FRANCESCA.  Count Lanciotto?  As I hope for grace,
A gallant gentleman!  How well he spoke! 
With what sincere and earnest courtesy
The rounded phrases glided from his lips! 
He spoke in compliments that seemed like truth. 
Methinks I’d listen through a summer’s day,
To hear him woo.—­And he must woo to me—­
I’ll have our privilege—­he must woo a space,
Ere I’ll be won, I promise.

RITTA.  But, my lady,
He’ll woo you for another.

FRANCESCA.  He?—­ha! ha! [Laughing.]
I should not think it from the prologue, Ritta.

  RITTA.  Nor I.

  FRANCESCA.  Nor any one.

RITTA.  ’Tis not the Count—­
’Tis not Count Lanciotto.

FRANCESCA.  Gracious saints! 
Have you gone crazy?  Ritta, speak again,
Before I chide you.

RITTA.  ’Tis the solemn truth. 
That gentleman is Count Paolo, lady,
Brother to Lanciotto, and no more
Like him than—­than—­

  FRANCESCA.  Than what?

RITTA.  Count Guido’s pot,
For boiling waiting-maids, is like the bath
Of Venus on the arras.

FRANCESCA.  Are you mad,—­
Quite mad, poor Ritta?

RITTA.  Yes; perhaps I am. 
Perhaps Lanciotto is a proper man—­
Perhaps I lie—­perhaps I speak the truth—­
Perhaps I gabble like a fool.  O! heavens,
That dreadful pot!

  FRANCESCA.  Dear Ritta!—­

RITTA.  By the mass,
They shall not cozen you, my gentle mistress! 
If my lord Guido boiled me, do you think
I should be served up to the garrison,
By way of pottage?  Surely they would not waste me.

FRANCESCA.  You are an idle talker.  Pranks like these
Fit your companions.  You forget yourself.

RITTA.  Not you, though, lady.  Boldly I repeat,
That he who looked so fair, and talked so sweet,
Who rode from Rimini upon a horse
Of dapple-gray, and walked through yonder gate,
Is not Count Lanciotto.

  FRANCESCA.  This you mean?

  RITTA.  I do, indeed!

FRANCESCA.  Then I am more abused—­
More tricked, more trifled with, more played upon—­
By him, my father, and by all of you,
Than anything, suspected of a heart,
Was ever yet!

RITTA.  In Count Paolo, lady,
Perchance there was no meditated fraud.

  FRANCESCA.  How, dare you plead for him?

RITTA.  I but suppose: 
Though in your father—­O!  I dare not say.