Z usir.
THE lessee of the Royal Italian Opera Covent Garden has issued his annual prospectus of the season. The theatre will open on Tuesday, the 2nd of April, with the Prophite, in which Tamberlik and Csillag, the hero and heroine of that opera last season, will reappear. The names of Grisi and Mario, for the first time since the establishment of the Royal Italian Opera, are not in the list of the company. They have gone over to the rival house, from which they were the leaders of the secession which proved so ruinous to Mr. Lumley fourteen years ago. The list, however, contains many of the favourites of former years; Mesdames Peneo, Didi6e, Csillag, Corbari, and Miolan- Carvalho ; Messieurs Tamberlik, Neri-Baraldi, Ronconi, Tagliafieo, Zelg,er, Faure, Graziani, and Formes. We expected to find the names of the sisters Marchisio, the soprano and contralto who have made so great a sensation in Paris during last season, it having been re- peatedly affirmed that they were engaged by Mr. Gye ; and we regret to find that this is not the ease. Only one new name is men- tioned—Ziberini, a tenor of some repute in Italy. Only one new opera, too, is promised, B Ballo in Maschera, the latest production of Verdi, who, it is said, has abandoned his art for the sake of poli- tics, being an ardent liberal, and a deputy to the new parliament of United Italy. From all this we have little prospect of novelty. But the company is sufficiently strong, and the repertoire of the theatre sufficiently ample, to furnish the means of a satisfactory and suc- cessful season.
It is ramoured—and the rumour is gaining strength—that Jenny Lind is about to reappear before the pu.blic in a series of Concerts, to be given by Mr. Gye in the "Floral Hall" of Covent Garden Theatre.
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