"When I saw her in Paris and Vienna, twenty years ago," whispered Max, "she was too pale and slender, and the expression of those brilliant eyes was as cold and still as glacier depths."
Not so now, I thought,—for they fairly blazed with a passionate fire, as the music welled up on her beautiful quivering lips; indeed, the melody appeared to come from them, as much as from her mouth, and I seemed to be listening with my looks as well as my hearing. She was not well, evidently,—for there was a bright red, feverish spot on either cheek, and her movements were feeble and trembling; but her voice was full of the deepest pathos.
"In her best days she never sang so well," said Max, as the room rang with applause at the termination of the duo, "Time may have taken away a little fulness from her lower notes; but the touching tenderness which envelops them, as a purple mist hanging over a forest in autumn, fully compensates for the loss of youthful vigor."
Her voice was, indeed, wonderful,—not simply clear and flexible, but dazzling and glancing, like the lightning that plays around the horizon on a hot midsummer's night; and her execution was as if the Cherub All-Knowledge and the Seraph All-Love had united their divine powers in one human form.
In the Sextette, which followed, the tenor showed to great advantage. His voice, though no longer young, was beautifully managed; it had an exquisite timbre, and on this night there was added to it a rare expression and character.
When he asked the poor trembling Lucia if the signature to the marriage contract was hers, there was a concentrated rage in his singing that was fearful; and Madame C—— almost cowered to the floor, as he held her firmly by the wrist,—for the scenes were sung in costume and with action,—and demanded,—
"A me rispondi. Son tue cifre? Rispondi!"
Her affirmative was like the silvery wail of a fallen angel. Then followed the terrible imprecation passage. He darted out the
"Maledetto sia l'istante!"
with such startling fury that the notes and words seemed to be forked, stinging, serpent tongues.