She did not speak to foreigners.

She did not care to go to foreign cities, but loved Milan, and lived in it free and happy as an earwig in a ripe apricot.

The circumvallation of Milan gave her elbow-room enough, owing to the absence of forts all round--'which knock one's funny-bone in Verona, signora.' Beppo presented a pure smile upon a simple bow for acceptance.

'The air of Milan,' he went on, with less confidence under Laura's steady gaze, and therefore more forcing of his candour--'the sweet air of Milan gave her a deep chestful, so that she could hold her note as long as five lengths of a fiddle-bow:--by the body of Sant' Ambrogio, it was true!' Beppo stretched out his arm, and chopped his hand edgeways five testificatory times on the shoulder-ridge.

'Ay, a hawk might fly from St.Luke's head (on the Duomo) to the stone on San Primo over Como, while the signorina held on her note! You listened, you gasped--you thought of a poet in his dungeon, and suddenly, behold, his chains are struck off!--you thought of a gold-shelled tortoise making his pilgrimage to a beatific shrine!--you thought--you knew not what you thought!' Here Beppo sank into a short silence of ecstasy, and wakening from it, as with an ardent liveliness: 'The signora has heard her sing?
How to describe it! Tomorrow night will be a feast for Milan.' 'You think that the dilettanti of Milan will have a delight to-morrow night ?' said Laura; but seeing that the man's keen ear had caught note of the ironic reptile under the flower, and unwilling to lose further time, she interdicted his reply.
'Beppo, my good friend, you are a complete Italian--you waste your cleverness.