DEAR AUNT,--We have now been here a week, and I feel ashamed that I have
not written to you before, but I have been doing a great deal. The Cooleys
have a gorgeous house in Fifth Avenue, furnished with every luxury one can
imagine. The sitting-room, dining-room, library, and a conservatory next
to the billiard-room, are down-stairs; up-stairs are the drawing-rooms
(first, second, and third), which open into a marble-floored Pompeian
room, with a fountain. Then comes mama's and my bed-room, with bath-room
attached. On the third floor the family have their apartment. We have been
many times to the opera, and heard an Italian tenor, called Brignoli, whom
people are crazy over. He has a lovely voice and sings in "Trovatore."
Last night, when he sang "Di quella pira," people's enthusiasm knew no
bounds. They stood up and shouted, and ladies waved their handkerchiefs;
he had to repeat it three times, and each time people got wilder. Nina and
I clapped till our gloves were in pieces and our arms actually ached.
A Frenchman by the name of Musard has brought over a French orchestra, and
is playing French music at the opera-house. People are wild over him also.
Madame La Grange, who they say is a fine lady in her own country, is
singing in "The Huguenots." She has rather a thin voice, but vocalizes
beautifully. Nina and I weep over the hard fate of Valentine, who has to
be present when her husband is conspiring against the Huguenots, knowing
that her lover is listening behind the curtain and can't get away. The
priests come in and bless the conspiracy, all the conspirators holding
their swords forward to be blessed. This music is really too splendid for
words, and we enjoy it intensely.
Mr. Bancroft, the celebrated historian, invited us to dinner, and after
dinner they asked me to sing. I had to accompany myself. Every one
pretended that they were enchanted. Just for fun, at the end I sang,
"Three Little Kittens Took Off Their Mittens, to Eat a Christmas Pie," and
one lady (would you believe it?) said she wept tears of joy, and had cold
shivers down her back. When I sang, "For We Have Found Our Mittens," there
was, she said, such a jubilant ring in my voice that her heart leaped for
joy.
Mr. Bancroft sent me the next day a volume of Bryant's poems, with the
dedication, "To Miss Lillie Greenough, in souvenir of a never-forgetable
evening." I made so many acquaintances, and received so many invitations,
that if we should stay much longer here there would be nothing left of me
to take to Europe.
I will write as soon as we arrive on the other side. On whatever side I
am, I am always your loving niece, who thinks that there is no one in the
wide world to compare to you, that no one is as clever as you, that no one
can sing like you, and that there never was any one who can hold a candle
to you. There!