Some first-rate songsters have been produced among
them, whose merits have been acknowledged, not only by the Russian
public, but by the most fastidious foreign critics. Perhaps the
highest compliment ever paid to a songster was paid by Catalani
herself to one of these daughters of Roma. It is well known
throughout Russia that the celebrated Italian was so enchanted with
the voice of a Moscow Gypsy (who, after the former had displayed
her noble talent before a splendid audience in the old Russian
capital, stepped forward and poured forth one of her national
strains), that she tore from her own shoulders a shawl of cashmire,
which had been presented to her by the Pope, and, embracing the
Gypsy, insisted on her acceptance of the splendid gift, saying,
that it had been intended for the matchless songster, which she now
perceived she herself was not.
The sums obtained by many of these females by the exercise of their
art enable them to support their relatives in affluence and luxury:
some are married to Russians, and no one who has visited Russia can
but be aware that a lovely and accomplished countess, of the noble
and numerous family of Tolstoy, is by birth a Zigana, and was
originally one of the principal attractions of a Rommany choir at
Moscow.
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