s scene of the "benediction of the
poniards," they no longer keep to the enjoined _allegro_. Singers
and musicians broke away impetuously. The leader does not even
attempt to restrain them. Nor do the public protest; on the
contrary, the people find themselves carried away, and see that
they are involved in the movement, and that the movement responds
to the impulses of their souls.

"Will you, with me, deliver the land,
From troubles increasing, an impious band?"

They promise, they swear. Nevers has scarcely time to protest,
and to sing that "among his ancestors were many soldiers, but
never an assassin." He is arrested. The police and the aldermen
rush forward and rapidly swear "to strike all at once." Saint
Bris shouts the recitative which summons the Catholics to
vengeance. The three monks, with white scarfs, hasten in by the
door at the back of Nevers's room, without making any account of
the stage directions, which enjoin on them to advance slowly.
Already all the artists have drawn sword or poniard, which the
three monks bless in a trice. The soprani tenors, bassos, attack
the _allegro furioso_ with cries of rage, and of a dramatic 6/8
time they make it 6/8 quadrille time. Then they rush out,
bellowing,--

"At midnight,
Noiselessly,
God wills it,
Yes,
At midnight."

At this moment the audience start to their feet. Everybody is
agitated--in the boxes, the pit, the galleries. It seems as if
the spectators are about to rush upon the stage, the Burgomaster
Van Tricasse at their head, to join with the conspirators and
annihilate the Huguenots, whose religious opinions, however, they
share. They applaud, call before the curtain, make loud
acclamations! Tatanemance grasps her bonnet with feverish hand.
The candles throw out a lurid glow of light.

Raoul, instead of slowly raising the curtain, tears it apart with
a superb gesture and finds himself confronting Valentine.

At last! It is the grand duet, and it starts off _allegro
vivace_. Raoul does not wait for Valentine's pleading, and
Valentine does not wait for Raoul's responses.

The fine passage beginning, "Danger is passing, time is flying,"
becomes one of those rapid airs which have made Offenbach famous,
when he composes a dance for conspirators. The _andante amoroso_,
"Thou hast said it, aye, thou lovest me," becomes a real _vivace
furioso_, and the violoncello ceases to imitate the inflections
of the singer's voice, as indicated in the co