The late comer was struck by their eyes being directed with unusual interest upon a vocalist.

He stood before the kind of throne on which the marchioness conceitedly installed herself.
He was singing in German, and he accompanied himself on a zither.

He had an excellent baritone voice, and the ballad, simple and unfinished, became a tragic _scena_ from his skill in repeating some exceptionally talented teacher's instructions.
To Cesarine, the strains awakened dormant meditations; aspirations frozen in her placid home, began to melt; a curtain was gradually drawn aside to reveal a world where woman reigned over all.

What she had heard from her grandmother of the magic splendor which Wanda had missed and Iza enjoyed, flashed up before her, and her heart warmed delightedly in the voluptuous intoxication of unspeakable bliss.

On the wings of this melody, which, in truth, merely sought to picture the celestial dwelling of the elect, she was carried into one of those bijou palaces of the best part of the Queen City of the Universe, where the bedizened Imperia at the plate-glass window reviews an army of faultlessly-clad gentlemen filing before her, and sweetly calls out: "This, gentlemen, is the spot where you can be amused!" Yes, Cesarine was intended to entertain men! She longed to be the central figure in the scene, however brief, of that apotheosis where Cupid is proclaimed superior to all the high interests of human conscience; this glittering stage sufficed for her, although it would have limited Felix's ideal of man's function.
In a struggle between duty and passion, she expected passion to overcome, and she concurred beforehand with this troubadour who protested that the gentler sex really held the under one in its dependence.
Radiant with pleasure and farther delighted to recognize a well-known face on the minstrel's shoulders, she hastened at the conclusion to give him her compliments.