Opera, as we know it to-day, is a creation subsequent to the Reformation. Like oratorio, the country of its birth was Italy, and similarly, its origin was connected with the miracle plays of the ancient Church. On its introduction to England, Purcell, with his restless genius, was quick to perceive the possibilities it opened out to the imaginative musician, and it was not long before he was testing his powers in the new field of labour. Unhappily, however, his life was too short to permit him to make any effective appeal on its behalf to the English people, and it soon became looked upon by them, simply, as a diversion of a foreign court or the amusement of an aristocracy, with either of whom they were in little sympathy. So far as the masses of people are concerned, nothing has happened since those days, to materially alter the situation. Opera remains a source of entertainment to the wealthy, or a luxury to the middle-classes. In early Puritan times it was regarded with particular horror, but as time passed, it became rather to be looked upon with indifference, since it so evidently made little impression on the common people. It is not difficult to suggest a cause for the hostility with which it was early regarded. Opera came, first, prominently into notice in the reign of Charles II., and as he was a great patron of all foreign inventions, he naturally bestowed his patronage, and probably ostentatiously, on this one. Thus it would be associated in the minds of the people with the hideous immorality of that wretched monarch and his court. At any rate, to them it was a foreign institution, and, to all intents and purposes, it has so remained to this day. There is little to wonder at in this. If the reign of Charles II. was sufficient to determine the people to get rid of the Stuart dynasty at any price, there is nothing surprising in the comparatively unimportant fact, that they became prejudiced against any new form of foreign amusement to which he and his court accorded princely support. He was alien in blood, in tastes and sympathies, and was utterly cynical in his ways of showing it. The performances were mainly given in Italian, a language understood by but few, even of the wealthy classes, but, as ever, so soon as it became the fashion and the "right thing" to support it, success was assured. It is not an excess of language to say the conditions that obtain to-day are not far removed from those of the times described. Italian opera has been for centuries the most fashionable and exclusive source of amusement in the metropolis, and far beyond the reach of the masses.