"Bravo! bravo!" he cried, rubbing his hands. "That is what I want! You will make a capital Moor, set in shape a little! I engage you at once, at fifteen ducats a month: and here is the first month's pay in advance for your outfit--a suit of clothes to make you look like a gentleman. Go, buy them, pack up to go with us; and I will have a mule ready for you." While the impresario made his preparations for departure, the delighted hostess assisted Louis in his. He had spent two or three days roaming about Naples before he came to the hotel, and had some debts to pay. These liquidated, his bill paid at the hotel, and a new suit purchased, nothing remained of his fifteen ducats. In less than two hours the troupe was on its way out of Naples. At Salerno the manager had advertisements struck off, announcing the _début_ of a new tragic actor--a wonderful genius--presented to the public as a phenomenon--in a popular part. Curiosity was soon excited to see him. In the evening the theatre was crowded. The director walked about, rubbing his hands in ecstasy, and counting the piles of gold as they accumulated. Louis, arrayed in an emperor's costume of the middle ages, was practising behind the scenes how to sustain the part of a sovereign. A pretty young girl--one of the chorus--who may be called Rosina, stood watching him, and commenting freely on his performance. {22} "Oh! that will not do at all, your majesty!" she cried, as he made an awkward movement. "What an emperor! This is your style!" And she began mimicking his gestures so provokiagly that Louis declared he would have his revenge in a kiss. He was presently chasing her around the scenes, to the disorder of his imperial robes. The sound of voices and an unusual bustle startled him; he fancied the curtain was going to rise, and called lustily for his sword. But the noise was outside the private door of the theatre. It was flung open, and the lad's consternation may be imagined when he saw advancing toward him the vice-rector of his school, followed by six _sbirri_. The manager was there, too, wringing his hands with gestures of grief and despair. Louis stood petrified, till the officer, laying a hand on his shoulder, arrested him by an order from the King of Naples. The whole company had rushed together, and were astonished to hear that their tragedian was forthwith to be taken back to the "Conservatorio clella Pieta dei Turchini," to be remanded to his musical studies under the great master Marcello Perrino. The emperor _in petto_ forgot his dignity, and burst into tears; Rosina cried for sympathy, and there was a general murmur of dissatisfaction. The manager strove to remonstrate. "Such a genius--tragedy is his vocation!" he pleaded. "His vocation just now is to go back to school," said the vice-rector gruffly. "But, signer, you are robbing the public." "Has not the graceless boy been robbing his majesty, who was pleased to place him in the conservatorio after his father's death?"