the proceedings being taken against me, as if there had been a certainty
of my having desecrated a grave, whilst there could be nothing but
suspicion. But I was mistaken, the summons was not relating to that
affair. M. Barbaro informed me in the evening that a woman had brought a
complaint against me for having violated her daughter. She stated in her
complaint that, having decoyed her child to the Zuecca, I had abused her
by violence, and she adduced as a proof that her daughter was confined to
her bed, owing to the bad treatment she had received from me in my
endeavours to ravish her. It was one of those complaints which are often
made, in order to give trouble and to cause expense, even against
innocent persons. I was innocent of violation, but it was quite true that
I had given the girl a sound thrashing. I prepared my defence, and begged
M. Barbaro to deliver it to the magistrate's secretary.

DECLARATION

I hereby declare that, on such a day, having met the woman with her
daughter, I accosted them and offered to give them some refreshments at a
coffee-house near by; that the daughter refused to accept my caresses,
and that the mother said to me,--

"My daughter is yet a virgin, and she is quite right not to lose her
maidenhood without making a good profit by it."

"If so," I answered, "I will give you ten sequins for her virginity."

"You may judge for yourself," said the mother.

Having assured myself of the fact by the assistance of the sense of
feeling, and having ascertained that it might be true, I told the mother