according to circumstances. Richard Wagner agrees with me, when he says,
"Why, then, write operas to be sung, when we no longer have either male
or female singers?"

* * * * *

Since modern progress has come to regard "the three trifles" as
belonging entirely to the past, and in their place has proclaimed,
"Boldness, Spirit, Power," two evil spirits have had rule: they go hand
in hand, ruin the voice, wound the cultivated ear, and provide for
us--only empty opera houses. One of these evils has been frequently
alluded to by me. It is "the expenditure of a great deal too much
breath." The finest voices are obliged to practise with full breath
until they shriek, and the result is mere sobbing, and the heavy drawing
of the breath, just at the time when the tone should still be heard.
Even if every thing else could be right, in such a culture of the tone,
which must very shortly relax the muscles of the voice, that one thing,
in itself, would be sufficient to destroy all promise of success.

The second evil endangers even the male voice, which is able to endure
much ill-treatment; while the female voice is quickly forced by it into
a piercing shrillness, or is driven back into the throat, soon to be
entirely exhausted, or is, at least, prevented from attaining a natural,
fine development. This second evil is the reckless and destructive
straining of single tones to their extreme limits, even to perfect
exhaustion. The poor singer urges and squeezes out the voice, and
quivers to the innermost marrow, in order that the two requirements of
"Boldness" and "Power" may be satisfied. But the "Spirit" is still
wanting, which should be shown in a light and well-shaded delivery. The
effect of extreme shading, however, is accomplished in a single