Perhaps the most striking fact regarding the career of the famous prima donna is that she was born of strict Presbyterian parents, who held the theatre and opera house in abhorrence. Indeed, her father, Mr. David Mitchell, who still lives in Melbourne, where his daughter was born, had such a repugnance of his daughter becoming a professional vocalist that he actually never heard her sing in public until she revisited Melbourne at the zenith of her fame a few years ago. Madame Melba was born on May 19, 1863, and it was in the early eighties that she began to come into prominence at concerts in Melbourne, and as principal soprano in the most popular Roman Catholic church of that city. At that time she was known as Mrs. Armstrong, having married, before she was out of her teens, Captain C. F. Armstrong, son of an Irish baronet. Five years after her marriage, and after studying in Paris under the famous Madame Marchesi, she made her operatic debut in Brussels as " Gilda " in " Rigoletto," and in the following year appeared at Covent Garden, since when, as everyone knows, her career has been one long series of vocal triumphs. Madame Melba, when in London, lives in Great Cumberland Place, where she has a beautiful house, packed with trophies and mementos of her wonderful career as a singer.

Madame Melba Dinham