immediately thought myself in the road to great adventures; that being
the point to which all my ideas tended: this, however, did not prove so
brilliant as I had conceived it. I waited on the lady with the servant;
who had mentioned me: she asked a number of questions, and my answers not
displeasing her, I immediately entered into her service not, indeed, in
the quality of favorite, but as a footman. I was clothed like the rest
of her people, the only difference being, they wore a shoulder--knot,
which I had not, and, as there was no lace on her livery, it appeared
merely a tradesman's suit. This was the unforeseen conclusion of all my
great expectancies!

The Countess of Vercellis, with whom I now lived, was a widow without
children; her husband was a Piedmontese, but I always believed her to be
a Savoyard, as I could have no conception that a native of Piedmont could
speak such good French, and with so pure an accent. She was a
middle-aged woman, of a noble appearance and cultivated understanding,
being fond of French literature, in which she was well versed. Her
letters had the expression, and almost the elegance of Madam de
Savigne's; some of them might have been taken for hers. My principal
employ, which was by no means displeasing to me, was to write from her
dictating; a cancer in the breast, from which she suffered extremely,
not permitting her to write herself.

Madam de Vercellis not only possessed a good understanding, but a strong
and elevated soul. I was with her during her last illness, and saw her
suffer and die, without showing an instant of weakness, or the least
effort of constraint; still retaining her feminine manners, without
entertaining an idea that such fortitude gave her any claim to
philosophy; a word which was not yet in fashion, nor comprehended by her
in the sense it is held at present. This strength of disposition