ly that he had found Irma in the carriage
instead of the little 'v,' thanked him for the joke, and had brought her
back. Pericles was therefore not surprised when Irma, as Michiella, came
on, breathless, and looking in an excitement of anger; he knew that he
had been tricked.

Between Camillo and Michiella a scene of some vivacity
ensued--reproaches, threats of calamity, offers of returning endearment
upon her part; a display of courtly scorn upon his. Irma made her voice
claw at her quondam lover very finely; it was a voice with claws, that
entered the hearing sharp-edged, and left it plucking at its repose.
She was applauded relishingly when, after vainly wooing him, she turned
aside and said--

'What change is this in one who like a reed
Bent to my twisting hands? Does he recoil?
Is this the hound whom I have used to feed
With sops of vinegar and sops of oil?'

Michiella's further communications to the audience make it known that
she has allowed the progress toward the ceremonies of espousal between
Camillo and Camilla, in order, at the last moment, to show her power
over the youth and to plunge the detested Camilla into shame and
wretchedness.

Camillo retires: Count Orso appears. There is a duet between father and
daughter: she confesses her passion for Camillo, and entreats her father
to stop the ceremony; and here the justice of the feelings of Italians,
even in their heat of blood, was noteworthy. Count Orso says that he
would willingly gratify his daughter, as it would gratify himself, but
that he must respect the law. 'The law is of your own making,' says
Michiella. 'Then, the more must I respect it,' Count Orso replies.

The audience gave Austria credit for that much in a short murmur.

Michiella's aside, 'Till anger seizes him I wait!' created laughter; it
came in contrast with an extraordinary pomposity of self-satisfaction
exhibited by Count Orso--the flower-faced, tun-bellied basso, Lebruno.
It was irresistible. He stood swollen out like a morning cock. To make
it further telling, he took off his yellow bonnet with a black-gloved
hand, and thumped the significant colours prominently on his immense
chest--an idea, not of Agostino's, but Lebruno's own; and Agostino
cursed with fury. Both he and Rocco knew that their joint labour would
probably have only one night's display of existence in the Austrian
dominions, but they grudged to Lebruno the chief merit of despatching