Most of my readers are aware that the second act of Parisina opens with
the celebrated and effective duet in which Parisina, while sleeping,
betrays to Azzo the secret of her love for Ugo. The injured husband goes
through all the emotions of jealousy, until conviction seizes on his
mind, and then, in a frenzy of rage and indignation, he awakens his
guilty wife to tell her that he knows her guilt and to threaten her with
his vengeance.
This duet is one of the most beautiful, expressive and terrible
conceptions that has ever emanated from the fruitful pen of Donizetti.
Franz now listened to it for the third time; yet its notes, so tenderly
expressive and fearfully grand as the wretched husband and wife give
vent to their different griefs and passions, thrilled through the soul
of
