Michele Puccini died at the age of fifty-one in 1864, leaving his wife, who was then thirty-three, to provide and care for his seven children. It is interesting to record that the famous Pacini, the composer of _Saffo_, which is still regarded as perhaps the chief classic of the purely Italian school, conducted the Requiem sung at his funeral. Puccini's mother and her noble work in bringing up her large family--for she was left with no great share of this world's goods--deserves infinitely more than this bare mention of her excellence. In the present instance, it is her patient care in making her fifth child, our Giacomo Puccini, a musician, that we have to recognise. But for this patience, the way of the man who was destined to achieve his own place in the annals of fame must have been still more rough. All praise then to the patient mother whose memory is still so lovingly cherished by her distinguished son. Giacomo Puccini was only six when his father died, and as a child was remarkable for a restless nature and a keen desire to travel. He was sent to school at the seminary of S. Michele, and afterwards to San Martino. Arithmetic appears to have been his chief stumbling-block, but in everything, his curious irresponsible nature, his strong dislike to anything like guidance and restraint, made the acquisition of knowledge a hard task. Failing to acquire any sort of distinction in any branch of scholarship, an uncle of his, on his mother's side, tried to make him a singer; but the future musician, whose triumph was gained, curiously enough, in the display of the very art he despised, added, in this particular subject, one more to his many failures. The mother, in spite, doubtless, of a good deal of well-meant advice as to wasting time and money on a singularly unpromising youth, stuck to her conviction that Giacomo was destined by his gifts to carry on the long line of family musicians; and with many real sacrifices in the way of pinching and scraping, sent him to Lucca, where, at the Institute of Music, founded by Pacini, he came first under the influence of Angeloni, who, it will be remembered, was a pupil of his father. Infinite patience seems to have been the chief quality possessed by Angeloni, and by dint of great tact and sympathy, he infused an interest and something of a passion for music into his wayward young pupil. Giacomo became a fair player, and was sent off to take charge of the music at the church of Muligliano, a little village three miles from Lucca, and in a short time he had the church of S. Pietro at Somaldi added to his responsibilities. It was during the exercise of his church duties that the spirit of composition seems to have descended upon him, and certainly, if not in actually a novel way, a rather disconcerting one. During the offertory, and at other places in the Mass, it was the custom of the organist to improvise a more or less extended _pièce d'occasion_, a custom which still obtains. The