owever, and to the theatre in winter,
they have carried a great green velvet bag, adorned with gold tassels
and lined with fur to keep their feet from freezing, as carpets are not
in use. Poor women run about the streets with a little earthen pipkin
hanging on their arm filled with fire, even if they are sent on an
errand."

In Florence, the art of making improviso verses--which has ever been
popular in southern countries--seems to have reached its highest state
of perfection during this eighteenth century, and a woman, the
celebrated Corilla, was acknowledged to be the most expert in this
accomplishment. At Rome, when at the climax of her wonderful career, she
was publicly crowned with the laurel in the presence of thousands of
applauding spectators; and in her later years, at Florence, her drawing
room was ever filled with curious and admiring crowds. Without
pretensions to immaculate character, deep erudition, or high birth,
which an Italian esteems above all earthly things, Corilla so made her
way in the world that members of the nobility were wont to throng to her
house, and many sovereigns, _en passage_ at Florence, took pains to seek
her society. Corilla's successor was the beautiful Fantastici, a young
woman of pleasing personality and remarkable powers of improvisation,
who soon became a popular favorite.

Both at home and abroad, Italian women were coming to the fore in
musical circles, and no opera in any one of the continental capitals
was complete without its prima donna. Among the distinguished singers of
this epoch the two most celebrated were Faustina Bordoni and Catarina
Gabrielli. Faustina, born in the year 1700, was the daughter of a noble
Venetian family, and at an early age began to study music under the
direction of Gasparoni; when she was but sixteen, she made her debut
with such success that she was immediately given place as one of the
greatest artists on the lyric stage. In Venice, Naples, Florence, and
Vienna, she displayed such dramatic skill and such a wonderful voice
that she was soon acknowledged as the most brilliant singer in Europe.
Later, she was brought to London, under the management of the great
composer Haendel, and there she finally displaced in the public favor her
old-time rival, Cuzzoni. The singer known as Catarina Gabrielli was the
daughter of the cook of the celebrated Cardinal Gabrielli; in spite of
her low origin, she was possessed of a great though insolent beauty, in
a