honour will succeed where those other gentlemen failed; but if you ask
my advice, I say, leave the doctor alone, and comfort the little lady."

His gross misapprehension of every merit of the case nettled me: I saw
it was useless to talk with a person of his condition, and that instant
action was my only safety. I must go, on my knees if must be, to the
feet of Donna Aurelia, I must put myself entirely at her service. Should
that lie in spurning me with her heel I must endure it; should she bid
me go and receive public chastisement from her dangerous husband, I
would assuredly go. Tears, stripes, hunger, thirst, cold, heat,
loneliness, nakedness, unjust accusation, ridicule, malicious
persecution--all these I would cheerfully undergo; and if one or any of
them could repair her misfortunes, then they would be repaired. The
custode said that he believed they could not, but I bade him be silent
and begone. "Wretched Venetian," I cried at him, "thou art incapable of
comprehending anything but victuals. If I tell thee that I have
lacerated an angel and deserve the sword, thou speakest of my skill in
fence! I waste my breath upon thee. Comfort the lady, dost thou dare to
say? What comfort can she have but in my repentance? What have I to
offer but devotion?"

"It is just that which I advise your honour-" he began, but I was now
embarked upon the waters of adventure, cheered with the prospect of
action, impatient to begin my voyage. Astonishment cropped his period
midway; he gaped as he saw what I did. I threw upon the floor my sword
and finely laced coat; I threw my vest, ruffles, cravat, watch, rings,
after them. I kicked into a corner with my foot my buckled shoes, my
silk stockings, my fine gilt garters. Upon the top of the heap I cast my
Paris hat, my gloves and brooch. "There lies," I said, "the sinful husk
of Francis Strelley. Let the swine nozzle and rout in it for what they