“Alas! Prince,” replied the melancholic Selim, “why did I not follow the advice of Mirzoza; and the misgivings of my own heart? My happiness is eclipsed, I am a lost man: I die, if her Toy does not speak; if it does, I am a dead man: let it speak out however. I expect frightful intelligences; but I fear them less than I hate the state of perplexity, in which I am.⁠—”

In the meantime Fulvia’s first motion was to put her hand on her Toy, and to shut its mouth: what it had hitherto said, might bear a favorable interpretation: but she dreaded the sequel. As she began to take courage on account of its remaining silent, the Sultan, urged by Selim, turned his ring: Fulvia was obliged to spread her fingers, and the Toy went on.