_From Note-book of Mr. Pips Junior._--_Tuesday._--PIPS Senior doesn't go to Opera to-night. PIPS Junior does. Think PIPS Senior, as an Admiralty official, will be at the Court Ball with Madame PIPS. Glad, therefore, to take his stall at the Opera. _Carmen_ always delightful. Tuneful, melodious, and bright. Good Bizet-ness. Mlle. ZELIE DE LUSSAN as _Carmen_ mighty difficult to beat, and she sings and plays the part with all the diabolical waywardness of this impudent Spanish baggage, as PIPS Senior would call her. Pity that MAGGIE McINTYRE is indisposed to play _Michaela_; she used to do it so prettily and so innocently that she shone out as just the very contrast intended by the author. Instead of MAGGIE, Mlle. COLOMBATI sings the part to-night. She is very graciously received, as is also Signor FERNANDO VALERO (from several Opera Houses abroad) who makes his _debut_ here as that vacillating tenor, DON JOSE. Clever Mlle. BAUERMEISTER as frisky _Frasquita_, and Mlle. LONGHI as _Mercedes_, both excellent Bohemian Girls. To see them going nap was a treat! Which wins? One excellent Irish-Italian, DAN DRADY, as the _Toreador_, first-rate. What a song it is! _Encores_ refused all round, of course. In spite of State Ball, House very nearly as full as on first night. Brilliant effect of some ladies who are "going on," and who can't of course "go on anyhow," but are obliged to appear in their diamonds. Pretty to see little Mlle. PALLADINO dancing. Very short life and a merry one has the _premiere danseuse_ in this Opera. Just a few steps, and then she "steps it," and is not seen again. There is too little of PALLADINO at any time, and in this case, as she only comes on for five minutes at the commencement of Act II., and then "_bon soir!_" she may be described as "Small and Early." _Thursday._--_Rentree_ of Mlle. ELLA RUSSELL as _Leila_ in BIZET'S _I Pescatori di Perle_, another version of _The Diversions of Purley_, a work now more or less forgotten. Signor VALERO better as _Nadir_ (isn't this the name of a well-known photographer?) than as _Don Jose_. Not unlike the lamented GAYARRE. The more like he can become to that tenor the better. M. DUFRICHE came from Madrid to play _Zurga_. A long journey; almost sorry he gave himself the trouble, but there's more than this for him to do. Lovely finish to First Act, but after that the Opera is not a stirring one, the story being so idiotically undramatic. ELLA fresher than ever.