perhaps smiled in his sleeve at the project, but he interposed no objection, and indeed went behind the scenes to congratulate her on her success during the night of the first performance.  Alboni’s achievement was gratifying to her pride, but it need not be said that her interpretation of Fides was radically different from that of Mme. Viardot, which was a grand tragic conception, akin to those created by the genius of Pasta and Schroeder-Devrient.  The music of “Le Prophete” had never been well fitted to Viardot’s voice, and it was in this better adaptation of Alboni to the vocal score that it may be fancied her success, such as it was, found its root.  It was significant that the critics refrained from enlarging on the dramatic quality of the performance.  Mlle. Alboni continued her grasp of this varied range of lyric character during her seasons in France, Spain, and England for several years, now assuming Fides, now Amino, in “Sonnambula,” now Leonora in “Favorita,” and never failing, however the critics might murmur, in pleasing the ultimate, and, on the whole, more satisfactory bench of judges, the public.  It was no new thing to have proved that the mass of theatre-goers, however eccentric and unjustifiable the vagaries of a favorite might be, are inclined to be swayed by the cumulative force of long years of approval.  In the spring of 1851, Mlle. Alboni, among several of her well-established personations, was enabled to appear in a new opera by Auber, “Corbeille d’Oranges,” a work which attained only a brief success.  It became painfully apparent about this time that the greatest of contralto singers was losing the delicious quality of her voice, and that her method was becoming more and more conventional.  Her ornaments and fioriture never varied, and this monotony, owing to the indolence and insouciance of the singer, was never inspired by that resistless fire and geniality which made the same cadenzas, repeated night after night by such a singer as Pasta, appear fresh to the audience.

Mlle. Alboni’s visit to the United States in 1852 was the occasion of a cordial and enthusiastic welcome, which, though lacking in the fury and excitement of the “Jenny Lind” mania, was yet highly gratifying to the singer’s amour propre.  There was a universal feeling of regret that her tour was necessarily a short one.  Her final concert was given at Metropolitan Hall, New York, on May 2, 1852, the special occasion being the benefit of Signor Arditi, who had been the conductor of her performances in America.  The audience was immense, the applause vehement.

The marriage of Alboni to the Compte de Pepoli in 1853 caused a rumor that she was about to retire from the stage.  But, though she gave herself a furlough from her arduous operatic duties for nearly a year, she appeared again in Paris in 1854 in “La Donna del Lago” and other of the Rossinian operas.  Her London admirers, too, recognized in the newly married prima donna all the charm of her youth.