ARGUMENT.
Don SALLUST, a nobleman attached to the train of
Maria, Queen of Spain, has been sentenced to banishment,
in consequence of an intrigue which he has formed
with one of the Queen's maids. Don Sallust determines to
be revenged on the Queen, and, finding that a footman in his
employ, one Ruy Blas, cherishes a mad love for her, he
determines to dress him up in magnificent clothes, and pass
him off as his cousin, Don Cæsar de Bazan. He does so—
the fictitious Don Cæsar gains great favour at Court, and
eventually rises to be Premier of Spain. Don Cæsar, when
he was only Ruy Blas, was in the habit of placing a bouquet,
every morning in the Queen's bower, together with an anonymous
letter, declaring his passion for her. Her curiosity
was naturally excited, and on comparing the handwriting in
the anonymous letter with that of Don Cæsar, she finds that
the two are identical. Ruy declares his love to the Queen,
and is on the point of marrying her, when Don Sallust (who
has obtained admission to the palace in the disguise of a
footman) appears, and produces a paper which he had made
Ruy Blas sign before his promotion, and in which Ruy
acknowledges his bondage to Don Sallust. Ruy, in horror
at the power which Sallust exercises over him by means of
this paper, determines to leave the palace, take his own name,
and seek a place as footman again. However, Don Sallust
is a secret witness to a farewell scene between Ruy and the
Queen, and then produces the paper, and explains to the
Queen that the man whom she has loved is only a footman.
Ruy, stung to madness by Sallust's taunts, challenges him.
They fight—Sallust is killed, and the Queen, delighted with
Ruy's behaviour on the occasion, offers him her hand, which
he, of course, accepts.
