Note 44 — Chapter VIII · FRENCH OPERA FROM LULLI TO THE DEATH OF RAMEAU.

Compare this with the Duke of Wellington keeping foxhounds in the Peninsula, and observe the characteristic pastimes of English and French generals. So, in our House of Commons, there is always an adjournment over the Derby day; in France, nothing used to empty the Chamber of Deputies so much as a new opera; and during the last French republic, when a question affecting its very existence was about to be discussed, the Assemblée Nationale was quite deserted, from the anxiety of the members to be present at the first representation of the Prophète.