LA GABRIELLI.
Of the person and performance of Gabrielli, the History of Music contains a full and luminous description. She was the most universally renowned singer of her time; for Agujari died before her high and unexampled talents had expanded their truly wonderful supremacy.
Yet here, also, no private detail can be written of the private performance, or manners, of La Gabrielli, as she never visited at the house of Dr. Burney; though she most courteously invited him to her own; in which she received him with flattering distinction. And, as she had the judgment to set aside, upon his visits, the airs, caprices, coquetries, and gay insolences, of which the boundless report had preceded her arrival in England, he found her a high-bred, accomplished, and engaging woman of the world; or rather, he said, woman of fashion; for there was a winning ease, nay, captivation, in her look and air, that could scarcely, in any circle, be surpassed. Her great celebrity, however, for beauty and eccentricity, as well as for professional excellence, had raised such inordinate expectations before she came out, that the following juvenile letters upon the appearance of so extraordinary a musical personage, will be curious,—or, at least, diverting, to lovers of musical anecdote.