"I thought after hearing my opera, that the Venetians would think me mad," said Rossini. "Not at all; I found they were much madder than I was." _Tancredi_ was followed by _Aureliano_, produced at Milan in 1814, and, as has already been mentioned, without success. The introduction, however, containing the chorus from which Almaviva's _cavatina_ was adapted, is said to have been one of Rossini's finest pieces. _Otello_, the second of Rossini's important serious operas, was produced in 1816 at Naples (Del Fondo Theatre). The principal female part, as in the now-forgotten _Elizabetta_, and as in a great number of subsequent works, was written for Mademoiselle Colbran. The other parts were sustained by Benedetti, Nozzari, and the celebrated Davide. * * * * * In _Otello_, Rossini continued the reforms which he had commenced in _Tancredi_. He made each dramatic scene one continued piece of music, used recitative but sparingly, and when he employed it, accompanied it for the first time in Italy, with the full band. The piano was now banished from the orchestra, forty-two years after it had been banished by Gluck from the orchestras of France. Davide, in the part of Otello," created the greatest enthusiasm. The following account of his performance is given by a French critic, M. Edouard Bertin, in a letter from Venice, dated 1823:-- [Sidenote: OTELLO.] "Davide excites among the _dilettanti_ of this town an enthusiasm and delight which could scarcely be conceived without having been witnessed. He is a singer of the new school, full of mannerism, affectation, and display, abusing, like Martin, his magnificent voice with its prodigious compass (three octaves comprised between four B flats). He crushes the principal motive of an air beneath the luxuriance of his ornamentation, and which has no other merit than that of difficulty conquered. But he is also a singer full of warmth, _verve_, expression, energy, and musical sentiment; alone he can fill up and give life to a scene; it is impossible for another singer to carry away an audience as he does, and when he will only be simple, he is admirable; he is the Rossini of song. He is a great singer; the greatest I ever heard. Doubtless, the manner in which Garcia plays and sings the part of "Otello" is preferable, taking it altogether, to that of Davide. It is purer, more severe, more constantly dramatic; but with all his faults Davide produces more effect, a great deal more effect. There is something in him, I cannot say what, which, even when he is ridiculous, commands, enhances attention. He never leaves you cold; and when he does not move you, he astonishes you; in a word, before hearing him, I did not know what the power of singing really was. The enthusiasm he excites is without limits. In fact, his faults are not faults for Italians, who in their _opera seria_ do not employ what the French call the tragic style, and