By the Misery of Fate I'm Haunted...

This aria concerns the most tragical character of the operetta. It is

in its substance a confession of a man of deformed character and dicey

morals. Kicked over and humilitated, Blether hurries from the castle

to Spiritus' inn to offer his services to the spiritists. Since they

have already known him for some time, he leaves misunderstood for

Jelezny Brod, where he drinks like a fish. Well - for his whole life

he has been accustomed to serving some master blindly, and so has life

suddenly lost all meaning for him. This probably is the strongest of

the motives for his desperate suicide, committed by jumping into the

wild Jizera rapids from the Rieger's path pn his way from Jelezny

Brod, UC.

While Blether is killing himself, Atrament passes the boring time in

jail by means of somnambulous sleep. All of sudden he starts to draw

thoughtlessly strange patterns on the wall of his dungeon with a

broken brick - medial drawings. A praemurdial spirit reveals to him

that the man who poses as the Captain Satrapold is - just Satrapold's

treacherous aide Poebeldorf, who devised a vile scheme with the

intention to steal jewels from the Jilemnice castle and to flee to

Cairo with enormous wealth. He was sent to the Jilemnice castle to

prepare everything for the arrival of the real Satrapold, who is

expected