The success of “La Pietra del Paragone” was an event in Rossini’s life; for just after its production the young composer, then twenty years of age, was claimed by the army. He had a narrow escape of making the Russian campaign; and though Paisiello and Cimarosa had both been to Russia with profit to themselves, it is doubtful whether Rossini, undertaking the journey under quite different circumstances, would have derived from it the same advantages. Fortunately Prince Eugene, the Viceroy of Italy—not the only one of Napoleon’s generals who, like Napoleon himself, had a cultivated taste for music—could appreciate the merit of “La Pietra del Paragone;” and, in the interest of art, exempted him from the perils of war. If Rossini had fallen due in 1811, before he had written either “La Pietra del Paragone” or “L’Inganno Felice,” the conscription would have taken him. Napoleon would have gained one soldier more, and the world would have lost the “Barber of Seville” and “William Tell.”
Of the two operettas written for the San Mosè of Venice in the year 1812 nothing need be said, except that the music of the second, “L’occasione fa il ladro,” was presented at Paris, in a new shape, and under rather remarkable circumstances, only ten years ago.
An Italian poet, M. Berettoni, determined that so much good work should not be lost, added to it some pieces from “La Pietra del Paragone” and “Aureliano in Palmira,” and arranged the whole in a new dramatic form. “Un Curioso Accidente” was the title given to this pasticcio in two acts, which was announced as a new Opera by Rossini.
Rossini, who is supposed to have been so entirely careless of his reputation, did not choose that a production made up of pieces extracted from the works of his youth, and put together without his sanction, should be announced as a new and complete work from his pen; and lost no time in addressing to M. Calzado the following letter:—
“November 11, 1859.
“Sir,—I am told that the bills of your theatre announce a new Opera by me under this title, ‘Un Curioso Accidents.’
“I do not know whether I have the right to prevent the representation of a production in two acts (more or less) made up of old pieces of mine; I have never occupied myself with questions of this kind in regard to my works (not one of which, by the way, is named ‘Un Curioso Accidente’). In any case I have not objected to and I do not object to the representation of this ‘Curioso Accidente.’ But I cannot allow the public invited to your theatre, and your subscribers, to think either that it is a new Opera by me, or that I took any part in arranging it.
“I must beg of you then to remove from your bills the word new, together with my name as author, and to substitute instead the following:—‘Opera, consisting of pieces by M. Rossini, arranged by M. Berettoni.’
“I request that this alteration may appear in the bills of to-morrow, in default of which I shall be obliged to ask from justice what I now ask from your good faith.
“Accept my sincere compliments.