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    c queen then understood why Don Aguilar had yielded so easily to the remonstrances of the reverend father , Agostino Sanchez ; and she rejoiced greatly in the conversion of Zuleima . Some few days after , Zuleima was baptized , receiving the name of Julia . The queen herself atid the marquis of Cadiz were the

    god-parents of the beautiful Moor . Anybody would have thought that Julia ' s singing would have become more fervent still , after her baptism ; but it happened quite the contrary . She often put out the choir by striking the deep tones of her cithern , which resounded along the vaulted temple , like the murrnurings of a

    coming storm ; and sometimes she interrupted the Latin hymns by singing Moorish words . Sister Emanuella , the chorus-mistress , warned the new convert to resist womanfully the devil , the secret enemy of her soul , who tempted her ; but Julia , instead of following her advice , very often sang , to the great scandal of the elder sisters , tender Moorish love-songs ,. at the very moment when the chorusses of old Ferrara were thundered in the ears of the saints .

    She accompanied those ballads with a light arpeggio , which contrasted strangely with the church music , and brought to recollection the sound of the little Moorish flutes / ' Flauti piccoli , octave flutes , ' said the chapel-master . c But , really , my dear friend , there is in your tale absolutely nothing at all for an opera ; not even an explanation , at the beginning , and

    that is the principal thing . The episode of the cithern did certainly strike me a little . But tell me , my dear friend , with respect to Julia being incited by the devil , do you think , as I do , that the devil has a tenor voice , and sings falsetto devilish well V ' My dear chapel-master , you become every day more and more caustic ; do pray allow me to continue my story , for I am approaching a very critical part . ' One day , the q ueen , accompanied by the principal captains of the army , attended the cloisters of the Benedictine nuns ,

    according to custom , to hear mass . A mendicant , covered with rags , had placed himself near the great gates , and when the guards would have driven him away , he bounded from one side to the other like a madman , and even knocked against the queen . Don Aguilar was going to strike him with his sword ; but the mendicant drew a cithern from under his tattered mantle , and made it give out tones so strange , that every body was struck with fear . When the guards had removed him , the queen

    was informed that he was a Moorish prisoner , who , being witless , was allowed to range the camp and amuse the soldiers with his songs . The queen entered the church , and the service commenced . When the sisters of the choir had thundered out the " Sanctus , " at the moment when Julia was beginning , in a sonorous voice , " Pleni sunt coeli gloria tu& / ' the sound of a cithern was heard in the church , and the new convert , closing her book , was going to leave the choir . The superior , Donna Maria , in vain endeavoured

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    The Sanctus . 87

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  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1835, page 87, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2642/page/7/