In Manhattan

At the Metropolitan, Massenet's Le Roi de Lahore was given its first showing one evening last week. As a stage spectacle, it was ultra-magnificent. Boris Anisfeld, most vigorous of modern Russian 'decorative artists, given a free hand with Eastern temple scenes and Oriental Gardens of Paradise, had splashed his paint regardless. The story, too, had its points as melodrama. Alim (King of Lahore), Scindia (Prime Minister), Timur (High Priest), the god Indra, rajahs, priests, fakirs, soldiers, dancers, bayaderes, slaves, musicians united in scenes of love and war to produce a scheme of action, ending gloriously in two suicides that gave unexampled opportunities to the composer. But Massenet's score disappointed those who might ignorantly have looked for more Meditations from Thais.

Le Roi de Lahore is one of Massenet's early operas, done in 1877, a year after Verdi's Aida, came to Paris. Its music was not written for the soul, but for pearly necks and starched bosoms.