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The Emperor Leopold the first, not only a lover and patron of music, but a good composer himself, ordered his am- bassador, at Rome, to entreat the Pope to permit him to have a copy of the cele- brated Miserere of Allegri, for the use of the Imperial chapel at Vienna; which be- ing granted, a copy was made by the Sig- nor Maestro of the Pope's chapel, and sent to the Emperor, who had then in his service some of the first singers of the age; but, notwithstanding the abilities of the performers, this composition was so far from answering the expectations of the Emperor and his court, in the execu- tion, that he concluded the Pope's Maestro di Capella, in order to keep it a mystery, had put a trick upon him, and sent him another composition *.
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