Campanini, and Del Puente (who had been in the cast of the original
London production); repeated it on January 11th, and "La Gioconda"
on January 12th.

On March 10th a spring season began, which lasted till April 12th. It
added four operas to the list. Ambroise Thomas's "Hamlet" (March 10),
Flotow's "Martha" (March 14th), Meyerbeer's "Huguenots" (March 19th),
and "Le Prophète" (March 21st). The last, which had first been heard in
New York at the Astor Place Opera House four years after its original
production in Paris, on April 16, 1849, had been absent from the
current operatic list so long that it was to all intents and purposes
a novelty to Mr. Abbey's patrons. The last week of the season brought
two disappointments: Mmes. Nilsson and Sembrich both fell ill, the
indisposition of the latter (or something else) causing the abandonment
of Gounod's "Roméo et Juliette," an opera that was new to New Yorkers,
and was promptly brought out by Colonel Mapleson with Mme. Patti in
his spring season at the Academy of Music.

As has already been set forth, Mr. Abbey made a monumental financial
fiasco; but his was a heroic effort to galvanize Italian opera, which
seemed moribund, into vitality. He showed an honest desire to keep
all his promises to the public made when he asked support for his
enterprise, and all in all, his administration was signalized by virtues
too frequently absent in the doings of operatic managers. His stage sets
were uniformly handsome, and some of them showed greater sumptuousness
than the people had seen for many years; his orchestra, though faulty in
composition as well as execution, did some admirable work under Signor
Vianesi; his chorus was prompt, vigorous, and tuneful; his ensembles
were carefully and intelligently composed, and his selection of operas
was judicious from a managerial point of view. He gave to New York the