Scene from New Ballet.
Conductor Jacobi Demonio charming the public to the Alhambra.
Mons. Jacobi is a wonderful man. The undefeated hero of a hundred ballets—there or thereabouts—still beats time and the record with his bâton at the Alhambra; and his music, specially composed for Fidelia, is to be reckoned among his ordinary triumphs. Fidelia is "a new Grand Romantic Ballet," in four tableaux, and its performance justifies its promise. It is "new," it is decidedly "grand," it is absorbingly "romantic," and there's no denying that it is a Ballet d'action. But, as in the oft-quoted reply when little Peterkin asked "what it was all about," so will the ballet-case-hardened spectator say, "'Why that I cannot tell,' quoth he, 'But 'twas a splendid victory!'" Somebody, possibly one Tartini, played by Signorina Cormani, is in love with Fidelia, Signorina Pollini, as naturally anyone would be; when a comic servant, Mr. George Lupino, is frightened by a Demon Fiddler with his fiddle (both being played by Paganini Redivivus) who either assists the lovers or does his best to prevent their coming together, I am not quite clear which. Up to the last it seemed doubtful whether the Demon Doctor was a good or bad spirit, or a little mixed. His appearance is decidedly against him, as he looks the very deuce. But I am inclined to think that he was a "bon diable," and was doing everything, as everybody else on the stage and in the orchestra does, for the best. After all, and before all, the show is the thing, and this will rank, as it does now, among the best of the greatest attractions hitherto provided by the Alhambra Company for an appreciative public and for
Your Representative.
OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
Madam Darmesteter's Retrospect and other Poems is turned out by Fisher Unwin in that dainty dress with which he has made attractive his Cameo Series. We used to know Madam Darmesteter as Miss Mary F. Robinson, a writer of charming verse. That in her new estate she has not lost the old touch is witnessed by several pieces in this volume, notably the first, which supplies the title. The penultimate verse of this little lyric is most musical. There are several others nearly as good. But occasionally Madam writes sad stuff. Of such is The Death of the Count of Armaniac, of which this verse is a fair sample:
"Armaniac, O Armaniac,
Why rode ye forth at noon?