Of Bellini's "Norma" the first burlesque produced was that which W. H. Oxberry, the comedian, contributed to the Haymarket in 1841. In this the title-part was played by Paul Bedford, with Wright as Adalgisa and Mrs. H. P. Grattan as Pollio. The piece had no literary pretensions, and it would be unfair to compare it, in that or any other respect, with "The Pretty Druidess, or the Mother, the Maid, and the Mistletoe Bough," which Mr. W. S. Gilbert wrote for the Charing Cross Theatre (now Toole's) just twenty-eight years later. This was one of the best of Mr. Gilbert's operatic travesties, the dialogue being characterised by especial point and neatness. Here, for example, is the advice given by Norma (Miss Hughes) to the ladies presiding over the stalls at a fancy fair. Hamlet's address to the players is very happily suggested:-- With pretty speech accost both old and young, And speak it trippingly upon the tongue; But if you mouth it with a hoyden laugh, With clumsy ogling and uncomely chaff-- As I have oft seen done at fancy fairs, I had as lief a huckster sold my wares. Avoid all so-called beautifying, dear. Oh! it offends me to the soul to hear The things that men among themselves will say Of some _soi-disant_ "beauty of the day," Whose face, when with cosmetics she has cloyed it, Out-Rachels Rachel!--pray you, girls, avoid it. Neither be ye too tame--but, ere you go, Provide yourselves with sprigs of mistletoe; Offer them coyly to the Roman herd-- But don't you "suit the action to the word," For in the very torrent of your passion Remember modesty is still in fashion. Oh, there be ladies whom I've seen hold stalls-- Ladies of rank, my dear--to whom befalls Neither the accent nor the gait of ladies; So clumsily made up with Bloom of Cadiz, Powder-rouge--lip-salve--that I've fancied then They were the work of Nature's journeymen. The "Gazza Ladra" of Rossini lives on the burlesque stage in the counterfeit presentment furnished by Byron's "Maid and the Magpie, or the Fatal Spoon." This was one of the writer's greatest triumphs in the field of travestie. Produced at the Strand in 1854, with Miss Oliver as Ninette, Miss Marie Wilton as Pippo, Bland as Fernando, and Clarke as Isaac (the old-clothes man), it at once hit the public taste, as it well deserved to do, for it is full of clever writing and ingenious incidents. The best scene of all, perhaps, is that in which the broken-down Fernando reveals himself to Ninette--a happy satire upon a familiar melodramatic situation:-- _Ninette_ (_entering_). A stranger here! _Fernan._ How beautiful she's grown! I say, my dear! (_she starts_) Start not--ha, ha!--do I alarm you? _Ninette_ (_uneasily_). Rather! _Fernan_ (_hesitatingly_). Why, miss, you see--the fact is--I'm your father! _Ninette._ Impossible! I never had one!