As the harvesters take a midday break, the landowner Adina reads about Tristan and Isolde, while the lovesick peasant Nemorino adores her from afar. Adina mockingly relates how the legendary lovers were enchanted by a magical love potion. A troop of soldiers march in, led by the handsome Sergeant Belcore, who boldly proposes marriage to Adina. After she deflects him, she is left alone with the yearning Nemorino. Adina advises Nemorino to go visit his wealthy uncle, who is ill. She warns him that she is capricious and will never settle down. But Nemorino insists that he will continue to love her faithfully. The quack Dr. Dulcamara arrives, hawking his beauty treatments and miracle cures. Nemorino asks him if he carries Isolde’s love potion, so Dulcamara sells him an ‘elixir of love’ which is actually just a bottle of cheap wine, telling him that it will take effect in one day. Nemorino guzzles the “elixir” and, feeling emboldened, approaches Adina, telling her that she will be his in just 24 hours. Belcore arrives to demand Adina’s answer to his marriage proposal. Just to spite the overconfident Nemorino, Adina agrees to marry Belcore in six days. But when the soldiers suddenly receive an order to leave town the next morning, Adina agrees to marry Belcore that very day. Nemorino pleads with her to wait just one day longer, but to no avail.