the latter an opera intended for two evenings. Meantime the operatic enterprise was on the eve of failure, owing to the irregular business methods of Keiser, who was obliged to resign his office of director and leave Hamburg. At this time also, Handel's stay in the city came to an end. He had learned what there was to learn and had moreover perceived that the German opera in Hamburg was only an imitation of the Italian, and that he must go to the fountain head in order to attain his end--a thorough mastery of the science of vocal composition, _Solo Gesang_. From the profits of his music-teaching in Hamburg he had managed to save the sum of two hundred ducats, and with this, at the end of the year 1706, or the beginning of 1707, he started for Italy. Possibly he made a short visit at Florence on his way to Rome; at any rate he was in the latter city during the opera season of 1707 and remained there certainly until July. Then he turned his face northward again, brought out in Florence his first Italian opera, "Rodrigo," in which the afterwards famous singer, Vittoria Tesi, assumed the leading role. In January, 1708, he went to Venice, which was still one of the principal homes of the opera in Italy, though Naples was already beginning to dispute its supremacy. The opera, "Agrippina," which Handel produced here, and in which Tesi, having followed the composer from Florence to Venice, again appeared in the leading role, spread his fame throughout the land and far beyond its boundaries. From Venice, where he had made the acquaintance of Antonio Lotti, he went back to Rome and found there a very cordial welcome from the "Arcadia," a society formed for the promotion of the arts and sciences, including among its members the most cultivated and talented people of the city, and presided over by the Marchese Ruspoli. Another society, in which music received still more attention than in the "Arcadia," had been founded by the Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni. All the more important works composed by Handel in Rome were performed in this circle and conducted by the great violin virtuoso, Archangelo Corelli. Two oratorios in the Italian style were produced at this time: "_La Risurrezione_" and "_Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno_." The latter work underwent two revisions during Handel's London period, first in 1737, then shortly before his death in 1757. The desire to perfect himself more and more in his art, the enthusiastic recognition which greeted him, his easy entrance into the most intellectual and brilliant society in Italy, all this combined to make these months in Rome the happiest period of his life. The best musicians became his friends. With Domenico Scarlatti, the greatest clavier master of Italy, he engaged in a grand competition, at the close of which it remained undecided which was the greater performer; but when they went to the organ, Scarlatti himself was the first to say that the prize belonged to his rival. Among