:

silenced but if I were once to knock under to him, he would lead me the life of a galley-slave.

Scene II.

GHERARDO, VIRGINIO, and MESSER PIERO.

Gherardo. I will endow her as you desire; and if you do not find your son, you will add a thousand golden florins. Virginio. Be it so.

Messer Piero. I am much deceived, or I have seen this gentleman before.

Virginio. What are you looking at, good sir?

Messer Piero. Certainly, this is my old master. Do you know in this town one Signor Vincenzio Bellenzini?

Virginio. I know him well. He has no better friend than I am.

Messer Piero. Assuredly, you are he. Salve, patronorum optime.*

Virginio. Are you Messer Pietro de' Pagliaricci, my son's tutor?

Messer Piero. I am, indeed.

Virginio. Oh, my son! Woe is me! What news do you bring me of him? Where did you leave him? Where did he die? For dead he must be, or I should not have been so long without hearing from him. Those traitors murdered him-those Jews, those dogs. Oh, my son! my greatest blessing in the world! Tell me of him, dear master.

Messer Piero. Do not weep, sir, for heaven's sake. Your son is alive and well.

Gherardo. If this is true, I lose the thousand florins. Take care, Virginio, that this man is not a cheat.

Messer Piero. Parcius ista viris tamen objicienda memento.† Virginio. Tell me something, master.

Messer Piero. Your son, in the sack of Rome, was a prisoner of one Captain Orteca.

Gherardo. So he begins his fable.

Messer Piero. And because the captain had two comrades, who might claim their share, he sent us secretly to Siena: then, fearing that the Sienese, who are great friends of right

* Hail! best of masters.

+ Remember, that such things must be more sparingly objected

to men.

and justice, and most affectionately attached to this city, might take him and set him at liberty, he took us to a castle of the Signor di Piombino, set our ransom at a thousand ducats, and made us write for that amount.

Virginio. Was my son ill-treated?

Messer Piero. No, certainly; they treated him like a gentleman. We received no answers to our letters.

Virginio. Go on.

Messer Piero. Now, being conducted with the Spanish camp to Corregia, this captain was killed, and the Court took his property, and set us at liberty.

Virginio. And where is my son?

Messer Piero. Nearer than you suppose.
Virginio. In Modena?

Messer Piero. At the hotel of the Fool.

Gherardo. The thousand florins are gone; but it suffices to have her. I am rich enough without them.

Virginio. I die with impatience to embrace him. Come,

master.

Messer Piero. But what of Lelia?

Virginio. She has grown into a fine young woman. Has my son advanced in learning?

Messer Piero. He has not lost his time, ut licuit per tot casus, per tot discrimina rerum.*

Virginio. Call him out. Say nothing to him. Let me see if he will know me.

Messer Piero. He went out a little while since. I will see if he has returned.

Scene III.

VIRGINIO, GHERARDO, MESSER PIERO, and STRAGUALCIA, afterwards FRUELLA.

Messer Piero. Stragualcia, oh! Stragualcia, has Fabrizio returned?

Stragualcia. Not yet.

Messer Piero. Come here. Speak to your old master. This is Signor Virginio.

Stragualcia. Has your anger passed away?

Messer Piero. You know I am never long angry with you.

*As far as it was available, through so many accidents and disas

trous chances.

Stragualcia. All's well, then. Is this our master's father? Messer Piero. It is.

Stragualcia. Oh! worthy master. You are just found in time to pay our bill at the Fool.

Messer Piero. This has been a good servant to your son. Stragualcia. Has been only?

Messer Piero. And still is.

Virginio. I shall take care of all who have been faithful companions to my son.

Stragualcia. You can take care of me with little trouble. Virginio. Demand.

Stragualcia. Settle me as a waiter with this host, who is the best companion in the world, the best provided, the most knowing, one that better understands the necessities of a foreign guest than any host I have ever seen. For my part, I do not think there is any other paradise on earth. Gherardo. He has a reputation for treating well. Virginio. Have you breakfasted?

Stragualcia. A little.

Virginio. What have you eaten?

Stragualcia. A brace of partridges, six thrushes, a capon, a little veal, with only two jugs of wine.*

Virginio. Fruella, give him whatever he wants, and leave the payment to me.

