triumph.  Since then it has gone the round of Europe and America, and is now probably the most popular opera in the modern repertory.  The story of ‘Madama Butterfly’ is familiar to English hearers, the opera being founded upon the drama by David Belasco, which was played here with great success some years ago.  Peculiarly apt for musical setting is the tale of the fascinating little ‘mousme’ who contracts a so-called Japanese marriage with a lieutenant in the American navy, and after a brief union is driven by his perfidy to suicide.  That the story is what may be called edifying can hardly be claimed, but the world has long since ceased to expect—­perhaps even to desire—­that opera should inculcate a lofty moral code.

However, to come to business, the scene opens in the garden of a country house among the hills above Nagasaki.  Lieutenant Pinkerton and his friend Sharpless, the American consul, are inspecting the retreat which the former has prepared for his Japanese wife.  The voices of Butterfly and her girl friends are soon heard in the distance as they ascend the hill.  After an amusing scene of greeting and introduction comes the marriage ceremony and its attendant festivities, which are interrupted by the arrival of Butterfly’s uncle.  This venerable person, who is a priest in a neighbouring temple, has discovered that Butterfly has renounced her own religion and adopted that of her ‘husband.’  He pronounces the most portentous maledictions upon her and is bundled out by Pinkerton.  The act ends with a love-duet of extraordinary beauty, breathing tenderness and passion in strains which seem to embody all the charm and mystery of the perfumed eastern night.  Three years have passed when the next act begins.  Butterfly is deserted and lives with her two-year-old baby and her faithful maid Suzuki, praying and waiting for the husband who never comes.  The friendly consul tries to break to her the news of Pinkerton’s marriage with an American girl, but Butterfly cannot comprehend such perfidy.  She sees Pinkerton’s ship entering the harbour and calls Suzuki to help her deck the house with flowers.  The music of this scene is exquisite, as is also that of the scene in which Sharpless reads Pinkerton’s letter to Butterfly; but the whole act is a treasure-house of delicious melody and tender pathos.  It ends curiously, but not the less effectively, with a short orchestral movement, played whilst Butterfly, Suzuki, and the child post themselves at the windows to watch through the night for the coming of Pinkerton.  The grey dawn shows Butterfly still at her post, though the others have fallen asleep, but no Pinkerton appears.  A little later that singularly unheroic person sneaks in with his wife, whom he commissions to interview Butterfly while he waits in the garden outside.  Mrs. Pinkerton rather cold-bloodedly offers to take charge of the child, to which Butterfly agrees, and, after a passionate farewell, kills herself behind a screen.  Puccini’s music is unquestionably