Mold read for the author.  I never could satisfy myself by what magic the skilful reader gained our unanimous approbation of a ridiculous work.  Surely the delightful voice of Mold, by awakening our recollection of the dramatic beauties of the French stage, prevented the wretched lines of Dorat Cubieres from striking on our ears.  I can assert that the exclamation Charming! charming! repeatedly interrupted the reader.  The piece was admitted for performance at Fontainebleau; and for the first time the King had the curtain dropped before the end of the play.  It was called the “Dramomane” or “Dramaturge.”  All the characters died of eating poison in a pie.  The Queen, highly disconcerted at having recommended this absurd production, announced that she would never hear another reading; and this time she kept her word.

The tragedy of “Mustapha and Mangir,” by M. de Chamfort, was highly successful at the Court theatre at Fontainebleau.  The Queen procured the author a pension of 1,200 francs, but his play failed on being performed at Paris.

The spirit of opposition which prevailed in that city delighted in reversing the verdicts of the Court.  The Queen determined never again to give any marked countenance to new dramatic works.  She reserved her patronage for musical composers, and in a few years their art arrived at a perfection it had never before attained in France.

It was solely to gratify the Queen that the manager of the Opera brought the first company of comic actors to Paris.  Gluck, Piccini, and Sacchini were attracted there in succession.  These eminent composers were treated with great distinction at Court.  Immediately on his arrival in France, Gluck was admitted to the Queen’s toilet, and she talked to him all the time he remained with her.  She asked him one day whether he had nearly brought his grand opera of “Armide” to a conclusion, and whether it pleased him.  Gluck replied very coolly, in his German accent, “Madame, it will soon be finished, and really it will be superb.”  There was a great outcry against the confidence with which the composer had spoken of one of his own productions.  The Queen defended him warmly; she insisted that he could not be ignorant of the merit of his works; that he well knew they were generally admired, and that no doubt he was afraid lest a modesty, merely dictated by politeness, should look like affectation in him.

[Gluck often had to deal with self-sufficiency equal to his own.  He was very reluctant to introduce long ballets into “Iphigenia.”  Vestris deeply regretted that the opera was not terminated by a piece they called a chaconne, in which he displayed all his power.  He complained to Gluck about it.  Gluck, who treated his art with all the dignity it merits, replied that in so interesting a subject dancing would be misplaced.  Being pressed another time by Vestris on the same subject, “A chaconne!  A chaconne!” roared out the enraged musician; “we must describe the Greeks; and had the Greeks chaconnes?” “They had not?” returned the astonished dancer; “why, then, so much the worse for them!”—­Note by the editor.]