Chapter III

The following year the management of the King's Theatre again endeavored to secure Pasta, who had returned to Paris. Before she would finally consent she stipulated that the new manager should pay her all the arrears of salary left unsettled by his predecessor, for, in spite of its artistic excellence, the late season had not proved a pecuniary success. After much negotiation the difficulty was arranged, and Mme. Pasta, binding herself to fill her Parisian engagements at the close of her leave of absence, received her _congé_ for England. Her reappearance in "Otello" was greeted with fervid applause, and it was decided that her singing had gained in finish and beauty, while her acting was as powerful as before. It was during this season that Pasta first sang with Malibran. Ronzi di Begnis had lost her voice, Caradori had seceded in a pet, and the manager in despair tried the trembling and inexperienced daughter of the great Spanish tenor to fill up the gap. She was a failure, as Pasta had been at first in England, but time was to bring her a glorious recompense, as it had done to her elder rival. For the next two years Pasta sang alternately in London and Paris, and her popularity on the lyric stage exceeded that of any of the contemporary singers, for Catalini, whose genius turned in another direction, seemed to care only for the concert room. But some disagreement with Rossini caused her to leave Paris and spend a year in Italy. During this time her English reputation stood at its highest point. No one had ever appeared on the English stage who commanded such exalted artistic respect and admiration. Ebers tells us, speaking of her last engagement before going to Italy: "At no period of Pasta's career had she been more fashionable. She had literally worked her way up to eminence, and, having attained the height, she stood on it firm and secure; no performer has owed less to caprice or fashion; her reputation has been earned, and, what is more, deserved."

On her reappearance in London in 1827 Pasta was engaged for twenty-three nights at a salary of 3,000 guineas, with a free benefit, which yielded her 1,500 guineas more. Her opening performance was that of _Desdemona_, in which Mme. Malibran also appeared during the same season, thus affording the critics an opportunity for comparison. It was admitted that the younger diva had the advantage in vocalization and execution, but that Pasta's conception was incontestably superior, and her reading of the part characterized by far greater nobility and grandeur. The novelty of the season was Signor Coccia's opera of "Maria Stuarda," in which Pasta created the part of the beautiful Scottish queen. Her interpretation possessed an "impassioned dignity, with an eloquence of voice, of look, and of action which defies description and challenges the severest criticism." It was a piece of acting which great natural genius, extensive powers of observation, peculiar sensibility of feeling, and those acquirements of art which are the results of sedulous study, combined to make perfect. It is said that Mme. Pasta felt this part so intensely that, when summoned before the audience at the close, tears could be seen rolling down her cheeks, and her form to tremble with the scarcely-subsiding swell of agitation.

During a short Dublin engagement the same year the following incident occurred, showing how passionate were her sensibilities in real life as well as on the stage: One day, while walking with some friends, a ragged child about three years of age approached and asked charity for her blind mother in such artless and touching accents that the prima donna burst into tears and put into the child's hands all the money she had. Her friends began extolling her charity and the goodness of her heart. "I will not accept your compliments," said she, wiping the tears from her eyes. "This child demanded charity in a sublime manner. I have seen, at one glance, all the miseries of the mother, the wretchedness of their home, the want of clothing, the cold which they suffer. I should indeed be a great actress if at any time I could find a gesture expressing profound misery with such truth."

Pasta's next remarkable impersonation was that of _Armando_ in "Il Crociato in Egitto," written by Meyerbeer for Signor Velluti, the last of the race of male sopranos. She had already performed it in Paris, and been overwhelmed with abuse by Velluti's partisans, who were enraged to see their favorite's strong part taken from him by one so much superior in genius, however inferior in mere executive vocalism. Velluti had disfigured his performance by introducing a perfect cascade of roulades and _fiorituri_, but Pasta's delivery of the music, while inspired by her great tragic sensibility, was marked by such breadth and fidelity that many thought they heard the music for the first time. A ludicrous story is told of the first performance in London. Pasta had flown to her dressing-room at the end of one of the scenes to change her costume, but the audience demanding a repetition of the trio with Mme. Caradori and Mile. Brambilla, Pasta was obliged to appear, amid shouts of laughter, half Crusader, half Mameluke.

On the occasion of her benefit the same season, the opera being "Otello," Mme. Pasta essayed the daring experiment of singing and playing the _rôle_ of the Moor, Mile. Sontag singing _Desdemona_. Though the transposition of the music from a tenor to a mezzo-soprano voice injured the effect of the concerted pieces, the passionate acting redeemed the innovation. In the last act, where she, as _Otello_, seized _Desdemona_ and dragged her by the hair to the bed that she might stab her, the effect was one of such tragic horror that many left the theatre. She thus united the most cultivated vocal excellence with dramatic genius of unequaled power. "Mme. Pasta," said a clever writer, "is in fact the founder of a new school, and after her the possession of vocal talent alone is insufficient to secure high favor, or to excite the same degree of interest for any length of time. Even in Italy, where the mixture of dramatic with musical science was long neglected, and not appreciated for want of persons equally gifted with both attainments, Mme. Pasta has exhibited to her countrymen the beauty of a school too long neglected, in such a manner that they will no longer admit the notion of lyric tragedy being properly spoken without dramatic as well as vocal qualifications in its representative." The presence of Malibran and Sontag during this season inspired Pasta to almost superhuman efforts to maintain her threatened supremacy. In her efforts to surpass these brilliant young rivals in all respects, she laid herself open to criticism by departing somewhat from the severe and classic school of delivery which had always distinguished her, and overloading her singing with ornament.

Honors were showered on Pasta in different parts of Europe. She was made first court singer in 1829 by the Emperor of Austria, and presented by him with a superb diadem of rubies and diamonds. At Bologna, where she performed in twelve of the Rossinian operas under the _bâton_ of the composer himself, a medal was struck in her honor by the Società del Casino, and all the different cities of her native land vied in doing honor to the greatest of lyric tragediennes. At Milan in 1830 she sang with Rubini, Galli, Mme. Pisaroni, Lablache, and David. Donizetti at this time wrote the opera of "Anna Bolena," with the special view of suiting the dominant qualities of Pasta, Rubini, and Galli. The following season Pasta sang at Milan, at a salary of 40,000 francs for twenty representations, and was obliged to divide the admiration of the public with Mali-bran, who was rapidly rising to the brilliant rank which she afterward held against all comers. Vincenzo Bellini now wrote for Pasta his charming opera of "La Sonnambula," and it was produced with Rubini, Mariano, and Mme. Taccani in the cast. Pasta and Rubini surpassed themselves in the splendor of their performance. "Emulating each other in wishing to display the merits of the opera, they were both equally successful," said a critic of the day, "and those who participated in the delight of hearing them will never forget the magic effect of their execution. But exquisite as were, undoubtedly, Mme. Pasta's vocal exertions, her histrionic powers, if possible, surpassed them. It would be difficult for those who have seen her represent, in Donizetti's excellent opera, the unfortunate _Amina_, with a grandeur and a dignity above all praise, to conceive that she could so change (if the expression may be allowed) her nature as to enact the part of a simple country girl. But she has proved her powers to be unrivaled; she personates a simple rustic as easily as she identifies herself with _Medea, Semiramide, Tancredi, and Anna Bolena_."