Act II, Scene 2
THIS is Verdi's only successful comic opera, and merriment bubbles and sparkles all through it, in the music as well as in the text. The libretto was made for him by his fellow composer Boito, who is likely to be better remembered by his work in that way than by his own music: he used not only The Merry Wives of Windsor, but parts of Henry IV. Falstaff himself dominates the opera and the part is a very difficult one to present with the requisite blend of bluff humour, and Cno singing.
In Act II. we are at the Garter Inn. Mistress Quickly brings Falstaff a message from Mistress Ford bidding him to a rendezvous. Ford himself comes next, and, under an assumed name, learns from Falstaff all that he wished to know!
The next scene is the famous one of the linen basket, ending in Falstaff's discomfiture.