But neither Phillipps nor Garcia was the first to present an
operatic version of Beaumarchais's comedy to the American people.
French operas by Rousseau, Monsigny, Dalayrac, and Gretry, which may
be said to have composed the staple of the opera-houses of Europe in
the last decades of the eighteenth century, were known also in the
contemporaneous theatres of Charleston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and
New York. In 1794 the last three of these cities enjoyed "an opera
in 3 acts," the text by Colman, entitled, "The Spanish Barber; or,
The Futile Precaution." Nothing is said in the announcements of
this opera touching the authorship of the music, but it seems to
be an inevitable conclusion that it was Paisiello's, composed for
St. Petersburg about 1780. There were German "Barbers" in existence
at the time composed by Benda (Friedrich Ludwig), Elsperger, and
Schulz, but they did not enjoy large popularity in their own
country, and Isouard's "Barbier" was not yet written. Paisiello's
opera, on the contrary, was extremely popular, throughout Europe.
True, he called it "The Barber of Seville," not "The Spanish
Barber," but Colman's subtitle, "The Futile Precaution," came from
the original French title. Rossini also adopted it and purposely
avoided the chief title set by Beaumarchais and used by Paisiello;
but he was not long permitted to have his way. Thereby hangs a
tale of the composition and first failure of his opera which I
must now relate.

On December 26, 1815, the first day of the carnival season, Rossini
produced his opera, "Torvaldo e Dorliska," at the Teatro Argentina,
in Rome, and at the same time signed a contract with Cesarini, the
impresario of the theatre, to have the first act of a second opera
ready on the twentieth day of the following January. For this opera
Rossini was to receive 400 Roman scudi (the equivalent of about