_Guido._ Ah, that was what you were to tell us--that was the miracle! Ay, already, at the first words, I divined something beneath them that I understood not.... It passed me like a flash--I took no heed of it.... But I see now that I must look more closely. So, when he had you in his tent, alone, with a cloak for all your covering, all night long, you say he spared you?... Am I a man to believe that the stars are fragments of hellebore, or that one may drop something into a well and put out the moon?... What! a man desires you so utterly that he will betray his country, stake all that he has for one single night, ruin himself forever, and do it basely, do such a deed as no man ever thought to do before him, and make the world uninhabitable to himself forever! And this man has you there in his tent, alone and defenseless, and he has but this single night that he has bought at such a price--and he contents himself with a kiss upon the brow, and comes even hither to make us give him credence! No, let us reason fairly and not too long mock at misfortune. If he asked but that, what need was there that he should plunge a whole people into sadness, sink me in an abyss of misery such that I have come from it crushed and older by ten years? Ah! Had he craved but a kiss upon the brow, he might have saved us without torturing us so! He had but to come like a god to our rescue.... But a kiss upon the brow is not demanded and prepared for after his fashion.... The truth is found in our cries of anguish and despair.... It is only at this psychological moment, a moment that sometimes changes all our conceptions, all our thoughts, our very life, that _Monna Vanna_ feels the new love for _Prinzivalle_ stirring in her soul, a love that knows no doubt. The conception of such a love is revolutionary in the scope of its possibilities--a love that is pregnant with the spirit of daring, of freedom, that lifts woman out of the ordinary and inspires her with the strength and joy of molding a new and free race. ROSTAND CHANTECLER In view of the progress the modern drama has made as an interpreter of social ideas and portrayer of the human struggle against internal and external barriers, it is difficult to say what the future may bring in the way of great dramatic achievement. So far, however, there is hardly anything to compare with "Chantecler" in philosophic depth and poetic beauty.