Page:The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14.djvu/131

1864.] the Grand Opéra. Meyerbeer himself had to bear much of the expense of preparing the stage-appointments, though not to such an extent as on the production of his "Romilda" in Italy, when he bought the libretto, gave the music gratis, paid the singers, and provided the costumes.

Dr. Véron, in his Memoirs, gives an amusing account of the accidents which attended the first production of "Robert." In the third act, a chandelier fell, and the prima donna Dorus had a narrow escape from being hit by the falling glass; after the chorus of demons, a cloud, rising from the cave to hide the stage, reached a certain elevation, and then, giving way, tumbled on the boards, nearly striking Taglioni the dancer, who, as Elena, was extended on her tomb, ready for the next scene; and in the last act, Nourrit, the Robert of the evening, in the excitement of the moment, leaped down the trap-door by which Levasseur (the Bertram) had just disappeared. This last event received different interpretations. On the stage there was alarm and weeping, because it was then thought Nourrit in his leap had been killed or maimed; by the audience it was supposed that the author intended Robert should share with Bertram the infernal regions; while under the stage Levasseur greeted the tenor with mingled surprise and disgust:—"Que diable faites vous ici? Est ce qu'on a changé le dénouement?" Luckily, Nourrit was unhurt, the curtain was raised again, the singers made their conventional acknowledgments, and the names of the authors were announced amid the wildest enthusiasm.

After that night Meyerbeer had to pay no more money to get his operas on the stage. The tables were so completely turned that he thenceforth could command almost any price he chose to ask. To follow his career more minutely, after this period of his emergence into the bright light of fame, would be but to recount a story with which almost every one is familiar.

The "Huguenots" was the next opera, and it was produced only after infinite delays; indeed, just before the rehearsal, Madame Meyerbeer fell ill, and her husband decided to convey her to Italy. He took the music from the orchestra desks, forfeited a fine of thirty thousand francs, and a few hours later he and his "Huguenots" were on the way to Nice. When finally produced at Paris, this opera was as well received as the "Robert." It appears, that, after the first general rehearsal, Nourrit, the tenor, found fault with the sublime music of the fourth act. Meyerbeer returned home in a very unpleasant frame of mind, and told his troubles to the friend with whom he lodged. "If I only had," said he, "a few stanzas to arrange as an andante and duo, all would be right. But I cannot ask Scribe to add more verses." The friend immediately called a literary acquaintance, Émile Deschamps, who was playing cards in a neighboring café, explained to him the situation, and in a few minutes the verses were written. It was about midnight, and the composer, seating himself at the piano with the words before him, in a fever of inspiration threw out the splendid duo between Raoul and Valentine which closes the act, and which always equally enchants performers and audience; and when this music was performed at the next rehearsal, the orchestra, players, and vocalists carried the composer in triumph on the stage to receive their spontaneous plaudits and congratulations, while Nourrit embraced him with tears of delight.

Eight years later came another triumph of elaborate Art in "Le Prophète," a work which is generally underrated by the leading French critics, though it contains many of the very noblest inspirations of the genius of Meyerbeer. To this opera followed "L'Ètoile du Nord," and "Le Pardon de Ploermel," while to these will soon follow "L'Africaine," so long promised, and in behalf of which the composer was visiting Paris at the time of his death. The score of the opera has been completed since 1860.