Actual murder by a man while apparently playing a part in a drama is older as a dramatic motif than "Pagliacci," and Leoncavallo's employment of it gave rise to an interesting controversy and a still more interesting revelation in the early days of the opera. Old theatre-goers in England and America remember the device as it was employed in Dennery's "Paillaisse," known on the English stage as "Belphegor, the Mountebank." In 1874 Paul Ferrier produced a play entitled "Tabarin," in which Coquelin appeared at the Theatre Francais. Thirteen years later Catulle Mendes brought out another play called "La Femme de Tabarin," for which Chabrier wrote the incidental music. The critics were prompt in charging Mendes with having plagiarized Ferrier, and the former defended himself on the ground that the incident which he had employed, of actual murder in a dramatic performance, was historical and had often been used. This, however, did not prevent him from bringing an accusation of theft against Leoncavallo when "Pagliacci" was announced for production in French at Brussels and of beginning legal proceedings against the composer and his publisher on that score. The controversy which followed showed very plainly that Mendes did not have a leg to stand upon either in law or equity, and he withdrew his suit and made a handsome amende in a letter to the editor of "Le Figaro." Before this was done, however, Signor Leoncavallo wrote a letter to his publisher, which not only established that the incident in question was based upon fact but directed attention to a dramatic use of the motif in a Spanish play written thirty-five years before the occurrence which was in the mind of Leoncavallo. The letter was as follows:-- Lugano, Sept. 3, 1894. Dear Signor Sonzogno. I have read Catulle Mendes's two letters. M. Mendes goes pretty far in declaring a priori that "Pagliacci" is an imitation of his "Femme de Tabarin." I had not known this book, and only know it now through the accounts given in the daily papers. You will remember that at the time of the first performance of "Pagliacci" at Milan in 1892 several critics accused me of having taken the subject of my opera from the "Drama Nuevo" of the well known Spanish writer, Estebanez. What would M. Mendes say if he were accused of having taken the plot of "La Femme de Tabarin" from the "Drama Nuevo," which dates back to 1830 or 1840? As a fact, a husband, a comedian, kills in the last scene the lover of his wife before her eyes while he only appears to play his part in the piece.