me from the unpleasant consequences of an interrogatory in the presence
of the Council of Ten, during which I should have been convicted of
having taken the young girl with me, and compelled to say what I had done
with her.

A few days afterwards we all proceeded to Padua to remain in that city
until the end of autumn. I was grieved not to find Doctor Gozzi in Padua;
he had been appointed to a benefice in the country, and he was living
there with Bettina; she had not been able to remain with the scoundrel
who had married her only for the sake of her small dowry, and had treated
her very ill.

I did not like the quiet life of Padua, and to avoid dying from ennui I
fell in love with a celebrated Venetian courtesan. Her name was Ancilla;
sometime after, the well-known dancer, Campioni, married her and took her
to London, where she caused the death of a very worthy Englishman. I
shall have to mention her again in four years; now I have only to speak
of a certain circumstance which brought my love adventure with her to a
close after three or four weeks.

Count Medini, a young, thoughtless fellow like myself, and with
inclinations of much the same cast, had introduced me to Ancilla. The
count was a confirmed gambler and a thorough enemy of fortune. There was
a good deal of gambling going on at Ancilla's, whose favourite lover he
was, and the fellow had presented me to his mistress only to give her the
opportunity of making a dupe of me at the card-table.

And, to tell the truth, I was a dupe at first; not thinking of any foul
play, I accepted ill luck without complaining; but one day I caught them
cheating. I took a pistol out of my pocket, and, aiming at Medini's