of his "Moïse Sauvé," it was forbidden to extract from that
epic materials for a play or poem. The descendants of
Beaumarchais fought for the same concession, and not very
long ago it was decided that the translators and arrangers
of "Le Nozze di Figaro" for the Théâtre Lyrique must share
their receipts with the living representatives of the author
of "Le Mariage de Figaro."

"Lucrezia Borgia," which, though based on one of the most dramatic of
stories and full of beautiful music, is not dramatically treated by the
composer, seems to mark the distance about half way between the styles
of Rossini and Verdi. In it there is but little recitative, and in the
treatment of the chorus we find the method which Verdi afterward came to
use exclusively. When Donizetti revisited Paris in 1840 he produced in
rapid succession "I Martiri," "La Fille du Regiment," and "La Favorita."
In the second of these works Jenny Lind, Sontag, and Alboni won bright
triumphs at a subsequent period.


II.

"La Favorita," the story of which was drawn from "L'Ange de Nigida,"
and founded in the first instance on a French play, "Le Comte de
Commingues," was put on the stage at the Académie with a magnificent
cast and scenery, and achieved a success immediately great, for as
a dramatic opera it stands far in the van of all the composer's
productions. The whole of the grand fourth act, with the exception of
one cavatina, was composed in three hours. Donizetti had been dining at
the house of a friend, who was engaged in the evening to go to a ball.
On leaving the house, his host, with profuse apologies, begged