e secret. It is the
dawn of a new day. Cherubini was preparing himself for the combat. Gluck
had accustomed France to the sublime energy of his masterpieces. Mozart
had just written 'Le Nozze di Figaro' and 'Don Giovanni.' He must not
lag behind. He must not be conquered. In that career which he was about
to dare to enter, he met two giants. Like the athlete who descends into
the arena, he anointed his limbs and girded his loins for the fight."

V.

Marmontel had furnished the libretto of an opera to Cherubini, and the
composer shortly after his return from Turin to Paris had it produced at
the Royal Academy of Music. Vogel's opera on the same text, "Demophon,"
was also brought out, but neither one met with great success.
Cherubini's work, though full of vigor and force, wanted color and
dramatic point. He was disgusted with his failure, and resolved
to eschew dramatic music; so for the nonce he devoted himself to
instrumental music and cantata. Two works of the latter class, "Amphion"
and "Circe," composed at this time, were of such excellence as to retain
a permanent hold on the French stage. Cherubini, too, became director of
the Italian opera troupe, "Les Bouffons," organized under the patronage
of Leonard, the Queen's performer, and exercised his taste for
composition by interpolating airs of his own into the works of the
Italian composers, which were then interesting the French public as
against the operas of Rameau.

"At this time," we are told by Laf age, "Cherubini had two distinct
styles, one of which was allied to Paisiello and Cimarosa by the grace,
elegance, and purity of the melodic forms; the other, which attached
itself to the school of Gluck and Mozart, more harmonic than melodious,
rich in instrumental details." This manner was the then unappreciated
type of a new school destined to change the forms of musical art.

In 1790 the Revolution broke out and rent the established order
of things into fragments. For a time all the interests of art were
swallowed up in the frightful turmoil which made Paris the center of
attention for astonished and alarmed Europe. Cherubini's connection had
been with the aristocracy, and now they were fleeing in a mad panic or
mounting the scaffold. His livelihood became precarious, and he suffered
severely during the first five years of anarchy. His seclusion was
passed in studying music, the physical sciences, drawing, and botany;
and his acquaintance was wisely confin