The plague of darkness opens the opera, the passage of the Red Sea concludes it.

Rossini's stage manager had no difficulty with the former, which demanded nothing more than the lowering of the stage lights.

But he could evolve no device which could save the final miracle from laughter.

A hilarious ending to so solemn a work disturbed the management and the librettist, Totola, who, just before a projected revival in Naples, a year or two after the first production, came to the composer with a project for saving the third act.

Rossini was in bed, as usual, and the poet showed him the text of the prayer, "Dal tuo stellato," which he said he had written in an hour.