294 THE MUSICIAN ABOUT TOWN. 
tion of the plebeian is indispensable. We plead for no indiscrimi- 
nate mixing up of the classes in society ; there must and will be 
Gibeonites in the camp. But he must be unobservant indeed who 
cannot perceive that a finer tone of civility has of late years per- 
vaded the deportment of our “ hewers of wood ;” and we believe 
that as, in proportion to their mental culture, men more accurately 
estimate their own position in society, and are prepared to render 
justice to that of their superiors (for it is the brutal only who are 
mere levellers of all distinction), so we believe that, effectually to 
maintain that distinction, the “ lower orders” should be courteously 
admitted to all public institutions, and above all to those great as- 
sociations whose object and tendency are to refine the feelings and 
soften the character : and therefore (returning from this digression) 
we believe that the stewards of the three choirs will consult the 
interests of the charities, and their own true dignity, by erecting 
galleries and issuing tickets at low prices, for the accommodation of 
the humbler classes. 'The committee for the Worcester festival, 
which will take place next year, and the members of which, we 
understand, have already begun to make preparatory arrangements, 
will, we hope, take our suggestion into consideration. 
The fullest audiences at the Gloucester festival were assembled 
on the performance of the ‘‘ Messiah” and “St. Paul;” at the 
evening concerts the chief attractions were, as might be expected, 
the singing of Grisi, Ivanoff, and Lablache. Mad. Albertazzi’s 
engagement was fortunately annulled, from her being unable to 
fulfil it, on the score of indisposition. The rupture of her contract 
with the Gloucester committee, as also subsequently with Dr, Cam- 
midge of York, at whose subscription concerts she had entered into 
a treaty, and was advertised to sing, created an undue emotion in 
the newspapers, with more proing and conning than fifty people in 
the country cared about for one moment. As regards Dr. Cam- 
midge, we should suppose that his disappointment at the absence of 
Mad. Albertazzi involved no pecuniary loss, while in the case of the 
Gloucester festival it must have been a positive saving to the stew- 
ards of £300., the reported sum which they had consented to pay 
the lady for her services. After the deplorable exhibition which 
Mad. Albertazzi made at Hereford the year before, it was a subject 
of surprise to every one that the Gloucester committee: should have 
consented to treat with her upon any terms (for they did not want 
her) ; and most-especially were the profession annoyed at the sum 
which Mad. Albertazzi was to have received, when the most emi- 
nent of the instrumentalists, upon the same occasion, had been per- 
