ut do as you are bid. The Prince and his flute shall
keep thee safe from Sarastro."

I wish the Prince at all the devils;
For death nowise I search;
What if, to crown my many evils,
He should leave me in the lurch?

He did not feel half as brave as he had seemed when he told Tamino how
he had killed the serpent.

Then another of the ladies of the court gave to Papageno a chime of
bells, hidden in a casket.

"Are these for me?" he asked.

"Aye, and none but thou canst play upon them. With a golden chime and
a golden flute, thou art both safe. The music of these things shall
charm the wicked heart and soothe the savage breast. So, fare ye well,
both." And away went the two strange adventurers, Papageno and Tamino,
one a prince, the other a bird-catcher.

_Scene II_

After travelling for a week and a day, the two adventurers came to a
fine palace. Tamino sent the fowler with his chime of bells up to the
great place to spy out what he could, and he was to return and bring
the Prince news.

Without knowing it they had already arrived at the palace of Sarastro,
and at that very moment Pamina, the Queen's daughter, was in great
peril.

In a beautiful room, furnished with divans, and everything in Egyptian
style, sat Monostatos, a Moor, who was in the secrets of Sarastro, who
had stolen the Princess. Monostatos had just had the Princess brought
before him and had listened malignantly to her pleadings to be set
free.

"I do not fear death," she was saying; "but it is certain that if I do
not return home, my mother will die of grief."

"Well, I have had enough of thy meanings, and I shall teach thee to be
more pleasing; so minions," calling to the guards and servants of the
castle, "chain this tearful young woman's hands, and see if it will
not teach her to make herself more agreeable." As the slaves entered,
to place the fetters upon her hands, the Princess fell senseless upon
a divan.

"Away, away, all of you!" Monostatos cried, just as Papageno peeped in
at the palace window.

"What sort of place is this?" Papageno said to himself, peering in
curiously. "I think I will enter and see more of it." Stepping in, he
saw the Princess senseless upon the divan, and the wretched Moor
bending over her. At that moment the Moor turned round and saw
Papageno. They looked at each other, and each was frightened half to
death.

"Oh, Lord!" each cried at the same moment. "This must be the fiend