No question of a song yet. "Qui la voce" seems way back in the Middle
Ages. Garcia says, "If, when your voice is well oiled [that is what he
calls the scaling process], you are not intelligent enough to sing a song
by yourself, then you had better knit stockings for the poor."

"Then," I answered, "I had better begin at once to learn to knit
stockings."

"Not quite yet!" he laughed. "Wait till I have finished with you." More
than once he has said, "Your voice reminds me of my sister Marie's
[meaning Malibran]; but she had no brains to speak of, whereas you have,
and you ought to be thankful for it."

I murmured that I was glad he thought so, and, if I really had some
brains, I should be thankful; but I was not quite sure that I had. "Trust
me to tell you if you have not," said he.

I trusted him, indeed, for I knew very well that he would not let the
occasion slip had he anything of that sort to say.


LONDON, _July, 1860._

DEAR A.,--Still hard at work. I wonder at mama's patience and endurance.
To hear scales, cadenzas, and trills from morning till night must be
terribly wearing on the nerves. I said as much to the master, and he
consented to give me "Bel raggio," of "Semiramide." It is as good as an
exercise, anyway, because it is nothing but cadenzas. Then he allowed me
to sing "Una voce poco fa." I told him that mama had put on a pound of