[290] His passion of collecting increased with age and fortune. A letter of 1750 reveals him buying some beautiful pictures, including a fine Rembrandt. It was the year before he was smitten with blindness. [291] From the "_Hauts tilleuls_" of _Almira_ up to the Night Chorus in _Solomon_. [292] A study of the MS. of _Jephtha_ (published in _facsimile_ by Chrysander) affords an opportunity of noticing Handel's speed of working at composition. On these very pages one reads various annotations in Handel's own handwriting. At the end of the first act, for instance, he writes: "_Geendiget_ (finished) 2 February." Again, on the same page one reads: "_Völlig_ (complete) 13th August, 1751." There were then two different workings; one the work of invention, the other a work of completion. It is easy to distinguish them here on account of the illness which changed the handwriting of Handel after February 13, 1751. Thanks to this circumstance, one sees that with the Choruses he wrote the entire subjects in all the voices at the opening; then he let first one fall, then another, in proceeding; he finished hastily with a single voice filled in or even the bass only. [293] It was so with the melody: _Dolce amor che mi consola_ in _Roderigo_, which became the air: _Ingannata una sol volta_ in _Agrippina_--and also with the air: _L'alma mia_ from _Agrippina_, which was used again for the _Resurrection_, for _Rinaldo_ and for _Joshua_. [294] The Eastern Dance in _Almira_ became the celebrated _Lascia ch'io pianga_ in _Rinaldo_; and a joyful but ordinary melody from _Pastor Fido_ was transformed to the touching phrase in the _Funeral Ode_: "Whose ear she heard." [295] One can examine here in detail the two very characteristic instrumental interludes from Stradella's _Serenata a 3 con stromenti_ which had the fortune of blossoming out into the formidable choruses of the Hailstones and the Plague of Flies in _Israel_. I have made a study of this in an article for the S.I.M. review (May and July, 1910), under the title of _Les plagiats de Handel_. [296] There is reason to believe that he was not absolutely free in the matter. In 1732, when the Princess Anne wished to have _Esther_ represented at the opera the Archbishop (Dr. Gibson) opposed it, and it was necessary to fall back to giving the work at a concert. [297] An anonymous letter published in the _London Daily Post_ in April, 1739, dealing with _Israel in Egypt_, defends Handel against the opposition of the bigots, who were then very bitter. The writer protests "that the performance at which he was present was the noblest manner of honouring God ... it is not the house which sanctifies the prayer, but the prayer which sanctifies the house." [298] Is not even _Joseph_ entitled "a sacred Drama," and _Hercules_ "a musical Drama"? [299] At the end of his second volume of the Life of Handel. [300] See the vocal distribution of some of the London Operas: