a
Colossal creatures with feet of clay!

Faustine
They clothe with their own illusions the creature that entangles them;
they love their own creation; they are egotists!

Quinola (aside)
Just like the women! (Aloud) Listen, senora, I wish that by some
honest means we could bury this doll in the depths of the--that is--of
a convent.

Faustine
You seem to me to be a fine fellow.

Quinola
I love my master.

Faustine
Do you think that he has noticed me?

Quinola
Not yet.

Faustine
Speak to him of me.

Quinola
But then, he would speak to me by breaking a stick across my back. You
see, senora, that girl--

Faustine
That girl ought to be forever lost to him.

Quinola
But he would die, senora.

Faustine
He must be very much in love with her.

Quinola
Ah! that is not my fault! All the way here from Valladolid I have a
thousand times argued the point, that a man like he ought to adore
women, but never to love an individual woman! Never--

Faustine
You are a pretty worthless rascal! Go and tell Lothundiaz to come and
speak with me and to bring his daughter with him. (Aside) She shall be
put in a convent.

Quinola (aside)
She is the enemy. She loves me so much that she can't help doing us a
great deal of harm. (Exit.)

SCENE EIGHTH

Faustine and Fregose.

Fregose
While you expect the master, you spend your time in corrupting the
servant.

Faustine
Can a woman ever lose her habit of seduction?

Fregose
Senora, you are ungenerous; I should think that a patrician lady of
Venice would know how to spare the feelings of an old soldier.

Faustine
Come, my lord, you presume more upon your white hair than a young man
would presume upon his fairest locks, and you find in them a stronger
argument than in--(She laughs). Let me have no more of this petulance.

Fregose
How can I be otherwise than vexed when you compromise yourself thus,
you, whom I wish to be my wife? Is it nothing to have a chance of
bearing one of the noblest of names?

Faustine
Do you think it is too noble for a Brancadori?

Fregose
Yet, you would prefer stooping to a Fontanares!

Faustine
But what if he could raise himself as high as to a Brancadori? That
would be a proof of love indeed! Besides, as you know from your own
experience, love never reasons.

Fregose
Ah! You acknowledge that!

Faustine
Your friendship to me is so great that you have been the first to
learn my secret.

Fre