raining to the kindly interest of Rossini, Fanny Persiani, the daughter
of the hunchback tenor, Tacchinardi, who through her singing did more
than any other artist to make the music of Donizetti popular throughout
Europe--these and a number of other names might be mentioned to show
that Italy was now the fountain head of song, as in the Renaissance it
had been the home of the other fine arts.

This account of the triumphs of Italian women upon the continental stage
would be wholly incomplete without some reference to the incomparable
_danseuse_ La Taglioni, who will always occupy an important place in the
annals of Terpsichore. Without great personal charm, her success was due
to her wonderful skill, which was the result of the mercilessly severe
training that she had received from her father, Filippo Taglioni, who
was a ballet master of some repute. Born at Stockholm, where her father
was employed at the Royal Opera, she made her debut at Vienna, where she
created an immediate sensation. Hitherto ballet dancing had been
somewhat realistic and voluptuous, as illustrated by the performances of
the celebrated Madame Vestris, but La Taglioni put poetry and
imagination into her work, which was more ideal in character, and her
supremacy was soon unquestioned. Among her most remarkable performances
was the dancing of the _Tyrolienne_ in _Guillaume Tell_, and of the _pas
de fascination_ in _Robert le Diable_. In this mid-century period
dancing occupied a far more important place in opera than it has since,
but with the retirement of La Taglioni, in 1845, the era of grand
ballets came practically to an end. About her work there seems to have
been a subtle charm which no other modern _danseuse_ has ever possessed,
and her admirers were to be found in all ranks of society. Balzac often
mentions her, and Thackeray says in _The Newcomes_ that the young men
of the epoch "will never see anything so graceful as Taglioni in _La
Sylphide_."

With the final accomplishment of Italian unity and the establishment of
the court at Rome, there began a new life for the whole country, wherein
the position of the ruling family was decidedly difficult. At the outset
there was the opposition of the Vatican, for the pope was unwilling to
accept the inevitable and relinquish his temporal power with good grace;
and there was the greater problem, perhaps, of moulding into one
nationality the various peoples of the peninsula. Neapolitans and
Milanese,