Oscar Hammerstein Builds a Second Manhattan Opera House How the Manager Put His Doubters to Shame His Earlier Experiences as Impresario Cleofonte Campanini A Zealous Artistic Director and Ambitious Singers A Surprising Record but No Novelties in the First Season Melba and Calvé as Stars The Desertion of Bonci Quarrels about Puccini's "Bohéme" List of Performances CHAPTER XXIV A BRILLIANT SEASON AT THE MANHATTAN Hammerstein's Second Season Amazing Promises but More Amazing Achievements Mary Garden and Maurice Renaud Massenet's "Thaïs," Charpentier's "Louise" Giordano's "Siberia" and Debussy's "Pelléas et Mélisande" Performed for the First Time in America Revival of Offenbach's "Les Contes d'Hoffmann," "Crispino e la Comare" of the Ricci Brothers, and Giordano's "Andrea Chenier" The Tetrazzini Craze Repertory of the Season CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION OF OPERA IN NEW YORK Considering the present state of Italian opera in New York City (I am writing in the year of our Lord 1908), it seems more than a little strange that its entire history should come within the memories of persons still living. It was only two years ago that an ancient factotum at the Metropolitan Opera House died who, for a score of years before he began service at that establishment, had been in various posts at the Academy of Music. Of Mr. Arment a kindly necrologist said that he had seen the Crowd gather in front of the Park Theater in 1825, when the new form of entertainment effected an entrance in the New World. I knew the little old gentleman for a quarter of a century or more, but though he was familiar with my interest in matters historical touching the opera in New York, he never volunteered information of things further back than the consulship of Mapleson at the Academy. Moreover, I was unable to reconcile the story of his recollection of the episode of 1825 with the circumstances of his early life. Yet the tale may have been true, or the opera company that had attracted his boyish attention been one that came within the first decade after Italian opera had its introduction.