who will not appear immediately treading the boards of the stage; they must first be seen in a cloud, or they must descend the lofty stairs of a palace, in order to give more effect to their _entree_. When the air is finished, whatever may be the violent or affecting situation of his character, the singer must bow to the audience in acknowledgment of their applause. The other day, in Semiramis, after the spectre of Ninus had sung his air, the representative of this shadowy personage made in his ghostly costume a low reverence to the pit, which greatly diminished the terror of the apparition. "They are accustomed in Italy to consider the theatre merely as a large assembly room, where there is nothing to hear but the airs, and the ballet! I am justified in saying _that they listen to nothing but the ballet_; for it is only when the ballet is about to begin, that silence is called for in the pit: and what is this ballet but a masterpiece of bad taste? There is nothing amusing in the dancing save the comic part of it; the grotesque figures alone afford entertainment, being indeed a good specimen of caricature. I have seen Gengis-Kan in a ballet, all covered with ermine, and full of fine sentiments; for he ceded his crown to the child of a king whom he had conquered, and lifted him up in the air upon one foot; a new mode of establishing a monarch upon his throne. I have also seen the sacrifice of Curtius formed into a ballet of three acts, with divertisements. Curtius, in the dress of an Arcadian shepherd, danced for a considerable time with his mistress; then mounting a real horse in the middle of the stage, he plunged into the gulf of fire, made of yellow satin and gilt paper, which looked more like a fancy riding habit than an abyss. In fact, I have seen the whole of Roman history from Romulus to Caesar, compressed into a ballet."