manufactory immediately at work. He continued to represent Chippenham till 24 July 1830. The battle of Waterloo, with horses, foot soldiers, and set scenes, was presented at Vauxhall in 1827 and 1828. Sir Henry Bishop was the musical director in 1830, and in the succeeding year Gye invented and introduced some ingenious optical illusions. The visitor saw a basket of fruit which retreated as he advanced to touch it; and looking through a telescope at a dead wall, beheld a living person who was nowhere else to be seen. In 1834 Vauxhall Gardens were open three alternate nights a week, and the proprietors took singers, musicians, fireworks, and lamps to Sydney Gardens, Bath, on the alternate nights. In 1836 the gardens were opened for the first time with day fêtes, of which balloon ascents formed the chief attraction. At this time Charles Green [q. v.] built for the proprietors of the establishment the Great Nassau balloon, a machine much larger and of superior make to any previously seen (Turnor, Astra Castra, 1865, pp. 139-140, 158, 166, 361). In 1837 Gye brought from Paris and introduced to the public 'poses plastiques;' and it was on 24 July in this year that Cocking was killed in attempting to descend in a parachute from the Great Nassau balloon [see Green, Charles].
In 1836 the wine company, owing to an unfortunate speculation in port, in which the principal part of a bad vintage had been bought, proved a failure, and in 1840 the tea company was sold. A long series of mishaps, including a succession of wet seasons, compelled Gye to give up Vauxhall in 1840. He then retired from business and lived at Brighton. He died of influenza at 2 Lansdowne Street, Hove, Brighton, 13 Feb. 1869, aged 88. His son Frederick is separately noticed.
[Historical Account of Vauxhall, published by the proprietors, Gye and Balne, 1822; Edwards's Lyrical Drama, 1881, pp. 15-30; Era Almanac, 1870, pp. 9-16, by E.L. Blanchard ; Vauxhall Gardens, a Collection of Bills, 1824-1845, in British Museum.]
GYE, FREDERICK, the younger (1810–1878), director of Italian opera, son of Frederick Gye the elder [q. v.], was born at Finchley, Middlesex, in 1810, and educated at Frankfort-on-the-Main. He assisted his father in the management of Vauxhall Gardens from about 1830, and at the same period had a contract for lighting some of the government buildings. He was afterwards associated with Monsieur L. G. A. J. Jullien in the Covent Garden promenade concerts in 1846, and was his acting-manager when that gentleman opened Drury Lane Theatre as an English opera house in 1847. When Edward Delafield became lessee of the Italian Opera House, Covent Garden, in 1848, Gye was appointed business manager. On 14 July 1849 Delafield was made a bankrupt; Gye, in conjunction with the artists, carried on the house for the remainder of the season as a joint-stock undertaking. In September 1849 he was the acknowledged lessee, having obtained a lease for seven years, and receiving a salary of 1,500l. per annum as manager. On 24 July in that year he produced Meyerbeer's ‘Le Prophète,’ but it never became a favourite piece in England. In 1851 the repertory of Covent Garden included thirty-three operas, three of which were by Meyerbeer. On 9 Aug. Gounod's ‘Sappho’ was played, the first opera by that composer that was heard in England, but it was a failure. Johanna Wagner, a German prima donna, breaking her contract with Benjamin Lumley in 1852, engaged to sing for Gye. Legal proceedings ensued, and in the queen's bench on 20 Feb. 1853 judgment was given in favour of Lumley, but without costs (Lumley, Reminiscences of the Opera, 1864, pp. 328–33; Ball, Leading Cases on the Law of Torts, 1884, pp. 135–52). In 1853 Verdi's ‘Rigoletto’ and Berlioz's ‘Benvenuto Cellini’ were given for the first time in England. Covent Garden had now become a success, good operas, with the best artists, and Michael Costa as conductor, serving to draw paying audiences; but on 5 March 1856 the house was destroyed by fire [see Anderson, John Henry]. Gye received 8,000l. from the insurance offices for the properties in the house, which were valued at 40,000l.
The opera during the seasons of 1856 and 1857, commencing 15 April 1856, was held in the Lyceum Theatre, where in the first season forty operas were given, and advertised as being under Gye's direction. The renters and proprietors of Covent Garden finding themselves unable to collect the money to rebuild that theatre, Gye with great energy raised or became accountable for 120,000l., the sum which the new structure cost. The opera house, from the designs of Edward Barry, R.A., was commenced and completed in the short period of six months (Walford, Old and New London, iii. 236–7). In 1857 Gye obtained a new ground lease from the Duke of Bedford for ninety years at a rent of 850l., and opened the house 15 April 1858, when the novelty was Flotow's ‘Martha.’ In the following year Meyerbeer's ‘Dinorah’ was added to the repertory. In 1860 concerts were given in the newly built Floral Hall, adjoining Covent Garden Market. The notable event of 1861 was the appearance on 14 May of Adelina Maria Clorinda Patti as Amina in ‘La Sonnambula.’
