im; it was
but the devil that led her astray."

In that case, Doctor Graziano said, everything was well, and there was
no cause for lamentation.

But Pasquarello began to sob and cry more violently than before, and at
last fell down in a faint, as if overcome by his terrible sorrow.

Doctor Graziano ran about anxiously; regretted that he had not a
smelling-bottle about him; searched in all his pockets, and at length
pulled out a roasted chestnut, which he held under the nose of the
insensible Pasquarello. The latter recovered at once, sneezing
violently, begged him to excuse the weak state of his nerves, and went
on to say that after the marriage Marianna had fallen into the deepest
melancholy, calling continually on Antonio's name, and regarding the
old man with loathing and contempt. But the latter, blinded by his love
and jealousy, had never ceased torturing her in the most terrible
manner with his foolishness. Then Pasquarello related a number of mad
tricks which Pasquale had been guilty of, and which were actually told
of him in Rome. Signor Pasquale jigged uneasily on his seat here and
there, murmuring, "Accursed Formica, you lie!--what devil inspires
you?" It was only the fact that Torricelli and Cavalcanti kept their
grave eyes fixed upon him that restrained a wild outburst of his anger.
Pasquarello ended by saying that the luckless Marianna had at last
fallen a victim to her unstilled love-longing, her bitter sorrow, and
the thousand-fold tortures which the accursed old man had inflicted
upon her, and had passed away from this world, in the flower of her
age.

At this moment there was heard an awe-inspiring _De profundis_, chanted
by hoarse and hollow voices; and men in long white mantles appeared
upon the stage bearing a bier, on which lay the body of the beautiful
Marianna, shrouded in white grave-clothes. Signor Pasquale Capuzzi, in
the deepest mourning, tottered along behind it, moaning aloud, beating
his breast, and crying, in his despair, "Oh, Marianna! Marianna!"

When the Capuzzi in the audience saw the body of his niece, both the
Capuzzis (him on the stage and he of the audience) howled, and cried in
the most heart-breaking tones: "Oh, Marianna! Oh, Marianna! Miserable
man that I am! Ah me! Ah me!"

Imagine the corpse of the beautiful girl on the open tier, Surrounded
by the mourners, their solemn _De profundis_, and along with all
this, the comic masks, Doctor Graziano and Pasquarello, expressi