Angelica has been forced by her family to join a convent after she has had a child despite being unmarried. With her life reduced to the confines of the convent’s walled garden, and tormented by the love and life she was robbed of, she takes some comfort thinking of the child who she will never know. When her aunt visits to demand Angelica relinquish her family estate and, in passing, reveals that the child died two years ago, Angelica is devastated. She becomes desperate to join her son in death. 

Preparing poison from flowers in the convent garden, Angelica drinks the potion. As death approaches, she realises that suicide is a mortal sin, and she prays for forgiveness. In the final moments Angelica is reunited with her child in the afterlife –  some of the most moving moments in all opera.