The year 1813 was the last season of Catalani's regular engagement on
the operatic stage. She continued to sing in "Tito" and "Figaro,"
but her principal pleasure was in the most extravagant and bizarre
show-pieces, such, for example, as variations composed for the violin
on popular airs like "God save the King," "Rule Britannia," "Cease your
Funning." She carried her departure from the true limits of art to such
an outrageous degree as to draw on her head the severest reprobation of
all good judges, though the public listened to her wonderful execution
with unbounded delight and astonishment. Toward the latter part of the
season an extraordinary riot took place in consequence of Catalani's
failure to appear two successive evenings. The managers were in arrears,
and the _diva_ by the advice of her husband adopted this plan to
force payment. There were mutterings of the thunder on the first
non-appearance; but when on the following night Catalani was still
absent, the storm broke. The opera which had been substituted was half
finished when the clamor drowned all the artistic noise behind the
footlights. A military guard who had been called in to protect the stage
from invasion were overpowered by a throng of gentlemen who leaped on
from the auditorium, many of them men of high rank, and the guns and
bayonets wrested from the soldiers' hands. Bloodshed seemed imminent;
and had it not been for the moderation of the soldiers, who permitted
themselves to be disarmed rather than fire, the result would have
been very serious. The chandeliers and mirrors were all broken into
a thousand pieces, and the musical instruments hurled around in the
wildest confusion. Fiddles, flutes, horns, drums, swords, bayonets,
muskets, operatic costumes, and stage properties generally were hurled
in a heap on the stage. The gentlemen Mohocks, who signalized themselves
on this occasion, did damage to the amount of nearly one thousand
pounds, though it is said they made it up to the manager afterward by
subscription. The theatre was closed for a week; and when it reopened,
so great was the magnificent Italian's power over the audience that,
though they came prepared to condemn, they received her with the loudest
demonstration of applause. But still such conduct toward audiences, if
followed up, could not but beget dissatisfaction and wrangling, and the
growing impatience of her managers as well as the more judicious public
could not be mistaken.
In spite of the fact that several brilliant singers were in England, and
of the desire of the public that the splendid talents of Catalani should
be appropriately supported, her jealousy and her exorbitant claims
prevented such a desirable combination. She offered to buy the theatre
and thus become sole proprietor, sole manager, and sole performer;
but, of course, the proposition was refused, luckily for the enraged
cantatrice, who would certainly have paid dearly for her experiment.
Catalani on closing her English engagement proceeded to Paris. She had
been known as an ardent friend of the Bourbon exiles, and so, during the
occupation of Paris by the Allies in 1814, she found herself in great
favor. After the Hundred Days had passed and the royal house seemed to
be firmly seated, she received a government subvention of one hundred
and sixty thousand francs and the privilege of the Opera. Catalani's
passion for absorbing everything within the radius of her own vanity and
her jealousy of rivals operated against her success in Paris, as they
had injured her in London; and she was obliged to yield up her privilege
in the course of three years, with the additional loss of five hundred
thousand francs of her own private fortune, and the loss of good will on
the part of the Paris public.
Her grand concert tour through Europe, undertaken with the purpose of
repairing her losses, was one of the most interesting portions of her
life. Everywhere she was received with abounding enthusiasm, and the
concerts were so thronged that there was rarely ever standing-room. She
sang in nearly every important city on the Continent, was the object of
the most flattering attention everywhere, and was loaded down with
the costliest presents, jewels, medals, and testimonials, everywhere.
Sovereigns vied with each other in showing their admiration by gorgeous
offerings, and her arrival in a city was looked on as a gala-day. In
the midst, however, of these the most trying circumstances in which
a beautiful and captivating woman could be placed, surrounded by
temptation and flattery, her course was marked by undeviating propriety,
and not the faintest breath tarnished her fair fame. Such an idol of
popular admiration would be sure to exhibit an overweening vanity. When
in Hamburg in 1819, M. Schevenke, a great musician, criticised her vocal
feats with severity. Mme. Catalani shrugged her beautiful shoulders and
called him "an impious man." "For," said she, "when God has given to a
mortal so extraordinary a talent as I possess, people ought to applaud
and honor it as a miracle; it is profane to depreciate the gifts of
Heaven."
It was during this tour that she met the poet Goethe at the court of
Weimar, where she was made an honored guest, as she had been treated
everywhere in royal and princely circles. At a court dinner-party where
she was present, the great German poet was as usual the cynosure of the
company. His imperial and splendid presence and world-wide fame marked
him out from all others. Catalani was struck by the appearance of this
modern Olympian god, and asked who he was. To a mind innocent of
all culture except such as touched her art merely, the name "Goethe"
conveyed but little significance. "Pray, on what instrument does he
play?" "He is no performer, madame--he is the renowned author of
'Werter.'" "Oh yes, yes, I remember," she said; then turning to the
venerable poet, she addressed him in her vivacious manner. "Ah! sir,
what an admirer I am of 'Werter!'" Flattered by her evident sincerity
and ardor, the poet bowed profoundly. "I never," continued she, in the
same lively strain, "I never read anything half so laughable in all
my life. What a capital farce it is, sir!" The poet, astounded, could
scarcely believe the evidence of his ears. "'The Sorrows of Werter' a
farce!" he murmured faintly. "Oh yes, never was anything so exquisitely
ridiculous," rejoined Catalani, with a ringing burst of laughter. It
turned out that she had been talking all the while of a ridiculous
parody of "Werter" which had been performed at one of the vaudeville
theatres of Paris, in which the sentimentality of Goethe's tale had been
most savagely ridiculed. We can fancy what Goethe's mortification was,
and how the fair _diva's_ credit was impaired at the court of Weimar by
her ignorance of the illustrious poet and of the novel whose fame had
rung through all Europe.
Mme. Catalani returned to England in 1821, and found herself the subject
of an enthusiasm little less than that which had greeted her in her
earlier prime. Her concert tour extended through all the cities of
the British kingdom. In this tour she was supported by the great tenor
Braham, as remarkable a singer in some respects as Catalani herself, and
probably the most finished artist of English birth who ever ornamented
the lyric stage. Braham had been brilliantly associated with the lyric
triumphs of Mara, Billington, and Grassini, and had been welcomed in
Italy itself as one of the finest singers in the world. When Catalani's
dramatic career in England commenced Braham had supported her, though
her jealousy soon rid her of so brilliant a competitor for the public
plaudits. Braham's part in Catalani's English concert tour was a very
important one, and some cynical wags professed to believe that as many
went to hear the great tenor as to listen to Catalani.
The electrical effect of her singing was very well shown at one of these
concerts. She introduced a song, "Delia Superba Roma," declamatory in
its nature, written for her by Marquis Sampieri. The younger Linley,
brother-in-law of Sheridan, who was playing in the orchestra, was so
moved that he forgot his own part, and on receiving a severe whispered
rebuke from the singer fainted away in his place. Mme. Catalani returned
again on finishing her English engagement to Russia, where she realized
fifteen thousand guineas in four months. Concert-rooms were too small
to hold her audiences, and she was obliged to use the great hall of the
Public Exchange, which would hold more than four thousand people. At her
last concert the Emperor and Empress loaded her with costly gifts, among
them being a girdle of magnificent diamonds.