While Flora was listlessly gazing at Monte Pincio from the solitude of her room in the Via delle Quattro Fontane, Rosabella was looking at the same object, seen at a greater distance, over intervening houses, from her high lodgings in the Corso.

She could see the road winding like a ribbon round the hill, with a medley of bright colors continually moving over it.

But she was absorbed in revery, and they floated round and round before her mental eye, like the revolving shadows of a magic lantern.
She was announced to sing that night, as the new Spanish _prima donna_, La Senorita Rosita Campaneo; and though she had been applauded by manager and musicians at the rehearsal that morning, her spirit shrank from the task.

Recent letters from America had caused deep melancholy; and the idea of singing, not _con amore_, but as a performer before an audience of entire strangers, filled her with dismay.

She remembered how many times she and Flora and Gerald had sung together from Norma; and an oppressive feeling of loneliness came over her.