loves his mistress, Rome, fallen and degraded though she may
be. He loves her, although she has broken faith with him, has
turned to listen to the blandishments of another, and basely
deserted him at the time of his utmost need.

Irene, touched by his grief, bids him not give way to
despair, but adjures him to make a last attempt to regain
his old ascendency over the minds of the fickle people. As
he leaves her to follow her advice, Adrian enters the hall,
wildly imploring her to escape while there is yet time, for
the infuriated Romans are coming, not only to slay Rienzi,
but to burn down the Capitol which has sheltered him.

As she utterly refuses to listen to his entreaties, he vainly
seeks to drag her away. It is only when the lurid light of
the devouring flames illumines the hall, and when she sinks
unconscious to the floor, that he can bear her away from a
place fraught with so much danger for them all. Rienzi, in the
mean while, has stepped out on the balcony, whence he has made
repeated but futile attempts to address the mob. Baroncelli and
Cecco, fearing lest he should yet succeed in turning the tide by
his marvellous eloquence, drown his voice by discordant cries,
fling stones which fall all around his motionless figure like
hail, and clamour for more fuel to burn down the Capitol, which
they have sworn shall be his funeral pyre. Calmly now Rienzi
contemplates their fury and his unavoidable death, and solemnly
predicts that they will regret their precipitancy, as the Capitol
falls into ruins over the noble head of the Last of the Tribunes.