le opera."

In "Otello," Rossini introduced his operatic changes to the Italian
public, and they were well received; yet great opposition was manifested
by those who clung to the time-honored canons. Sigismondi, of the Naples
Conservatory, was horror-stricken on first seeing the score of this
opera. The clarionets were too much for him, but on seeing third and
fourth horn-parts, he exclaimed: "What does the man want? The greatest
of our composers have always been contented with two. Shades of
Pergolesi, of Leo, of Jomelli! How they must shudder at the bare
thought! Four horns! Are we at a hunting-party? Four horns! Enough to
blow us to perdition!" Donizetti, who was Sigismondi's pupil, also tells
an amusing incident of his preceptor's disgust. He was turning over a
score of "Semiramide" in the library, when the _maestro_ came in and
asked him what music it was. "Rossini's," was the answer. Sigismondi
glanced at the page and saw 1. 2. 3. trumpets, being the first, second,
and third trumpet parts. Aghast, he shouted, stuffing his fingers in
his ears, "One hundred and twenty-three trumpets! _Corpo di Cristo!_
the world's gone mad, and I shall go mad too!" And so he rushed from the
room, muttering to himself about the hundred and twenty-three trumpets.

The Italian public, in spite of such criticism, very soon accepted the
opera of "Otello" as the greatest serious opera ever written for their
stage. It owed much, however, to the singers who illustrated its roles.
Mme. Colbran, afterward Rossini's wife, sang Desdemona, and Davide,
Otello. The latter was the predecessor of Rubini as the finest singer of
the Rossinian music. He had the prodigious compass of three octaves;
and M. Bertin, a French critic, says of this singer, so honorably linked
with the career of our composer: "He is full of warmth, _verve_, energy,
expression, and musical sentiment; alone he can fill up and give life to
a scene; it is impossible for another singer to carry away an audience
as he does, and, when he will only be simple, he is admirable. He is the
Rossini of song; he is the greatest singer I ever heard." Lord Byron,
in one of his letters to Moore, speaks of the first production at Milan,
and praises the music enthusiastically, while condemning the libretto as
a degradation of Shakespeare.

"La Cenerentola" and "La Gazza Ladra" were written in quick succession
for Naples and Milan. The former of these works, based on the old
Cinderella myth, was