of his German
prototype, and if it is impossible to say much for his originality, we
can at any rate admire his taste in choosing a model.

'Le Pre aux Clercs' is more popular at the present moment than 'Zampa,'
though it is far inferior in musical interest. If 'Zampa' showed the
influence of Weber, 'Le Pre aux Clercs' is redolent of Rossini. The
overture, with its hollow ring of gaiety, strikes the note of Italianism
which echoes throughout the opera. The plot is full of intrigues and
conspiracies, and is decidedly confusing. Mergy, a young Bernese
gentleman, aspires to the hand of Isabelle, who is one of the Queen of
Navarre's maids of honour. The Queen favours their love, but the King
wishes Isabelle to marry Comminges, a favourite of his own. The young
couple gain their point, and are married secretly in the chapel of the
Pre aux Clercs, but only at the expense of as much plotting and as many
disguises as would furnish the stock-in-trade of half-a-dozen detective
romances.

French music, as has often been pointed out, owes much to foreign
influence, but very few of the strangers to whom the doors of Parisian
opera-houses were opened left a deeper impression upon the music of
their adopted country than Meyerbeer (1791-1864). Giacomo Meyerbeer, to
give him the name by which he is now best known, underwent the same
influence as Herold. As a youth he was intimate with Weber, and his
first visit to Italy introduced him to Rossini, whose brilliant style he
imitated successfully in a series of Italian works which are now
completely forgotten. From Italy Meyerbeer came to Paris, and there
identified himself with the French school so fully that he is now
regarded with complete propriety as a French composer pure and simple.
Meyerbeer's music is thoroughly eclectic in type. He was a careful
student of contemporary music, and the various phases through which he
passed during the different stages of his career left their impress upon
his style. It says much for the power of his individuality that he was
able to weld such different elements into something approaching an
harmonious whole. Had he done more than he did, he would have been a
genius; as it is, he remains a man of exceptional talent, whose
influence on the history of modern music is still important, though his
own compositions are now slightly superannuated. 'Robert le Diable,' the
first work of his third or French period, was produced in 1831. The
libretto, which,