the only exception to the rule which gave all her time and toil to the United Kingdom. A splendid reception and a superb triumph were accorded her on the other side of the Atlantic; and among the plans for the future, which were destined never to be fulfilled, was a second American tour, in which the great prima donna was to have been heard in opera.

Of recognition from modern composers, Thérèse Tietjens received an ampler share than has been accorded to any artist. Auber, whom she has so frequently interpreted, once said to the writer of this sketch: I am the Nestor of critics as regards opera singers; I have heard them all for two-thirds of a century, and I remember them all. I assert that never has a finer voice been heard than Tietjens', never has such an actress in tragic opera been seen. There is nothing like her now, of course, cela va sans dire. She is of the old school, the true school.' For her Sir Julius Benedict wrote his Santa Cecilia' and his St. Peter,' for her he wrote his Richard Cœur de Lion.' The great event of the opera season of 1875 was her elevation of the Ortrud of Wagner's 'Lohengrin' to the height of a great tragic rôle, which elicited the eccentric composer's enthusiastic admiration, and made him ardently desire that Mademoiselle Tietjens should sing in his famous 'Trilogy.' This, too, has to be reckoned among the things which might have been.

The reopening of Her Majesty's Theatre this year was an event of much interest to the musical world; and the rentrée of Mademoiselle Tietjens as Norma, her singing and acting on the occasion, which were quite equal to any of her previous achievements, gave a seemingly complete and welcome contradiction to the rumours of her ill health, which had been circulated for some time previously. She was received with rapturous and prolonged applause, and her expressive face evinced the pleasure, amounting to strong emotion, which the demonstration afforded her. Only twice again was she to stir the hearts of a great crowd with her magnificent voice, and to receive the ovation which, as she once said to the writer of these lines, is a full reward for any toil, and is always as new as a surprise. A few nights later she sang in Il Trovatore,' and then on May 19, for the last time, in Lucrezia Borgia.' As Lucrezia she had first captivated the English public; as Lucrezia she took her unconscious leave of them. From that date, for the singer the rest is silence;' for the woman all that remained was suffering, patience, and release. On the morning of October 10, 1877, she died, in the forty-seventh year of her age, universally regretted. Few great artists have known so happy a life as hers, one so full of the triumphs of

VOL. XXXIV. NO. CXXXIII.

G

genius, and the best affections of the heart. Innumerable are the tributes of appreciation and regret which have been borne by the press to the great singer whom we have lost, before time had touched, to injure, her; from among them the writer selects the following, taken from the 'Spectator' of October 13, as the fullest expression of the estimate of the character of Thérèse Tietjens made by those who enjoyed the privilege of her friendship:

"The death of Mademoiselle Tietjens deprives the lyric stage of the greatest artist, both as singer and actress, of her time. No decline of her unequalled powers had taken place; she never sang more superbly or acted more grandly than on the last occasion on which she was to be heard and seen by the public, who recognised her as the supreme mistress of her art twenty years ago. Herein her fate differs widely from that of most famous singers. Not only the loss of an incomparable artist is deplored by those who mourn her. She was a noble woman, great of heart, a constant friend, full of charity, home-loving, and kindly, of high courage. Her prolonged sufferings were borne by her with heroic fortitude and ceaseless solicitude for the feelings of those around her. At the height of her renown, she was ever keen to recognise and eager to assist aspirants in her own art; liberal of praise; thoroughly appreciative of her own great genius, but untouched by vanity, as incapable of envy as her position was beyond rivalry. In all things essentially great, Thérèse Tietjens has left a loved and honoured memory, and has gone to her grave attended by the best blessings--those of the poor.'

83

That Night.

I.

'LISETTE! Lisette! do not go! oh, do not go! such an hour! such a night!'

The girl's voice ceased, and to the darkness of the muffled earth a deeper darkness seemed added by the dying of her tones. There was no sound abroad. No light came from the vacant blackness overhead. No ray helped the eye to an idea of distance. There was no means of determining any object outside the limits of touch. The door-step upon which the speaker stood, the doorjambs which she grasped as she leaned forward into the formless void, were all for which she had the evidence of her senses. She knew her younger sister Lisette had passed through that door. She knew that door opened on a short garden path terminating at a gate on a long, bleak, straight road that ran across a desolate moor. She knew that for miles on either side no habitation of man, no tree, no tall shrub was visible by day. At each side of the road a deep drain lay mute, stagnant. The drains had been dug to afford materials for making the road, and the waters of the moor had crept stealthily into them, and silently filled them up, and crouched ten feet deep ready to seize upon him who in the dark might scale the low dyke and seek to gain the level waste. Marion knew all this, and more.

