The Sun.
London, England, 1863-06-18 00:00:00

THE MORALITY OF THE OPERA.

The following is a remarkable fragment of a

letter addressed to our ehief morning contemporary
by the Hon. Mrs. Norton in reference to her recent
work "Lost and Saved" :
The opera is unquestionably the favourite amusement o
the English aristocracy, Now, what are the plots of the
principal operas?
The plot of " Don Giovanni" is so well known that the
name has passed into a byword for profligacy. In "Norma"
two Druid priestesses are seduced. The elder priestess, with
consummate hypocrisy, continues to head all sacred rites
till jealous frenzy forces from her the fact that she is the
mother of two children. These children she threatens to
murder, but spares, and is herself executed ; leaving it
doubtful whether or not the younger priestess and incon-
stant lover are to " live happy ever after," or not.
In the" Sonnambula" a young 1 ,rd puts up at the village

inn, where two young women walk into his room at night,
one from wantonness, tho other because she is a somnanabu-

list. The somnambulist, who was a bride on the point of
marriage, is unable to convince her betrothed by any
amount of melodious argument that she is innocent, til
during a repetition of her somnambulism, he is compelled
to admit that " seeing is believing," and all ends happily.
In the " Favorita " a young monk falls in love with a lady
while dipping their mutual fingers in holy water; forsakes
his monastery; lives a life of pleasure; goes to the wars,
and returns, covered with glory, to claim her hand. But
he discovers she is mistress to a King; so renounces the
tainted bride and returns to his monastery ; where the
lady arriving, disguised as a male novice, he instantly re-
verts to his earthly passion and proposes to her to elope.
He then finds that she has poisoned herself, and appointing
the next day forhis own death from a broken heart,the piece
ends.

In "Lucrezia Borgia " a beautiful youth, of unknown
parentage, falls in love at first sight with his own mother !
Not knowing this fact, but learning that she is the in-
famous Lucrezia Borgia, he clambers up and strikes out
the first letter of her carved name with his dagger, leav-
ing the word " Orgia." Seized while completing this insult,
and dragged before her husband, a pretended pardon from
the latter (who believes him to be Lucrezia's paramour)
is followed by the presentation of a cup of poison. Lu-
crezia offers an antidote as soon as she can, and he is
saved for the nonce. But, attempting to destroy a whole
group of her insulters, with whom he is feasting, she
poisons him over again. A few drops only of the antidote
remain, which he magnanimously refuses to take, since
there is not sufficient to share with his friends. • He there-
fore dies ; learning at the last moment that the fatal en-
chantress he had adored is his profligate mother.
In Rigoletto the buffoon or jester in another most profli-
gate Court has a beautiful daughter, who is seduced by the
Duke, his master, while he is encouraging the Duke's vices
and ridiculing the misery of an aged nobleman in whose
family the like misfortune has ,ccurred. Cursed solemnly
by the old nobleman, he discovers that his daughter is
ruined, and that he himself connived at her fall, thinking
it was the abduction of some other woman. Finally, he
hires an assassin to murder the lover, ties him up in a sack
and throw him into the river; but the daughter is unfor•
tunately murdered in mistake by the hired bravo, so that
when the father triumphantly drags out the sack with the
body he finds it to be the corpse of his own child.
We have, besides these, an operatic version of Goethe's
"Faust ;" and " Traviata," a story of an " unfortunate"
beloved by a young gentleman of good fortune, and held to
be (Heaven knows why) a more improper opera than even
„ . _

" Lucrezia Borgia."
Such are the subjects which twice or three times a week
recreate the understandings of the higher classes of Great
Britain. Whatever of sensuality can be added to these
themes by the sensuality of sweet music, the glitter of lights
and decoration, and the usual temptations of a theatre, find
their full measure in that ever fluctuating crowd, the whole
entertainment winding up with the " ballet," an amuse-
ment which an intelligent Indian gentleman affirmed it had
" paralysed him with astonishment" to find was an enter-
tainment for both sexes.

"To the pu►e all things are pure," and " habit makes
burdens light, ' and therefore I do not say that these extra-
ordinarily vicious stories need of themselves corrupt any
one. But Ido say that there is something very ludicrous
in the students of such subjects' becoming discontented if
any moral warning respecting their own world be offered,
instead of these motiveless fables of sin.