Nobody answered this question and Mary Jane led the table back to the legitimate opera. One of her pupils had given her a pass for _Mignon_. Of course it was very fine, she said, but it made her think of poor Georgina Burns. Mr Browne could go back farther still, to the old Italian companies that used to come to Dublin—Tietjens, Ilma de Murzka, Campanini, the great Trebelli, Giuglini, Ravelli, Aramburo. Those were the days, he said, when there was something like singing to be heard in Dublin. He told too of how the top gallery of the old Royal used to be packed night after night, of how one night an Italian tenor had sung five encores to _Let me like a Soldier fall_, introducing a high C every time, and of how the gallery boys would sometimes in their enthusiasm unyoke the horses from the carriage of some great _prima donna_ and pull her themselves through the streets to her hotel. Why did they never play the grand old operas now, he asked, _Dinorah, Lucrezia Borgia?_ Because they could not get the voices to sing them: that was why. “Oh, well,” said Mr Bartell D’Arcy, “I presume there are as good singers today as there were then.” “Where are they?” asked Mr Browne defiantly. “In London, Paris, Milan,” said Mr Bartell D’Arcy warmly. “I suppose Caruso, for example, is quite as good, if not better than any of the men you have mentioned.” “Maybe so,” said Mr Browne. “But I may tell you I doubt it strongly.” “O, I’d give anything to hear Caruso sing,” said Mary Jane. “For me,” said Aunt Kate, who had been picking a bone, “there was only one tenor. To please me, I mean. But I suppose none of you ever heard of him.” “Who was he, Miss Morkan?” asked Mr Bartell D’Arcy politely. “His name,” said Aunt Kate, “was Parkinson. I heard him when he was in his prime and I think he had then the purest tenor voice that was ever put into a man’s throat.” “Strange,” said Mr Bartell D’Arcy. “I never even heard of him.” “Yes, yes, Miss Morkan is right,” said Mr Browne. “I remember hearing of old Parkinson but he’s too far back for me.” “A beautiful pure sweet mellow English tenor,” said Aunt Kate with enthusiasm. Gabriel having finished, the huge pudding was transferred to the table. The clatter of forks and spoons began again. Gabriel’s wife served out spoonfuls of the pudding and passed the plates down the table. Midway down they were held up by Mary Jane, who replenished them with raspberry or orange jelly or with blancmange and jam. The pudding was of Aunt Julia’s making and she received praises for it from all quarters. She herself said that it was not quite brown enough. “Well, I hope, Miss Morkan,” said Mr Browne, “that I’m brown enough for you because, you know, I’m all brown.”