INA KLOSKING worked night and day upon Siebel, in Gounod's "Faust," and
upon the songs that had been added to give weight to the part.

She came early to the theater at night, and sat, half dressed, fatigued,
and nervous, in her dressing-room.

Crash!--the first _coup d'archet_ announced the overture, and roused her
energy, as if Ithuriel's spear had pricked her. She came down dressed, to
listen at one of the upper entrances, to fill herself with the musical
theme, before taking her part in it, and also to gauge the audience and
the singers.

The man Faust was a German; but the musical part Faust seems better
suited to an Italian or a Frenchman. Indeed, some say that, as a rule,
the German genius excels in creation and the Italian in representation or
interpretation. For my part, I am unable to judge nations in the lump, as
some fine fellows do, because nations are composed of very different
individuals, and I know only one to the million; but I do take on me to
say that the individual Herr who executed Doctor Faustus at Homburg that
night had everything to learn, except what he had to unlearn. His person
was obese; his delivery of the words was mouthing, chewing, and gurgling;
and he uttered the notes in tune, but without point, pathos, or passion;
a steady lay-clerk from York or Durham Cathedral would have done a little
better, because he would have been no colder at heart, and more exact in
time, and would have sung clean; whereas this gentleman set his windpipe
trembling, all through the business, as if palsy were passion. By what
system of leverage such a man came to be hoisted on to such a pinnacle of
song as "Faust" puzzled our English friends in front as much as it did
the Anglo-Danish artist at the wing; for English girls know what is what