, breast and • Rambles of a Naturalist on the Shores and Wa- belly white, legs and feet yellow, and completely ters of the China Sea. By Cuthbert Collingwood, MA., M.B., Cxon, F.L.S., &c. webbed. London: John A walk through the interior of Murray. the island among the trees and bushes revealed

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