Page:Rigoletto, composed by Verdi, with an English version and the music of the principal airs.djvu/5



nominally the jester of the libertine Duke of Mantua, is in truth his pander, and, amougamong [sic] his other misdeeds, assists his master in the seduction of the wife of the Count Ceprano. This naturally excites the anger of the Count and his Followers, and they determine to visit Rigoletto with vengeance. Another noble of the Court, Count Monterone, has also had his honour assailed through Rigoletto, and, in an interview with the Duke and his minion, invokes the vengeance of Heaven on the heads of both of them in such appalling earnestness, that Rigoletto ever afterwards reverts to the malediction in dismay, and with an inward conviction that it will one day be fulfilled. The unwavering destroyer of other men's domestic peace has a daughter of his own, named Gilda, on whose purity he doats. So rigidly has he guarded and concealed her, not allowing her ever to leave his house except to attend her religious observances on the Sabbath, that her existence even was hardly known to any but himself. But the quick observation of the libertine Duke had discovered the maiden at her dovotionsdevotions [sic], and, under pretence of being a poor student, he had won her affections, and traced her to her dwelling. From this, the residence of her father, Ceprano and his Followers, supposing her to be Rigoletto's mistress, undertake to tear her by force; and, by pretending that it is Ceprano's wife—whose house adjoins—that they are about to abduct, they make Rigoletto an instrument in the ravishment of his own daughter, whom they convey to the palace of the Duke. Enraged to madness, when he discovers the trick that has been practised on him, he hires a bravo, named Sparafucile, to assassinate the Duke; and the latter, aided by the blandishments of his sister, allures the Duke to a dilapidated inn of which he is the host, intending there to fulfil his compact, and to cast the body into a river that runs by. But the Duke's easy and fascinating manners so win upon Magdalena, the sister, that she becomes desirous of saving him. Rigoletto has desired his daughter to disguise herself in male attire, and thus to effect her escape to Verona; but, before departing, he brings her to the neighbourhood of the inn, that she may learn the Duke's faithlessness from ocular observation. While thus outside the inn, she hears an altercation between Sparafucile and Magdalena, relative to the contemplated murder of the Duke, and a declaration by the former that he will assuredly assassinate him unless some one shall happen to come by whom he could substitute for him, so as to get from Rigoletto the promised reward. With a woman's devotion, Gilda resolves to sacrifice herself for the man she so madly loves, and, knocking at the door and demanding admittance, she is stabbed as she enters. Sparafucile thrusts her into a sack, and delivers her to her father as the one he had compacted to slay. Rigoletto is about to cast the sack into the rushing waters, when the voice of the Duke, heard in the distance, apprises him that there is some dreadful mistake. He opens the sack, and discovers his still living daughter, who, however, speedily expires, while Rigoletto sinks to the earth, overwhelmed with the fulfilment of the ever-dreaded Malediction.