“Ah,” said Zanoni, “let us change both the wine and the theme.”

With that, Zanoni grew yet more animated and brilliant.  Never did wit more sparkling, airy, exhilarating, flash from the lips of reveller.  His spirits fascinated all present—­even the prince himself, even Glyndon—­with a strange and wild contagion.  The former, indeed, whom the words and gaze of Zanoni, when he drained the poison, had filled with fearful misgivings, now hailed in the brilliant eloquence of his wit a certain sign of the operation of the bane.  The wine circulated fast; but none seemed conscious of its effects.  One by one the rest of the party fell into a charmed and spellbound silence, as Zanoni continued to pour forth sally upon sally, tale upon tale.  They hung on his words, they almost held their breath to listen.  Yet, how bitter was his mirth; how full of contempt for the triflers present, and for the trifles which made their life!

Night came on; the room grew dim, and the feast had lasted several hours longer than was the customary duration of similar entertainments at that day.  Still the guests stirred not, and still Zanoni continued, with glittering eye and mocking lip, to lavish his stores of intellect and anecdote; when suddenly the moon rose, and shed its rays over the flowers and fountains in the court without, leaving the room itself half in shadow, and half tinged by a quiet and ghostly light.

It was then that Zanoni rose.  “Well, gentlemen,” said he, “we have not yet wearied our host, I hope; and his garden offers a new temptation to protract our stay.  Have you no musicians among your train, prince, that might regale our ears while we inhale the fragrance of your orange-trees?”

“An excellent thought!” said the prince.  “Mascari, see to the music.”

The party rose simultaneously to adjourn to the garden; and then, for the first time, the effect of the wine they had drunk seemed to make itself felt.

With flushed cheeks and unsteady steps they came into the open air, which tended yet more to stimulate that glowing fever of the grape.  As if to make up for the silence with which the guests had hitherto listened to Zanoni, every tongue was now loosened,—­every man talked, no man listened.  There was something wild and fearful in the contrast between the calm beauty of the night and scene, and the hubbub and clamour of these disorderly roysters.  One of the Frenchmen, in especial, the young Duc de R—­, a nobleman of the highest rank, and of all the quick, vivacious, and irascible temperament of his countrymen, was particularly noisy and excited.  And as circumstances, the remembrance of which is still preserved among certain circles of Naples, rendered it afterwards necessary that the duc should himself give evidence of what occurred, I will here translate the short account he drew up, and which was kindly submitted to me some few years ago by my accomplished and lively friend, Il Cavaliere di B—.