The demand was irresistible; for when he hesitated,
the persuasive though stern mouth of a musket hinted to him in
expressive silence that he had better prevent its speech with song.
So he had to make his first appearance upon that "unworthy scaffold,"
before an audience which, multifold as his experience had been, was
one such as he had never sung to yet. As the shadows of evening
began to fall, rough torches of pine wood were lighted and shed a
glare such as Salvator Rosa loved to kindle, upon a scene such as he
delighted to paint. The rascals had taste,--that the tenor himself
could not deny. They knew the choice bits of the operas which held
the stage forty years ago, and they called for them wisely and
applauded his efforts vociferously. Nay, more, in the height of
their enthusiasm, they would toss him one of his own doubloons or
dollars, instead of the bouquets usually hurled at well-deserving
singers. They well judged that these flowers that never fade would
be the tribute he would value most, and so they rewarded his
meritorious strains out of his own stores, as Claude Du Val or
Richard Tarpin, in the golden days of highway robbery, would
sometimes generously return a guinea to a traveller he had just
lightened of his purse, to enable him to continue his journey. It
was lucky for the unfortunate G---- that their approbation took this
solid shape, or he would have been badly off indeed; for it was all
he had to begin the world with over again.
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