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Library / Literature & Fiction

A Siren

by Thomas Adolphus Trollope

Pages
about 615
Category
Literature & Fiction
Language
English
Reading time
11 h at 250 wpm
Start readingThe whole book, as cards or one word at a time. 6.3 h at 450 wpm in Read mode.

From the opening

CHAPTER I In the Cardinal's Chapel II The Corso III "La Sonnambula" IV The Marchese Lamberto's Correspondence V Bianca at Home VI Paolina at Home VII Two Interviews VIII A Carnival Reception IX Paolina's Return to the City

BOOK V Who Did The Deed? CHAPTER I At the City Gate II Suspicion III Guilty or Not Guilty? IV The Marchese hears the Ill News V Doubts and Possibilities VI At the Circolo again VII A Prison Visit VIII Signor Giovacchino Fortini at Home IX The Post-Mortem Examination X Public Opinion XI In Father Fabiano's Cell XII The Case against Paolina

BOOK VI Poena Pede Claudo CHAPTER I Signor Fortini receives the Signora Steno in his Studio II Was it Paolina after all? III Could it have been the Aged Friar? IV What Ravenna thought of it V "Miserrimus" VI The Trial VII The Friar's Testimony VIII The Truth! IX Conclusion

It was Carnival time in the ancient and once imperial, but now provincial and remote, city of Ravenna. It was Carnival time, and the very acme and high-tide of that season of mirth and revel. For the theory of Carnival observance is, that the life of it, unlike that of most other things and beings, is intensified with a constantly crescendo movement up to the last minutes of its existence. And there now remained but an hour before midnight on the Tuesday preceding the first day of Lent, Ash Wednesday--Dies Cinerum!--that sad and sober morrow which has brought with it "sermons and soda-water" to so many generations of revellers.

Of course Carnival, according to the Calendar and Time's hour-glass, is over at twelve o'clock on the night of Shrove Tuesday. Generally, however, in the pleasure-loving cities of Italy, a few hours' law are allowed or winked at. The revellers are not supposed to become aware that it is past midnight till about three or four in the morning.

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