and consents to marry Lord Arthur.  No sooner has she set her name to the contract than the door opens and Edgar appears.  Confronted with the proof of Lucy’s inconstancy, he curses the house of Lammermoor and rushes away.  Ashton follows him, and, after a stormy interview, challenges him to mortal combat.  Meanwhile, on her bridal night Lucy has lost her reason and in her frenzy stabbed her unfortunate bridegroom.  On coming once more to her senses, she puts an end to her own life; while Edgar, on hearing of the tragedy, betakes himself to the tombs of his ancestors and there commits suicide.  Much of the music suffers from the conventionality to which Donizetti was a slave, notably the ridiculous mad scene, a delightfully suave melody ending with an elaborate cadenza divided between the voice and flute; but there are passages of real power, such as the fine sextet in the contract scene, and the gloomy air in which the hero calls upon the spirits of his forefathers.

Less sombre than ‘Lucia,’ and quite as tuneful, is ‘Lucrezia Borgia,’ once a prime favourite at Covent Garden, but now rarely heard.  Lucrezia Borgia, the wife of Alfonso of Ferrara, has recognised Gennaro, a young Venetian, as an illegitimate son of her own, and watches over him with tender interest, though she will not disclose the real relation in which they stand to one another.  Gennaro, taunted by his friends with being a victim of Lucrezia’s fascinations, publicly insults her, and is thereupon condemned to death by the Duke, who is glad of the opportunity of taking vengeance upon the man whom he believes to be his wife’s paramour.  Gennaro is poisoned in the presence of his mother, who, however, directly the Duke’s back is turned, gives him an antidote which restores him to health.  In the last act Lucrezia takes comprehensive vengeance upon the friends of Gennaro, whose taunts still rankle in her bosom, by poisoning all the wine at a supper party.  Unfortunately Gennaro happens to be present, and as this time he refuses to take an antidote, even though Lucrezia reveals herself as his mother, he expires in her arms.

There is little attempt at dramatic significance in the music of ‘Lucrezia Borgia,’ but the score bubbles over with delicious and wholly inappropriate melodies.  Occasionally, as in the final scene, there is a touch of pathos, and sometimes some rather effective concerted music; but, for the most part, Donizetti was content to write his charming tunes, and to leave all expression to the singers.  The orchestration of his Italian operas is primitive in the extreme, and amply justifies Wagner’s taunt about the ‘big guitar.’  In works written for foreign theatres Donizetti took more pains, and ‘La Favorite,’ produced in Paris in 1840, is in many ways the strongest of his tragic works.  The story is more than usually repulsive.  Fernando, a novice at the convent of St. James of Compostella, is about to take monastic vows, when he catches sight of a fair penitent, and bids farewell to the Church