dinner. They pressed each other to eat, drank to the health of their
friends in Moscow, clapped their hands at the waiter for a delicious
dish of fish, and kept asking him for live _frutti di mare_; the
waiter shrugged his shoulders and scraped with his feet, but when he
had left them, he shook his head and once even muttered with a sigh,
_poveretti_! (poor things!) After dinner they set off for the theatre.

They were giving an opera of Verdi's, which though, honestly speaking,
rather vulgar, has already succeeded in making the round of all the
European theatres, an opera, well-known among Russians, _La Traviata_.
The season in Venice was over, and none of the singers rose above the
level of mediocrity; every one shouted to the best of their abilities.
The part of Violetta was performed by an artist, of no renown, and
judging by the cool reception given her by the public, not a
favourite, but she was not destitute of talent. She was a young, and
not very pretty, black-eyed girl with an unequal and already
overstrained voice. Her dress was ill-chosen and naively gaudy; her
hair was hidden in a red net, her dress of faded blue satin was too
tight for her, and thick Swedish gloves reached up to her sharp
elbows. Indeed, how could she, the daughter of some Bergamese
shepherd, know how Parisian _dames aux camelias_ dress! And she did
not understand how to move on the stage; but there was much truth and
artless simplicity in her acting, and she sang with that passion of
expression and rhythm which is only vouchsafed to Italians. Elena and
Insarov were sitting alone together in a dark box close to the stage;
the mirthful mood which had come upon them in the academy _delle Belle
Arti_ had not yet passed off. When the father of the unhappy young man
who had fallen into the snares of the enchantress came on to the stage
in a yellow frock-coat and a dishevelled white wig, opened his mouth
awry, and losing his presence of mind before he had begun, only