are not understood by the "million." We have on many occasions observed
a large audience, who, after having listened with an air of puzzled
stupidity to the performance of the most beautiful _cavatine_ by the
first singers of the day, would the next moment, one and all, be thrown
into apparent ecstasy by a wretched ballad, wound up by the everlasting
ponderous English shake. This mode of conclusion, to which true taste is
an utter stranger, is still considered indispensable; though, in the
Italian school, it has been exploded upwards of a century. Such is the
music which calls forth the latent enthusiasm of an English assembly,
and a very respectable degree of excitement is often thus produced.
There are many, who believe this music to be of the highest class of
excellence, and who affect to despise the music of every other school.
There are also many, who assert that all other music is artificial and
meretricious--who contend that the Italian and German schools are
usurping an undue ascendency over the genuine, but modest, merit of our
native music. That Bishop, Calcott, Webbe, Arne, and the rest, had
reached the perfection of their art, would seem a bold assertion; and
their most enthusiastic admirers would probably hesitate to state it as
their conviction, that the compositions of their favourites contain the
elements of universal popularity. Such, however, is the logical
deduction from these premises, and the necessary conclusion from
opinions, which those who hold them will not easily evade. If the music
of our country does indeed possess the excellence, so fondly asserted by
its numerous admirers, we might naturally expect, amid the general
demand in Europe for musical entertainments, that its beauties should
not be entirely neglected and unknown. But while the Italian opera has
found its way over nearly the whole of Europe, and is absolutely
naturalized in England, France, and Spain, our musical productions are
unknown beyond the limits of their native shores. This, being a negative
proposition, is not capable of direct proof. Michael Kelly gives an