She knew that upon the morning of this day a message had come saying that John Maine would call to see Lisette that night. John Maine and Lisette were lovers. John Maine had made love to Lisette for a year; six months ago all had been settled. But somehow of late Lisette was sad and John Maine came rarely, and did not stay long, and sent messages but seldom. Something was wrong. Lisette did not complain. She said there was something strange about John, but that he was as kind-kinder to her than ever; he seemed, however, uneasy, and absent-minded, and changed; changed in what, she could not tell in general manner rather than towards her. And Marion of this matter could learn no

more.

Marion thought a good deal. She thought-Ah, my poor Lisette! my own, my only sister Lisette! it will kill her if anything goes wrong, for she is a deep, wild, passionate nature. Few suspect that she is so quiet, so still, so absent-minded in her eyes.

But she loves John Maine.
skylark's song, but he the sun.
waters lying out there on either side of the road through the sheer
black would be the Lethe of her despair. That Marion thought.

She loves him so much that life is a
She loves him so that the obscure

Why had he not come? It was close to midnight, after eleven some time. She and Lisette had sat up in the back of the house waiting. Their mother, and old Jane the housemaid, and old Tom the gardener, had gone to bed early. Oh, why had he not come? could it be he was tiring of Lisette? could that be?

She turned her head from right to left in the direction of the clefts of stagnant water, and shuddered.

The village of Barrowleigh, where John Maine lived, was only four miles distant down that road. They both, she and Lisette, had often seen him a mile off as he came towards them waving his hat, or his handkerchief, or both. Oh, how Lisette's face would brighten when she saw him! How her dark eyes would light up! How her pale cheek would flush! How her hands would relax on anything she held, her hat or a flower, letting it fall to the ground! How she would bend forward her neck and seem to listen for his voice with her ears, with her hungry eyes, with her parted lips! And how quickly and softly her breath would come! But once he was near and could see, she changed. She became her old, calm self again, and only for a strange, deep under-trill in her voice, and a certain wonderful lengthening out of syllables until they acquired new and deeper meanings, he might have been old Tom the gardener.

Once in the dusk when the two sisters had been talking of him and Marion had said something about her being too cold, she had arisen and flung up her arms and then drawn them swiftly across her bosom and held them fast, whispering:

'My love! my love! my love! If you only knew how wild I am about you! If you only knew how my heart aches when you are not here! how my very soul seems dull with excess of pleasure when you are by!'

6

Then she had sat down and asked Marion, What did I say? Some nonsense, no doubt. Don't mind my nonsense, Marion.

Let us go out into the air.'

And after that Marion stood in a kind of fear of Lisette, and let her be.

Lisette was now gone out into that awful night, at that wild hour. She had offered her company, but Lisette would not hear of it. Lisette had said:

If I do not hear his footstep when I have gone a mile, I shall return. The walk will do me good, I shall sleep better after it.'

'But there is no chance of his coming, of his being on the road at such an hour.'

"There is something horrible in the air, I am suffocating and must walk. Wait up for me, and have a light-this dark is hideous.'

No one ever came by that road after daylight was gone except those for the Moor House, so that Marion felt none of the ordinary uneasiness such a design might cause.

After a little while she turned into the house, leaving the front door open, and sat down in the back room, awaiting the return of Lisette.

II.

ALONG the straight road lying between the two clefts Lisette walked slowly with her head thrown up so that any sound in front might reach her quickly. She knew the road well, had known it from her earliest childhood. She could have trodden it blindfold. She was now treading it by the aid of blind tradition in her memory. To right and left the stolid darkness reached from the invisible earth to the sightless heavens. The darkness opened before her and closed behind her, folding her round as strictly as water folds round a stone falling through sea-depths in a cave.

She did not know it was dark. She did not know it was still. She felt that if he were approaching she should hear his tread. She knew that when he had come she should know his voice. Oh, it was too bad he stayed away! What a change had arisen in him! How was this cruel change to be accounted for? She had done nothing to cause it. There had been no quarrel. But worse, a thousand times worse than any quarrel, he had of late grown reserved. He no longer spoke out to her freely and joyously, as in the delicious, bygone time. In her presence he seemed nervous and ill at ease. When they met he scanned her face hastily, fearfully, as though he dreaded something. What was it he dreaded? Not that she had altered towards him. He knew her too well for that. But why did he shun her? Of old, no evening passed without his coming. Now, for the past month, he had stayed a week away at the time. It was ten days since she had last seen him. This morning Tom the gardener had brought news he would be with her that night. It was close to midnight now and he had not arrived. Oh, how sunny-faced he used to be! How his blue eyes softened when he looked into hers! How his strong arms wound slowly and surely round her, holding her tenderly, but as though no power on earth could steal her from his embrace!