| Ernani, | Rigoletto, | Il Trovatore, |
| La Traviata, | Sicilian Vespers, | Othello, |
| Aida, | Masked Ball, | Falstaff. |
Do you know that of one of Verdi's operas the scene is laid in our country? The MASKED BALL was first entitled Gustavo III. But the authorities would not allow reference to certain political matters in it. Therefore the libretto (or story) of the opera was changed, and the scene laid in Boston, Massachusetts. One of the characters was the Governor of Boston, a humorous matter to us, for there never was any such official.
Another famous opera by Verdi, the scene of which is laid in a foreign country, is Aida. It was written for the Khedive of Egypt, and first performed in Cairo in 1871, when the composer was fifty-eight years old.
A SCENE FROM AÏDA
After Verdi had composed Aida he wrote no more operas for sixteen years. Then to the great surprise of all the world he wrote two others, the finest of them all—Othello and Falstaff.
Meanwhile he was a farmer. He planted, harvested, helped his tenants, urged them to cultivate the land carefully. He bought all kinds of American farming machinery to show the Italians how to cultivate the ground to best advantage.
The great man, who was once a simple little boy, died in 1901, on January 27, which day is the anniversary of Mozart's birth.
All his life long Verdi had succeeded, doing a little more and a little better each year, so that, at the end of his life, he was able to do a truly wonderful thing: namely, to build a home where musicians—who had not succeeded in life—could find a comfortable abiding place in their old age.
