I find I cannot include Chaliapine’s Basilio in my list of bad mannered stage performances, although his trumpetings into his handkerchief disturbed many of New York’s professional writers. _Il Barbiere_ is a farcical piece, and the music of Rossini hints at the Rabelaisian humours of the dirty Spanish priest. In any event, it was the finest interpretation of the rôle that I have ever seen or heard and, with the splendid ensemble (Mme. Sembrich was the Rosina, Mr. Bonci, the count, and Mr. Campanari, the Figaro), the comedy went with such joyous abandon (the first act finale to the accompaniment of roars of laughter from the stalls) that I am inclined to believe the performance could not be bettered in this generation. The late Algernon St. John Brenon used to relate a history about Emma Eames and a recalcitrant tenor. The opera was _Lohengrin_, I believe, and the question at issue was the position of a certain couch. Mme. Eames wished it placed here; the tenor there. As always happens in arguments concerning a Wagnerian music-drama, at some point the Bayreuth tradition was invoked, although I have forgotten whether that tradition favoured the soprano or her opponent in this instance. In any case, at the rehearsal the tenor seemed to have won the battle. When at the performance he found the couch in the exact spot which had been designated by the lady his indignation was all the greater on this account. With as much regard for the action of the drama as was consistent with so violent a gesture he gave the couch a violent shove with his projected toe, with the intention of pushing it into his chosen locality. He retired with a howl, nursing a wounded member. The couch had been nailed to the floor!