“An immense number of persons had attended the early rehearsals of _Didon_, and had come to the conclusion that it was one of Piccini’s worst productions. But Piccini consoled himself by saying: ‘Wait till my Didon comes!’ At the first rehearsal, which took place with myself in the part, every one said: ‘Ah! he has recomposed the greater part of his opera!’ And yet only four days had elapsed since the previous rehearsal. Piccini heard it and remarked: ‘No, Messieurs, I have altered nothing in the part. But until now _Didon_ was being played without Didon.’” From which letter it will be gathered that undue modesty was not one of Madame Saint-Huberty’s failings. The day of the first representation drew near. The great singer resolved to carry out a radical change in her costume. She held, as Mlle. Clairon had held, that in order to faithfully represent the personages of antiquity, it was absolutely essential to investigate their manners and their characters, and to ascertain exactly the garments which they were in the habit of wearing.[192] She regarded the theatre as a picture which cannot hope to produce illusion, save by the fortunate accord of all its elements, and she was far from meeting with this accord in tragedy, in which the verse transported the audience to Rome or Sparta, but in which one saw appear Greeks wearing brocaded robes, with turbans on their heads, and Roman ladies with long trains borne by pages.[193] This time she succeeded better than in _Ariane_, and went to the extreme of simplicity. She announced that the costume she proposed to adopt was an exact copy of a design by Moreau _le jeune_, sent from Rome, where the artist then was. The tunic was of linen, the buskins laced on the bare foot, the crown encircled by a veil, which fell down her back, the mantle of purple, the robe fastened by a girdle below the bosom. We may imagine the astonishment of the committee of the Opera, of La Ferté, and of Amelot, when Madame Saint-Huberty, with Moreau’s design in her hand, insisted that a costume exactly resembling it should be forthwith ordered for her. “She thus dared to patronise new ideas and to introduce to the Opera a costume designed by this reformer, whom they believed they had conquered.”[194] All the authorities were up in arms against these exorbitant pretensions, but the actress’s genius had rendered her all-powerful; her wishes could no longer be ignored, and they were obliged to yield. But every day the lady became more exacting in her demands, and poor La Ferté was driven to his wits’ end to satisfy them. “I have just ordered Madame Saint-Huberty’s robe,” he writes to Amelot; “but it is terrible!” And again: “I have endeavoured to satisfy Madame Saint-Huberty’s caprices in making her decide to content herself with some changes in her robe for the part of Didon!” Unhappy Intendant! The actress was now indeed taking an ample revenge for the rebuff she had sustained in _Ariane_.