with those snug sedan-chairs: they are there, but only, like Mr. Pepper's ghosts, behind glass; the voices sound hollow and distant, the magic light is flashed upon them for a moment, presently it fades out, and they are gone.

In 1720, Handel, being at the time the organist at Cannons, was engaged by a society of noblemen, including his Grace of Chandos, to compose operas for the Royal Academy of Music at the Haymarket, and the Postboy soon afterwards announces "the most celebrated opera Radamistus, by Mr. Handell." Of this opera, "Ombra Cara," which Handel considered one of the finest airs he had ever written, may still be occasionally heard. The work was fairly successful, and was followed, in 1721, by Muzio Scævola, to which we shall return presently.

In 1721, Floridante also appeared. It was this opera which called forth the remark from Dr. Burney, "I am convinced that his slow airs are as much superior to those of his contemporaries as the others are in spirit and science." Otho, which appeared in 1723, was generally considered the flower of his dramatic works. Like Mozart's Don Juan, Weber's Freischütz, Rossini's Tell, Meyerbeer's Prophète, and Gounod's Faust, it was a work composed of one long string of gems, and each air became in its turn a favourite throughout the land. Pepusch, who could never quite forget that he had been the best organist in England before the arrival of Handel, remarked of "Affanni

M

del pensier," "That great bear was certainly inspired when he wrote that song." The celebrated Madame Cuzzoni came out in it. On the second night the tickets rose to four guineas each, and the Cuzzoni was paid £2,000 for the season.

In the same year Flavio and Giulio Cesare were produced. The first is celebrated for the "Dona Pace" (the first scenic quintet ever composed). The second is for ever associated with poor George III. It was revived in 1787 in order to attract him to the theatre to hear some of Handel's music, of which he was passionately fond. "Da Tempesta" and "Alma del gran Pompeo" are still much esteemed by connoisseurs. In 1725 Rodelinda was received with enthusiasm; the public going so far as to adopt in society the costume worn by the favourite prima donna.

Between 1726 and 1727 appeared Scipio, Siroe, and Ptolemy, of which little can now be said. The principal airs were popular at the time, and published in the favourite form of harpsichord pieces, in which some of them are still extant; and many more have been worked up by subsequent composers until their phrases have passed into modern music, and now live over again unrecognised in the works of many a contemporary composer, and, perhaps, suspected least of all by the composer himself. We remember our astonishment at discovering M. Jullien's once celebrated "Bridal Waltz" in a trio of Corelli; it is notorious that "Where the Bee Sucks," by Dr. Arne, is taken from a movement in Rinaldo; and we doubt not that a

further study of the old masters would bring to light similar cases. Thus the soil of music is ever growing rich with the dead leaves of the past, and what appears to us the new life in forest and glade is, after all, but the old life under a new form.

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But a change was at hand. In 1720 this Royal Academy of noblemen had subscribed £50,000 to get the Italian opera, and they had engaged Mr. Handel to compose. The first operas, as we have seen, made furor; the singers were the finest in the world, the audience of the very grandest description. Opera after opera rolled from Mr. Handel's facile pen. But as time went on sinister rumours got afloat. It was said the funds were not coming in. It is quite certain they were going out. In two years the committee of management had spent £15,000; the wits and critics were beginning to abuse Mr. Handel, and laugh at his supporters. The appeals for money became urgent. The libretto to Ptolemy even announces that they were "in the last extremity." Some of his warm supporters began to cool; either they could not or would not pay. Threats at last caused an open breach. Many forsook the opera-house; the rest got up a ball

to pay the expenses, and invitations were issued to

improper characters. The proceedings were declared by legal authority to be "an offence to his Majesty's virtuous subjects;" the opera itself "a nursery of lewdness, extravagance, and immorality." It ended by the whole thing being put a stop to by order of the

king; and poor Handel, who had nothing to do with the ball, and never got the money, found himself defiled without having touched the pitch. To make matters worse, an opposition house started up. The Beggars' Opera, with music by Dr. Pepusch, who stole some of it from Handel, was brought out at the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, and the fickle public, suffering under a surfeit of Julius Cæsar, Cyrus, and all the Ptolemies, went off in crowds to enjoy a little low life with the burglar Macheath and Polly. Rich was the name of the manager, and Gay that of the poet; and the people who nightly greeted the smiling manager and called loudly for the needy poet, remarked that the Beggars' Opera had made Gay rich and Rich gay.

Handel, who either could not or would not see that a change had taken place in the public taste, gathered up the remnant of his fortune, and making arrangements with Heidegger, proprietor of the Haymarket, prepared to make another serious attack on the musical world in the character of an operatic composer. He made up his various quarrels with the singers and managers, got together his scattered orchestra, and finally went off in person to Italy for reinforcements. His energy was undiminished; he was in his finest musical vein, and prepared to pour forth opera after opera upon a public whose ears and eyes seemed closed.

In 1729 Lothario was produced. Parthenope followed in 1731. Both fell flat. The wonderful voice

of Senesino carried Porus through fifteen representations in 1731, then Rinaldo was revived with "new cloathes," but the public had heard the music, and did not care for the "cloathes ;" and when Etius appeared in the following year, they grumbled at the old clothes, and did not care for the new music. A faint flicker of interest was shown in Sosarme, produced in the same year, but the audience steadily dropped off; and Orlando (1733), although the scenery was admitted to be "extraordinary fine and magnificent," died without a struggle in an empty house.

True originality has usually the same battle to fight with conventional tastes, stupidity, or ignorance. The Duke of Wellington, in the Peninsula, contending for his own measures with a distant Government; Nelson disobeying orders at Copenhagen; Jenner trying to persuade people to be vaccinated; or the Liberal politicians of our own age labouring for years to pass Liberal measures; are only instances in other spheres of action of what is constantly going on in the world of Art.

It would be interesting to inquire in such cases how far circumstances control men and their measures, and how far men and their measures were influenced by circumstances. In some cases we seem to have very nearly a balance of power. Handel's operatic career is a case in point. It would be curious to study how far the very music and instrumentation were dictated to him at times by the tyranny, necessity, or solicitation of