How different in disposition, and, alas, in conduct, was our incomparable warbler Mrs. Billington! As the following anecdotes of this celebrated singer convey, to my mind, a not uninstructive lesson to such of my fair countrywomen as may be in possession of this most fascinating, as well as most dangerous, of all God's gifts, when unaccompanied by good conduct, I shall introduce them into the present chapter.

Mrs. Billington came to Naples in the year 1794, accompanied by her husband, a doublebass player, and her brother Charles Weischell, the famous performer on the violin. She was soon engaged to sing at the theatre San Carlo; and on her account Signor Bianchi was instructed to set to music the opera of Ines di Castro; into which, in consequence of her defective memory, she instructed him to introduce a favourite song, which she had for years been giving in London, composed by Salicri. Bianchi complied with her request, but added thereto a few bars and three cadenzas, in order that she might change them in the course of the opera; Cimarosa also wrote three; the German composer, Hermil, added three more; while Marescalche, one of the orchestra, and a music seller, likewise contri

buted three; making up amongst them a round dozen, all of them obligatos, which she was to sing, accompanied by her brother the violinist.

It will scarcely be credited, that this most skilful singer possessed so little nature and so much science, that she actually began the Carnival with the first cadenza, and ended it, without varying a note during the whole time. Whatever she had determined on doing, she executed to the greatest perfection; but in point of genius, and at variations, or at an impromptu, she was a mere dunce, and, in every respect, what the Italians call una testa dura.

Mrs. Billington had not been long at Naples before she attracted the attention of princes, dukes, barons, counts, and commoners. Her amazing musical powers, with her great personal charms, and the facility with which those charms were yielded up, and perhaps for the first time opposed by her hitherto complaisant husband, gave birth to a rumour of his having been carried off by poison. The occasion of it was this.

On the second day of her first engagement at the theatre San Carlo, after she and Mr. Billington had been dining with an English family who were lodging in the same hótel, he went up stairs to fetch the cloak in which she was

about to go to the theatre, when, while in the act of putting it on her shoulders, without uttering a. syllable, he dropped down at her feet, and expired!

Great suspicions were entertained that this sudden event had been occasioned by poison; but, the characters both of Mr. and Mrs. Billington were too well established in the world of gallantry, to render the supposition that the husband, through jealousy, had taken poison, credible, or that the wife had administered the potion for the sake of gratifying her passions ad libitum. No, no! Mr. and Mrs. Billington understood each other's necessities far better! The easy compliances of the lady were too profitable to the fiddler, to render such a result probable.

Mrs. Billington, however, soon consoled herself for the loss of her double-bass husband, in the arms of those who performed more to her satisfaction on the strings of her heart, not only during the remainder of her stay at Naples, but in every town which she visited. Her vast musical talents, added to her nightly personal fame, never failed to furnish her with what the French call de grande pratique. Lovers, admirers, cavalieri servanti, were accepted by her and dismissed, as easily as fashions are taken up

and laid down, according as inclination, or reasons of a more solid nature, happened to predominate. Happily for the public at large, no individual occupied her undivided attention, until, by a turn of the wheel of fortune, she found herself engaged at the theatre della Scala at Milan. Here it was that Mrs. Billington got acquainted with a fellow of the name of Filisan, a native of Lyons, who had, it is said, been one of the active murderous agents, employed against the unfortunate nobility, who fell by wholesale in the Place du bel Course of that city, by cannon à la mitraille; it being then thought more expeditious, as it was at a time of the year when the days were getting short, and at a period when the blood-hounds had a deal of business on their hands, to fire on the wretched victims of revolutionary phrenzy in groups, than to dispatch them separately by the sainte guillotine.

The work of slaughter being at length accomplished, Filisan followed the army of cutthroats to Italy, and arrived with it at Milan, in the capacity of a garde-magasin. Being in the prime of youth, possessing a fine athletic figure and other personal advantages, he soon got introduced to the company of the filles des menus plaisirs, who formed the corps de ballet;

and, step by step, he ingratiated himself into the society of the principal dancers at the theatre della Scala, and amongst the rest into the society of the Zerbi, a lady who was at that time as celebrated for her feats on the " light fantastic toe," as she was for the liberality with which she dispensed her personal favours; and who afterwards, though a woman of the lowest extraction, and the sister of a sbirro, became the wife of Alvise Manin, nephew to the last Doge of Venice: whom, by the bye, she has ruined by her extravagance.

Finding, however, that her connection with Filisan was unfavourable to her private speculations, and having also, on sundry occasions, felt the weight of his massy fist on her slender and elegant shoulders, and the nimbleness of his fingers in her pockets, whenever she brought home her earnings from the theatre, she thought proper to discard from her favour a man, whom she found intent on gratifying his amour propre at the expense of her professional labours.

In this unsatisfactory state of his affairs Filisan cast his eyes about, and at last fixed them on Mrs. Billington, who was then singing at the same theatre; and, so well did the wary Frenchman play his part, that in a very short time the lady became Madame Filisan, to the great as