shorten it by many years; he was already sixty-three, and had recovered
from a serious apoplectic stroke.

I went to dine with Lady Murray (English-women who are daughters of lords
keep the title), and after dinner the ambassador told me that he had told
M. Cavalli the whole story of the false nun, and that the secretary had
informed him, the evening before, that everything had been done to his
liking. Count Capsucefalo had been sent to Cephalonia, his native
country, with the order never to return to Venice, and the courtezan had
disappeared.

The fine part, or rather the fearful part, about these sentences is that
no one ever knows the reason why or wherefore, and that the lot may fall
on the innocent as well as the guilty. M. M. was delighted with the
event, and I was more pleased than she, for I should have been sorry to
have been obliged to soil my hands with the blood of that rascally count.

There are seasons in the life of men which may be called 'fasti' and
'nefasti'; I have proved this often in my long career, and on the
strength of the rubs and struggles I have had to encounter. I am able, as
well as any man, to verify the truth of this axiom. I had just
experienced a run of luck. Fortune had befriended me at play, I had been
happy in the society of men, and from love I had nothing to ask; but now
the reverse of the medal began to appear. Love was still kind, but
Fortune had quite left me, and you will soon see, reader, that men used
me no better than the blind goddess. Nevertheless, since one's fate has
phases as well as the moon, good follows evil as disasters succeed to
happiness.

I still played on the martingale, but with such bad luck that I was soon