OPERATIC NOTES.

[Illustration: Fancy Sketch for a Brazen Statue of a Composer notable
for his "Horns and Brass."]

_Tuesday._--_Première_ of _Elaine_. BEMBERG Composer, LÉON-JEHIN
Conductor, and Sir DRURIOLANUS Producer. Full House, determined to
give New Opera a fair hearing, and sit it out. Don't get a new Opera
every day. Congratulations to BEMBERG in a general way. "In a first
Opera" (if this be his first), to quote the Composer of the recent
De-La-ra-Boom Buddha, who was complacently listening to the other
Composer's new Opera, "originality breeds contempt." So a little
bit here, and a little bit there, here a bit, and there a bit, and
everywhere a bit, gets rid of all superfluity in the Composer's
brain, and saves the listening critic much trouble. Then his next
Opera--Ah!--_that_ ought to be all genuinely new and original
Sparkling BEMBERG Cabinet. "_Elaine_," observed a lady critic,
"is graceful and airy"--which, in the lady's presence, the present
listener was not prepared to deny.

Contented must have been Composer BEMBERG with such a cast as was made
and provided for him by Sir DRURIOLANUS. MELBA, as the "Lily Maid of
Astolat," charming, with a charming song, "_L'Amour est pur_." The
audience was in an encoring humour, but, thank goodness, only a few
encores were taken, and the others left, otherwise none of us would
have been home till sunrise. In the swan-like dying scene the Composer
wrings our heart-strings with his harp-strings, reminding everyone
forcibly that, as _Mr. Guppy_ observed, "There _are_ chords!"
Wagnerian, sometimes, is our BEMBERG, with his horns and brass. Fine