TORELLI.
No, something stranger than all these would be,
If they had happened,—he has found a mistress!
[All burst out laughing.
MANFREDI.
My lady's pet baboon? Bertuccio
Graced with a mistress? [He laughs.
ASCOLTI.
She is blind, of course?
ORDELAFFI.
And has a hump, I hope, to match his own?
What a rare breed 't will be, of two-humped babes,
Like Bactrian camels!
MANFREDI.
Bertuccio with a mistress! Why, the rogue
Ne'er yet made joke so monstrous or so pleasant!
[They laugh again.
TORELLI.
Laugh as you please, sirs; on my knightly faith,
He has a mistress,—and a rare one, too!
Nay, if you doubt my word— Here comes Dell' Aquila;
He knows, as well as I.
MANFREDI.
We'll question him.
[Enter Serafino Dell' Aquila, C.
Good-even to my poet. You walk late.
DELL' AQUILA (pointing to the moon).
I tend my mistress: poets and lunatics,
You know, are her liege subjects.
