CONTI. How, Prince! do you know this angel? PRINCE (_endeavouring to compose himself, but unable to remove his eyes from the picture_). A little; just enough to recognise her. A few weeks ago I met her with her mother at an assembly; since then I have only seen her in sacred places, where staring is unseemly. I know her father also; he is not my friend. He it was who most violently opposed my pretensions to Sabionetta. He is a veteran, proud and unpolished, but upright and brave. CONTI. You speak of the father, this is the daughter. PRINCE. By Heavens! you must have stolen the resemblance from her mirror (_with his eyes still rivetted on the picture_). Oh, you well know, Conti, that we praise the artist most when we forget his merits in his works. CONTI. Yet I am extremely dissatisfied with this portrait, and nevertheless I am satisfied with being dissatisfied with myself. Alas! that we cannot paint directly with our eyes! On the long journey from the eye through the arm to the pencil, how much is lost! But, as I have already said, though I know what is lost, and how and why it is lost, I am as proud and prouder of this loss than of what I have preserved. For by the former I perceive more than by the latter, that I am a good painter, though my hand is not always so. Or do you hold, Prince, that Raffaelle would not have been the greatest of all artists even had he unfortunately been born without hands? PRINCE (_turning his eyes a moment from the picture_). What do you say, Conti? What was your enquiry? CONTI. Oh, nothing--nothing; mere idle observations! Your soul, I observe, was wholly in your eyes. I like such souls and such eyes. PRINCE (_affecting coldness_). And so, Conti, you really consider Emilia Galotti amongst the first beauties of our city. CONTI. Amongst them? Amongst the first? The first of our city? You jest, Prince, or your eyesight must have been all this time as insensible as your hearing. PRINCE. Dear Conti (_again fixing his eyes on the picture_), how can we uninitiated trust our eyes? In fact, none but an artist can judge of beauty. CONTI.