Masc monologue (Act 4) — The Blunderer

Pray, not quite so fast, for fear we might stumble. Your skull is rather thick, therefore you should be perfectly well instructed in your part. Some time ago Trufaldin left Naples; his name was then Zanobio Ruberti. Being suspected in his native town of having participated in a certain rebellion, raised by some political faction (though really he is not a man to disturb any state), he was obliged to quit it stealthily by night, leaving behind him his daughter, who was very young, and his wife. Some time afterwards he received the news that they were both dead, and in this perplexity, wishing to take with him to some other town, not only his property, but also the only one who was left of all his family, his young son, a schoolboy, called Horatio, he wrote to Bologna, where a certain tutor, named Alberto, had taken the boy when very young, to finish there his education; but though for two whole years he appointed several times to meet them, they never made their appearance. Believing them to be dead, after so long a time, he came to this city, where he took the name he now bears, without for twelve years ever having discovered any traces of this Alberto, or of his son Horatio. This is the substance of the story, which I have repeated so that you may better remember the groundwork of the plot. Now, you are to personate an Armenian merchant, who has seen them both safe and sound in Turkey. If I have invented this scheme, in preference to any other, of bringing them to life again according to his dream, it is because it is very common in adventures for people to be taken at sea by some Turkish pirate, and afterwards restored to their families in the very nick of time, when thought lost for fifteen or twenty years. For my part, I have heard a hundred of that kind of stories. Without giving ourselves the trouble of inventing something fresh, let us make use of this one; what does it matter? You must say you heard the story of their being made slaves from their own mouths, and also that you lent them money to pay their ransom; but that as urgent business obliged you to set out before them, Horatio asked you to go and visit his father here, whose adventures he was acquainted with, and with whom you were to stay a few days till their arrival. I have given you a long lesson now.