We have seen that Masaniello was represented in Paris four days before the commencement of the outbreak which ended in the elder branch of the Bourbons being driven from the throne. On the 26th of July, Guillaume Tell was to have been represented, but the city was in such a state of agitation, in consequence of the issue of the ordonnances, signed at St. Cloud the day before, that the Opera was closed. On the 27th the fighting began and lasted until the 29th, when the Opera was re-opened. On the 4th of August, La Muette de Portici was performed, and created the greatest enthusiasm,—the public finding in almost every scene some reminder, and now and then a tolerably exact representation, of what had just taken place within a stone's throw of the theatre. La Muette, apart from its music, became now the great piece of the day; and the representations at the Opera were rendered still more popular by Nourrit singing "La Parisienne" every evening. The melody of this temporary national song, like that of its predecessor (so infinitely superior to it), "La Marseillaise" (according to Castil Blaze), was borrowed from Germany. France, never wanting in national spirit, has yet no national air. It has four party songs, not one of which can be considered truly patriotic, and of which the only one that possesses any musical merit, disfigured as it has been by its French adapters, is of German origin.
Nourrit is said to have delivered "La Parisienne" with wonderful vigour and animation, and to this and to Casimir Delavigne's verses (or rather to Delavigne's name, for the verses in themselves are not very remarkable) may be attributed the reputation which the French national song, No. 4,[92] for some time enjoyed.
Guillaume Tell is Rossini's last opera. To surpass that admirable work would have been difficult for its own composer, impossible for any one else; and Rossini appears to have resolved to terminate his artistic career when it had reached its climax. In carrying out this resolution, he has displayed a strength of character, of which it is almost impossible to find another instance. Many other reasons have been given for Rossini's abstaining from composition during so many years, such as the coldness with which Guillaume Tell was received (when, as we have seen, its immediate reception by those whose opinion Rossini would chiefly have valued, was marked by the greatest enthusiasm), and the success of Meyerbeer's operas, though who would think of placing the most successful of Meyerbeer's works on a level with Guillaume Tell?
"Je reviendrai quand les juifs auront fini leur sabbat," is a speech (somewhat uncharacteristic of the speaker, as it seems to me), attributed to Rossini by M. Castil Blaze; who, however, also mentions, that when Robert le Diable was produced, every journal in Paris said that it was the finest opera, except Guillaume Tell, that had been produced at the Académie for years. It appears certain, now, that Rossini simply made up his mind to abdicate at the height of his power. There were plenty of composers who could write works inferior to Guillaume Tell, and to them he left the kingdom of opera, to be divided as they might arrange it among themselves. He was succeeded by Meyerbeer at the Académie; by Donizetti and Bellini at the Italian opera-houses of all Europe.
Rossini had already found a follower, and, so to speak, an original imitator, in Auber, whose eminently Rossinian overture to La Muette, was heard at the Académie the year before Guillaume Tell.
ROSSINI'S FOLLOWERS.
I need scarcely remind the intelligent reader, that the composer of three master-pieces in such very different styles as Il Barbiere, Semiramide, and Guillaume Tell, might have a dozen followers, whose works, while all resembling in certain points those of their predecessor and master, should yet bear no great general resemblance to one another. All the composers who came immediately after Rossini, accepted, as a matter of course, those important changes which he had introduced in the treatment of the operatic drama, and to which he had now so accustomed the public, that a return to the style of the old Italian masters, would have been not merely injudicious, but intolerable. Thus, all the post-Rossinian composers adopted Rossini's manner of accompanying recitative with the full band; his substitution of dialogued pieces, written in measured music, with a prominent connecting part assigned to the orchestra, for the interminable dialogues in simple recitative, employed by the earlier Italian composers; his mode of constructing finales; and his new distribution of characters, by which basses and baritones become as eligible for first parts as tenors, while great importance is given to the chorus, which, in certain operas, according to the nature of the plot, becomes an important dramatic agent. I may repeat, by way of memorandum, what has before been observed, that nearly all these forms originated with Mozart, though it was reserved for Rossini to introduce and establish them on the Italian stage. In short, with the exception of the very greatest masters of Germany, all the composers of the last thirty or forty years, have been to some, and often to a very great extent, influenced by Rossini. The general truth of this remark is not lessened by the fact, that Hérold and Auber, and even Donizetti and Bellini (the last, especially, in the simplicity of his melodies), afterwards found distinctive styles; and that Meyerbeer, after Il Crociato, took Weber, rather than Rossini, for his model—the composer of Robert at the same time exhibiting a strongly marked individuality, which none of his adverse critics think of denying, and which is partly, no doubt, the cause of their adverse criticism.
ROSSINI'S RETIREMENT.
What will make it appear to some persons still more astonishing, that Rossini should have retired after producing Guillaume Tell is, that he had signed an agreement with the Académie, by which he engaged to write three grand operas for it in six years. In addition to his "author's rights," he was to receive ten thousand francs annually until the expiration of the sixth year, and the completion of the third opera. No. 1 was Guillaume Tell. The librettos of Nos. 2 and 3 were Gustave and Le Duc d'Albe, both of which were returned by Rossini to M. Scribe, perhaps, with an explanation, but with none that has ever been made public. Rossini was at this time thirty-seven years of age, strong and vigorous enough to have outlived, not only his earliest, but his latest compositions, had they not been the most remarkable dramatic works of this century. If Rossini had been a composer who produced with difficulty, his retirement would have been more easy to explain; but the difficulty with him must have been to avoid producing. The story is probably known to many readers of his writing a duet one morning, in bed, letting the music paper fall, and, rather than leave his warm sheets to pick it up, writing another duet, which was quite different from the first. A hundred similar anecdotes are told of the facility with which Rossini composed. Who knows but that he wished his career to be measured against those of so many other composers whose days were cut short, at about the age he had reached when he produced Guillaume Tell? A very improbable supposition, certainly, when we consider how little mysticism there is in the character of Rossini. However this may be, he ceased to write operas at about the age when many of his immediate predecessors and followers ceased to live.[93]
And even Rossini had a narrow escape. About the critical period, when the composer of Guillaume Tell was a little more than half way between thirty and forty, the Italian Theatre of Paris was burnt to the ground. This, at first sight, appears to have nothing to do with the question; but Rossini lived in the theatre, and his apartments were near the roof. He had started for Italy two days previously; had he remained in Paris, he certainly would have shared the fate of the other inmates who perished in the flames.