Stragualcia. Fruella, first bring a little wine for these gentlemen.

Messer Piero. They do not need it.

Stragualcia. They will not refuse. You must drink too, Master.

Messer Piero. To make

peace with

you, I am content. Stragualcia. Signor Virginio, you have reason to thank the Master, who loves your son better than his own eyes.

Virginio. Heaven be bountiful to him.

Stragualcia. It concerns you first, and heaven after. Drink,

gentlemen.

Gherardo. Not now.

* The reader may be reminded of Massinger's Justice Greedy :"Overreach. Hungry again! Did you not devour this morning A shield of brawn and a barrel of Colchester oysters?

"Greedy. Why, that was, sir, only to scour my stomach

A kind of a preparative."

New Way to Pay Old Debts, act iv., scene 1.

Stragualcia. Pray then, go in till Fabrizio returns. And let us sup here this evening.

Gherardo. I must leave you for a while.

business at home.

I have some

Virginio. Take care that Lelia does not get away.
Gherardo. This is what I am going for.

Virginio. She is yours. I give her to you. Arrange the matter to your mind.

Scene IV.-The Street, with the house of VIRGINIO.

GHERARDO, LELIA, and CLEMENTIA.

Gherardo. One cannot have all things one's own way. tience. But how is this? Here is Lelia.

Pasquella has let her escape.

Pa

That careless

Lelia. Does it not appear to you, Clementia, that Fortune makes me her sport?

Clementia. Be of good cheer. I will find some means to content you. But come in, and change your dress.

must not be seen so.

You

Gherardo. I will salute her, however, and understand how she has got out. Good day to you, Lelia, my sweet spouse. Who opened the door to you? Pasquella, eh? I am glad you have gone to your nurse's house; but your being seen in this dress does little honour to you or to me.

Lelia. To whom are you speaking? What Lelia? I am not Lelia.

Gherardo. Oh! a little while ago, when your father and I

locked you up with my daughter Isabella, did you not confess

that you were Lelia? And now, you think I do not know you. Go, my dear wife, and change your dress.

Lelia. God send you as much of a wife, as I have fancy for you as a husband.

All women

[Goes in. have their

Clementia. Go home, Gherardo. child's play,* some in one way, some in another. This is a very innocent one. Still these little amusements are not to

be talked of.

Gherardo. No one shall know it from me. But how did she escape from my house, where I had locked her up with Isabella?

Clementia. Locked up whom?

Gherardo. Lelia; this Lelia.

* Cittolezze (zitellezze), equivalent to fanciullaggini.

Clementia. You are mistaken. She has not parted from me to-day; and for pastime she put on these clothes, as girls will do, and asked me if she did not look well in them?

Gherardo. You want to make me see double. I tell you I locked her up with Isabella.

Clementia. Whence come you now?

Gherardo. From the hotel of the Fool.

Clementia. Did you drink?

Gherardo. A little.

Clementia. Now go to bed, and sleep it off.

Gherardo. Let me see Lelia for a moment before I go, that I may give her a piece of good news.

Clementia. What news?

Gherardo. Her brother has returned safe and sound, and her father is waiting for him at the hotel.

Clementia. Fabrizio?

Gherardo. Fabrizio.

Clementia. I hasten to tell her.

Gherardo. And I to blow up Pasquella, for letting her

escape.

Scene V.-The Street, with the hotels and the house of GHERARDO.

PASQUELLA, alone.

Pasquella, who had only known Lelia as Fabio, and did not know what the two old men had meant, by calling the supposed Lelia, whom they had delivered to her charge, a girl, has nevertheless obeyed orders, in locking up Fabrizio with Isabella, and now, in an untranslatable soliloquy, narrates that the two captives had contracted matrimony by their own ritual.

Scene VI.

PASQUELLA and GIGLIO.

Pasquella, seeing Giglio coming, retires within the courtyard, through the grated door of which the dialogue is carried on. Giglio wishes to obtain admission to Gherardo's house, without giving Pasquella the rosary he had promised her. He shows it to her, and withholds giving it, on pretence that it wants repairs. She, on the other hand, wishes to get the