_Lucrezia Borgia_ contains less recitative than belongs to the operas of Rossini, who himself dispensed with the endless monologues and recitatives cultivated by his predecessors. Indeed, the amount of measured talk in _Lucrezia Borgia_ scarcely exceeds that which is to be met with in the most popular of Verdi's works. The brilliancy of the introduction, the series of dramatic scenes--for which the composer had, above all, to thank his librettist, who, in his turn, was indebted to Victor Hugo--and an unusually large number of tuneful themes for four leading personages among whom the interest is judiciously distributed, could not fail to secure for _Lucrezia Borgia_ the success it in fact obtained. The graceful _Elisir d'Amore_, which, owing to the prevailing taste for spectacular opera, is now but rarely heard, was given for the first time at Milan in 1832. Donizetti was now composing operas at the rate of about three a year. Many of them made but little impression and scarcely a twelfth part of them are performed in the present day. In 1835, however, Donizetti produced an opera which was received with enthusiasm, which soon became popular throughout Europe, and which seems to possess as much vitality now as when it was first brought out. _Lucia di Lammermoor_, the work in question, contains some of the most beautiful melodies, in the sentimental style, that Donizetti has composed; and it is especially admired by musicians for the broadly conceived, well-constructed and highly dramatic finale which brings the second act to so effective a conclusion. The sudden appearance of Edgar of Ravenswood just as his devoted but despairing Lucy has been forced to sign the contract which gives her to another, is but the first of a series of situations, skilfully varied and contrasted, which the librettist has ably planned, and which have been admirably treated by the composer. The part of Lucia, beloved by every "light soprano" of the present day, was written for Persiani; that of Edgardo, which, in the days of the great tenors, was even more popular than the prima donna's part, for Duprez. Of the last act of _Lucia_, which, until the reign of the light sopranos set in, used to be considered the crowning glory of the opera, Donizetti wrote both words and music. It has already been mentioned that he once transformed a French vaudeville into an Italian opera or operetta; and it may be added that the libretti of _Betly_ and of _La Figlia del Reggimento_ are both from his pen. _La Figlia del Reggimento_, however, was only _La Fille du Régiment_ translated into Italian; and the libretto of _Betly_ is based, scene by scene, on Adolphe Adam's little opera of _Le Chalet_--known in English as the _Swiss Cottage_. In the case of the last act of _Lucia_, Donizetti not only wrote the words; he designed the scenes. In the novel Edgar loses himself on the seashore, and is drowned. In the opera, however, when so