Then comes the Larghetto, three-four time in E flat major, which Handel calls a Musette, and which is one of the most delightful dreams of pastoral happiness.^[1] A whole day of poetic and capricious events gradually unrolls itself over the beautiful echoing refrain,

then the movement slackens, nearly going to sleep, then presses forward again, acquiring a strong, joyous rhythm, a pulsating dance of robust youths, full of bounding life.

1. ↑ Arnold Schering believes that the idea of this Musette was given to Handel by a ritournelle from Leonardo Leo's S. Elena il Calvaroa.