Performers of every kind, singers of the highest excellence, have come among us; the powers and performances of Farinelli, Caffarelli, Pachierotti, Gabrielli, Mara, and others, are handed down by tradition, while all remember the great artists of still later times. These have been our preceptors in the art of song, and to them, and them alone, are we indebted for our knowledge of the singer's, powers; and but for their guidance and instruction, our native home-taught professors would have been centuries instead of years behind. It may, however, be some consolation to reflect, that we have not been alone in our pupilage; for Italy, herself the pupil of ancient Greece, has in her turn become the preceptress of the modern world in music, as well as the other branches of the fine arts, in all of which her supremacy has been universally acknowledged. Besides the native musicians whose names we have enumerated, many _ephemeræ_ of the genus have fluttered their short hour, and been forgotten. On turning over the popular music of the early years of the present century, or the music which may, perhaps, have formed the delight and amusement of the last generation, the musician will marvel that such productions should have been ever tolerated. Native skill has undoubtedly advanced since this period; and however worthless much of our present music may be considered, it is nevertheless superior to most of the like productions of our immediate predecessors. We have some living composers whose works are not without some merit; but they can scarcely be placed even in the second class. Their compositions, when compared with the works of the great continental masters, are tame, spiritless, and insipid; we find in them no flashes of real genius, no harmonies that thrill the nerves, no melodies that ravish the sense, as they steal upon the ear. Effort is discernible throughout this music, the best of which is formed confessedly upon Italian models; and nowhere is the universal law, of the inferiority of all imitation, more apparent.