Though the Luebeck maiden had stirred no bad blood between them, musical rivalry did.  A dispute in the theatre resulted in a duel.  The only thing that saved.  Handel’s life was a great brass button that shivered his antagonist’s point, when they were parted to become firm friends again.

While at Hamburg Handel’s first two operas were composed, “Almira” and “Nero.”  Both of these were founded on dark tales of crime and sorrow, and, in spite of some beautiful airs and clever instrumentation, were musical failures, as might be expected.

Handel had had enough of manufacturing operas in Germany, and so in July, 1706, he went to Florence.  Here he was cordially received; for Florence was second to no city in Italy in its passion for encouraging the arts.  Its noble specimens of art creations in architecture, painting, and sculpture, produced a powerful impression upon the young musician.  In little more than a week’s time he composed an opera, “Rodrigo,” for which he obtained one hundred sequins.  His next visit was to Venice, where he arrived at the height of the carnival.  Whatever effect Venice, with its weird and mysterious beauty, with its marble palaces, facades, pillars, and domes, its magnificent shrines and frescoes, produced on Handel, he took Venice by storm.  Handel’s power as an organist and a harpsichord player was only second to his strength as a composer, even when, in the full zenith of his maturity, he composed the “Messiah” and “Judas Maccabaeus.”

“Il caro Sassone,” the dear Saxon, found a formidable opponent as well as dear friend in the person of Scarlatti.  One night at a masked ball, given by a nobleman, Handel was present in disguise.  He sat at the harpsichord, and astonished the company with his playing; but no one could tell who it was that ravished the ears of the assembly.  Presently another masquerader came into the room, walked up to the instrument, and called out:  “It is either the devil or the Saxon!” This was Scarlatti, who afterward had with Handel, in Florence and Rome, friendly contests of skill, in which it seemed difficult to decide which was victor.  To satisfy the Venetian public, Handel composed the opera “Agrippina,” which made a furore among all the connoisseurs of the city.

So, having seen the summer in Florence and the carnival in Venice, he must hurry on to be in time for the great Easter celebrations in Rome.  Here he lived under the patronage of Cardinal Otto-boni, one of the wealthiest and most liberal of the Sacred College.  The cardinal was a modern representative of the ancient patrician.  Living himself in princely luxury, he endowed hospitals and surgeries for the public.  He distributed alms, patronized men of science and art, and entertained the public with comedies, operas, oratorios, puppet-shows, and academic disputes.  Under the auspices of this patron, Handel composed three operas and two oratorios.  Even at this early period the young composer was parting company with the strict old musical traditions, and his works showed an extraordinary variety and strength of treatment.