The Queen favours their love, but the King
wishes Isabelle to marry Comminges, a favourite of his own. The young
couple gain their point, and are married secretly in the chapel of the
Pre aux Clercs, but only at the expense of as much plotting and as many
disguises as would furnish the stock-in-trade of half-a-dozen detective
romances.
French music, as has often been pointed out, owes much to foreign
influence, but very few of the strangers to whom the doors of Parisian
opera-houses were opened left a deeper impression upon the music of
their adopted country than Meyerbeer (1791-1864). Giacomo Meyerbeer, to
give him the name by which he is now best known, underwent the same
influence as Herold. As a youth he was intimate with Weber, and his
first visit to Italy introduced him to Rossini, whose brilliant style he
imitated successfully in a series of Italian works which are now
completely forgotten. From Italy Meyerbeer came to Paris, and there
identified himself with the French school so fully that he is now
regarded with complete propriety as a French composer pure and simple.
Meyerbeer's music is thoroughly eclectic in type. He was a careful
student of contemporary music, and the various phases through which he
passed during the different stages of his career left their impress upon
his style. It says much for the power of his individuality that he was
able to weld such different elements into something approaching an
harmonious whole.
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