which is the outcome of personal observation. All that a compilation of
this kind can hope to effect is best gained in preserving this kind
of vividness, instead of revamping impressions and opinions into
second-hand forms. Pains have been taken to verify dates and facts, and
it is believed they will be found trustworthy.

It will be observed that many well-known singers have been omitted, or
treated only incidentally: among the earlier singers, such as Anas-tasia
Robinson, Mingotti, Anna Maria Crouch, and Anna Selina Storace; among
more recent ones, such as Mmes. Fodor, Cinti-Damoreau, Camperese,
Pisaroni, Miss Catherine Stephens, Mrs. Paton-Wood, Mme. Dorus-Gras, and
Cornelie Falcon. This omission has been indispensable in a work whose
purpose has been to cover only the lives of the very great names
in operatic art, as the question of limit has been inflexible. A
supplementary volume will give similar sketches of later celebrities.

The works from which material has been most freely drawn are as follows:
Bernard's "Retrospection of the Stage"; Dr. Burney's various histories
of music; Chorley's "Thirty Years' Musical Recollections"; Dibdin's
"Complete History of the English Stage"; Ebers's "Seven Years of the
King's Theatre"; Fétis's "Biographie des Musiciens"; Hogarth's "Musical
Drama"; Sutherland Edwards's "History of the Opera"; Arsène Houssaye's
"Galerie des Portraits"; Michael Kelly's "Reminiscences"; Lord Mount
Edgcumbe's "Musical Reminiscences"; Oxberry's "Dramatic Biography and
Histrionic Anecdotes"; Mrs. Clayton's "Queens of Song"; Arthur Simpson's
"Memoirs of Catalani"; and Grove's "Dictionary of Music and Musicians."