The only change that Rossini next day found it necessary to make in his work was to substitute a new air for the unfortunate Spanish song which Garcia had been allowed to introduce. This gave him no trouble. He simply transcribed for the solo voice the melody of the celebrated chorus which had already figured first in _Ciro in Babilonia_, and afterwards in _Aureliano in Palmira_. Such was the origin of the beautiful "Ecco ridente il cielo" which he handed to Garcia as he wrote it, and which was sung the same evening. Those who believe in the absolute significance of music apart from words, may be interested to hear that Almaviva's charming love song was, as first composed, a prayer--as a love song after all may well be. At the second representation the _Barber_ was comparatively well received. Being heard, it was naturally admired. Indeed, a certain number of connoisseurs are said to have appreciated it from the very first, though on the opening night the difficulty must have been not to understand the work--which appeals alike to the simplest, and to the most cultivated, musical intelligence--but merely to hear it. After a few performances Rossini's new work began to excite enthusiasm; and it had not been before the public for more than a week when it was received nightly with frantic applause. Garcia's Spanish melody was, after some years, reintroduced into the _Barber_ by Rubini; the trio which, in the music lesson scene, occupied the place now filled by no matter what fancy air that the Rosina of the evening thinks fit to introduce, is known to have been lost: and it has been seen that, according to some authorities, a like fate attended the overture written specially for the work. Stendhal, on the unacknowledged authority of Carpani, states that at the first representation the opera was preceded by the overture to _Aureliano in Palmira_ and to _Elisabetta_, which, though heard in connection with the former work at Milan and in connection with the latter at Naples, had never been heard at Rome. Besides borrowing from himself, Rossini, in more than one "number" of the _Barber of Seville_, was indebted to the invention of others. The melody of the trio "Zitti zitti" is taken, note for note, from Simon's air in Haydn's _Seasons_--a work, it will be remembered, of which Rossini in his early youth had directed the performance at the Lyceum of Bologna. The very lively tune sung by the Duenna Berta is adapted without much alteration from a Russian dance, which Rossini had heard played by a Russian lady of his acquaintance. It soon became the custom not to listen to Berta's air, which is always assigned to an inferior singer; and it acquired the name of the "Ice tune;" not in allusion to its place of origin, but because, during its performance, the people in the boxes called for ices. The part of Rosina, which in the present day is usually given to the soprano, was composed for the mezzo-soprano voice. Mme.