airs were sung throughout the land, and published as harpsichord pieces; for in these halcyon days of our composers the whole atmosphere of the land was full of the flavor and color of Handel.  Many of the melodies in these now forgotten operas have been worked up by modern composers, and so have passed into modern music unrecognized.  It is a notorious fact that the celebrated song, “Where the Bee sucks,” by Dr. Arne, is taken from a movement in “Rinaldo.”  Thus the new life of music is ever growing rich with the dead leaves of the past.  The most celebrated of these operas was entitled “Otto.”  It was a work composed of one long string of exquisite gems, like Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” and Gounod’s “Faust.”  Dr. Pepusch, who had never quite forgiven Handel for superseding him as the best organist in England, remarked, of one of the airs, “That great bear must have been inspired when he wrote that air.”  The celebrated Madame Cuzzoni made her debut in it.  On the second night the tickets rose to four guineas each, and Cuzzoni received two thousand pounds for the season.

The composer had already begun to be known for his irascible temper.  It is refreshing to learn that operatic singers of the day, however whimsical and self-willed, were obliged to bend to the imperious genius of this man.  In a spirit of ill-timed revolt Cuzzoni declined to sing an air.  She had already given him trouble by her insolence and freaks, which at times were unbearable.  Handel at last exploded.  He flew at the wretched woman and shook her like a rat.  “Ah!  I always knew you were a fery tevil,” he cried, “and I shall now let you know that I am Beelzebub, the prince of de tevils!” and, dragging her to the open window, was just on the point of pitching her into the street when, in every sense of the word, she recanted.  So, when Carestini, the celebrated tenor, sent back an air, Handel was furious.  Rushing into the trembling Italian’s house, he said, in his four- or five-language style:  “You tog! don’t I know better as yourself vaat it pest for you to sing?  If you vill not sing all de song vaat I give you, I vill not pay you ein stiver.”  Among the anecdotes told of Handel’s passion is one growing out of the composer’s peculiar sensitiveness to discords.  The dissonance of the tuning-up period of an orchestra is disagreeable to the most patient.  Handel, being peculiarly sensitive to this unfortunate necessity, always arranged that it should take place before the audience assembled, so as to prevent any sound of scraping or blowing.  Unfortunately, on one occasion, some wag got access to the orchestra where the ready-tuned instruments were lying, and with diabolical dexterity put every string and crook out of tune.  Handel enters.  All the bows are raised together, and at the given beat all start off con spirito.  The effect was startling in the extreme.  The unhappy maestro rushes madly from his place, kicks to pieces the first double-bass he sees, and, seizing a kettle-drum, throws