Great Singers, Second Series | Page 5

an audacious and superb improvisation. Thunders of
applause greeted her, and while trembling with excitement she felt her
arm grasped by a hand of iron. "Briccona!" hissed a voice in her ear, as
Velluti glared on her, gnashing his teeth with rage. After performing in
London, she appeared in the autumn with her father at the Manchester,
York, and Liverpool Festivals, where she sang some of the most
difficult pieces from the "Messiah" and the "Creation." Some said that
she failed, others that she sang with a degree of mingled brilliancy,
delicacy, and sweetness that drew down a storm of applause.

II.
Garcia now conceived a project for establishing Italian opera in the
United States, and with characteristic daring he set sail for America
with a miserable company, of which the only talent consisted of his
own family, comprising himself, his son, daughter, and wife, Mme.
Garcia having been a fairly good artist in her youth. The first opera
produced was "Il Barbiere," on November 29, 1825, and this was
speedily followed by "Tancredi," "Otello," "Il Turco in Italia," "Don
Giovanni," "Cenerentola," and two operas composed by Garcia
himself--"L'Amante Astuto," and "La Figlia dell' Aria," The young
singer's success was of extraordinary character, and New York,
unaccustomed to Italian opera, went into an ecstasy of admiration.
Maria's charming voice and personal fascination held the public
spellbound, and her good nature in the introduction of English songs,
whenever called on by her admirers, raised the delight of the
opera-goers of the day to a wild enthusiasm.
The occurrence of the most unfortunate episode of her life at this time
was the fruitful source of much of the misery and eccentricity of her
after-career. M. François Eugène Malibran, a French merchant,
engaged in business in New York, fell passionately in love with the
young singer, and speedily laid his heart and fortune, which was
supposed to be great, at her feet. In spite of the fact that the suitor was
fifty, and Maria only seventeen, she was disposed to accept the offer,
for she was sick of her father's brutality, and the straits to which she
was constantly put by the exigencies of her dependent situation. Her
heart had never yet awakened to the sweetness of love, and the
supposed great fortune and lavish promises of M. Malibran dazzled her
young imagination. Garcia sternly refused his consent, and there were
many violent scenes between father and daughter. Such was the
hostility of feeling between the two, that Maria almost feared for her
life. The following incident is an expressive comment on the condition
of her mind at this time: One evening she was playing _Des-demona_
to her father's Othello, in Rossini's opera. At the moment when Othello
approaches, his eyes sparkling with rage, to stab Desdemona, Maria
perceived that her father's dagger was not a stage sham, but a genuine

weapon. Frantic with terror, she screamed "Papa, papa, for the love of
God, do not kill me!" Her terrors were groundless, for the substitution
of the real for a theatrical dagger was a mere accident. The audience
knew no difference, as they supposed Maria's Spanish exclamation to
be good operatic Italian, and they applauded at the fine dramatic point
made by the young artist!
At last the importunate suitor overcame Gar-cia's opposition by
agreeing to give him a hundred thousand francs in payment for the loss
of his daughter's services, and the sacrifice of the young and beautiful
singer was consummated on March 23, 1826. A few weeks later
Malibran was a bankrupt and imprisoned for debt, and his bride
discovered how she had been cheated and outraged by a cunning
scoundrel, who had calculated on saving himself from poverty by
dependence on the stage-earnings of a brilliant wife. The enraged
Garcia, always a man of unbridled temper, was only prevented from
transforming one of those scenes of mimic tragedy with which he was
so familiar, into a criminal reality by assassinating Malibran, through
the resolute expostulations of his friends. Mme. Malibran instantly
resigned for the benefit of her husband's creditors any claims which she
might have made on the remnants of his estate, and her New York
admirers had as much occasion to applaud the rectitude and honor of
the woman as they had had the genius of the artist. Garcia himself,
hampered by pecuniary difficulties, set sail for Mexico with his son and
younger daughter, to retrieve his fortunes, while Maria remained in
New York, tied to a wretch whom she despised, and who looked on her
musical talents as the means of supplying him with the luxuries of life.
Mme. Malibran's energy soon found a vent in English opera, and she
made herself as popular on the vernacular as she had on the Italian
stage. But she soon wearied of her