cannot deny it a few lines.

Mme. M. may have been eighteen when she began to study singing with
Delsarte, together with her husband, who was destined for a similar
career. She had an agreeable voice, but a particularly charming face,
the freshness of a child in its cradle, a sweet expression of innocence.
In figure she was tall and slender. The lovely creature always looked
like a Bengal rose tossing upon its graceful stalk. These young students
considered themselves finished and made an engagement with the manager
of a theatre in Brazil.

"Don't do it," said Delsarte to the husband, knowing his suspicious
nature, "that is a dangerous region; you will never bring your wife back
alive."

He prophesied but too truthfully.

Soon after, we heard that the fair songstress had been shot dead by the
hand of the husband who adored her. I like to think that she was
innocent of more than imprudence. The story which reached us from that
distant land was, that M. M. threatened to kill his wife if she
continued to associate with a certain young man.

"You would never do it!" she said.

She did not reckon on the aberrations of jealousy. It was said, in
excuse for the murderer, that she had defied him, saying:

"I love him, and I do not love you!"

After the catastrophe, the unfortunate husband gave himself up to
justice. No case was found against him, but how he must have suffered
when he had forever cut himself off from the sight of that enchanting
creature!

Three figures stand preeminent in the crowd: Darcier, Giraudet, Madame
Pasca.

I will proceed in order of seniority.

The first named did not attend the lectures when I did, but I often
heard him mentioned in society where he attracted attention by his
rendering of Delsarte's "Stanzas to Eternity," Pierre Dupont's "Hundred
Louis d'or," and many other impressive or dramatic pieces. I know the
master considered him possessed of much aptitude and feeling for art.

They met one evening at a large party given by a high official of the
day. Darcier sang well, in Delsarte's opinion; but it was perhaps too
well for a public made up of fashionables, not connoisseurs.

"It takes something more than talent to move them," thought the real
judge, annoyed; and with that accent familiar to well-bred people, which
transfigures a triviality, he said to the singer:

"Let them have _the bread!_"

He referred to a political song ending with these lines:

"Ye cannot hush th