When the arrival of Patti became known in New York great excitement prevailed. The day afterwards the steamship Lessing arrived from Hamburg with an entire German Company for the Metropolitan Opera-house. I now felt quite at my ease, having no anxiety whatever as to the result of their season.
I opened brilliantly on the Monday following the arrival of Patti, with her inimitable performance of "Rosina" in Il Barbiere.
On Sunday I was invited by Henry Ward Beecher to visit Plymouth Church, at Brooklyn. On this occasion a number of railway guards and pointsmen had been asked; and never shall I forget the sermon he preached to them. It was magnificent, and in every way impressive. At the conclusion of the service I was invited to Mr. Beecher's house to luncheon, where there were some twenty of his relations and intimate friends present.
As the water came round he may possibly have observed a distressed look on my countenance. But certain it is that within a few minutes afterwards he said he thought he had a bottle of cider which I might prefer to the beverage then before us; and, although it was labelled cider, I discovered that the bottle contained something resembling excellent old "Pommery sec."
Two nights afterwards I invited him to my box at the opera, scarcely hoping that he would come; but shortly after the overture had commenced I was surprised to find him sitting at my side. He remained there all that evening, the eye of every one in the audience being fixed upon him.
Shortly afterwards my new prima donna, Mdlle. Emma Nevada, arrived, and in due course made her first appearance, in La Sonnambula, when a remarkable scene occurred. At the close of the performance the audience, instead of rushing to the doors as usual, remained, rose to their feet, and called the prima donna three times before the curtain.
This was followed by a production of Gounod's Mirella, in which Emma Nevada again appeared with brilliant success; and afterwards by La Gazza Ladra, with Patti and Scalchi in the leading rôles.
On the 24th November, it being the 25th anniversary of Patti's first appearance at the New York Academy of Music, great preparations were made for the purpose of celebrating her silver wedding with the New York operatic stage.
The opera selected for the occasion was Lucia di Lammermoor, being the same work in which she had appeared exactly 25 years previously on the Academy boards. Patti's first "Edgardo," Signor Brignoli, was to have appeared with her. But his sudden death necessitated an alteration of the original programme, and it was decided to give an opera which the Diva had never sung in America, namely, Martha.
The following account of Patti's début, which appeared in the New York Herald, of November 25th, 1859, will be read with interest:—