^#smrgSAHAF Carmen : An Opera in Four Acts - The Music By Georges Bizet (With an English Version) As Represented at the Royal Italian Opera - Covent Garden -

"ARGUMENT

Don Jose, & Dragoon Brigadier in garrison at Seville, comes to relieve the guard in a square where the guard-house faces the renowned tobacco manufactory. Being the time when the pretty cigar girls have to enter the works, groups of young men assemble to look at them. They soon come, followed by Carmen, the greatest beauty and coquette among the throng. The youths eagerly press around her, desirous to obtain a word or a smile, but she, casting her eyes upon Jose, flings at him a bunch of flowers as a mark of prefer. ence, then enters the factory with the others, and the crowd disperse, Don Jose, at first indifferent, when alone, feels a spell creeping around him, but is released by the arrival of Micaela, a country girl, his affianced bride, who comes to bear to him a message from his mother. No sooner has Micaela gone than a clamour is heard in the works, Jose is sent by his Officer to see the cause, and he returns bringing in Car. mea, who, in a quarrel, has stabbed another girl. The Officer orders her to be fettered, and while he goes to write the warrant for her im. prisonment, Carmen persuades the already love-stricken Jose to let her escape, giving him afterwards a meeting at the tavern of Lilla Pastia, a place of resort for gipsies and smugglers: Jose yields and she escapes ..."