more like a
cathedral service than an operatic pageant. Agostino had done his best
to put the heart of the creed of his Chief into these last verses.
Rocco's music floated them in solemn measures, and Vittoria had been
careful to articulate throughout the sacred monotony so that their full
meaning should be taken.

In the printed book of the libretto a chorus of cavaliers, followed by
one harmless verse of Camilla's adieux to them, and to her husband and
life, concluded the opera.

'Let her stop at that--it's enough!--and she shall be untouched,' said
General Pierson to Antonio-Pericles.

'I have information, as you know, that an extremely impudent song is
coming.'

The General saw Wilfrid hanging about the lobby, in flagrant
disobedience to orders. Rebuking his nephew with a frown, he commanded
the lieutenant to make his way round to the stage and see that the
curtain was dropped according to the printed book.

'Off, mon Dieu! off!' Pericles speeded him; adding in English, 'Shall
she taste prison-damp, zat voice is killed.'

The chorus of cavaliers was a lamentation: the keynote being despair:
ordinary libretto verses.

Camilla's eyes unclose. She struggles to be lifted, and, raised on
Camillo's arm, she sings as if with the last pulsation of her voice,
softly resonant in its rich contralto. She pardons Michiella. She tells
Count Orso that when he has extinguished his appetite for dominion,
he will enjoy an unknown pleasure in the friendship of his neighbours.
Repeating that her mother lives, and will some day kneel by her
daughter's grave--not mournfully, but in beatitude--she utters her adieu
to all.

At the moment of her doing so, Montini whispered in Vittoria's ear.
She looked up and beheld the downward curl of the curtain. There was
confusion at the wings: Croats were visible to the audience. Carlo
Ammiani and Luciano Romara jumped on the stage; a dozen of the noble
youths of Milan streamed across the boards to either wing, and caught
the curtain descending. The whole house had risen insurgent with cries
of 'Vittoria.' The curtain-ropes were in the hands of the Croats, but
Carlo, Luciano, and their fellows held the curtain aloft at arm's length
at each side of her. She was seen, and she sang, and the house listened.

The Italians present, one and all, rose up reverently and murmured the
refrain. Many of the aristocracy would, doubtless, have preferred that
this public declaration of the plain enigma s