“I had built some hopes on the success of the Martiri, for we votaries of the blue divinity Hope always discount results.  When a man believes himself destined to do great things, it is hard not to fancy them achieved; the bushel always has some cracks through which the light shines.

“My wife’s family lodged in the same house, and the hope of winning Marianna, who often smiled at me from her window, had done much to encourage my efforts.  I now fell into the deepest melancholy as I sounded the depths of a life of poverty, a perpetual struggle in which love must die.  Marianna acted as genius does; she jumped across every obstacle, both feet at once.  I will not speak of the little happiness which shed its gilding on the beginning of my misfortunes.  Dismayed at my failure, I decided that Italy was not intelligent enough and too much sunk in the dull round of routine to accept the innovations I conceived of; so I thought of going to Germany.

“I traveled thither by way of Hungary, listening to the myriad voices of nature, and trying to reproduce that sublime harmony by the help of instruments which I constructed or altered for the purpose.  These experiments involved me in vast expenses which had soon exhausted my savings.  And yet those were our golden days.  In Germany I was appreciated.  There has been nothing in my life more glorious than that time.  I can think of nothing to compare with the vehement joys I found by the side of Marianna, whose beauty was then of really heavenly radiance and splendor.  In short, I was happy.

“During that period of weakness I more than once expressed my passion in the language of earthly harmony.  I even wrote some of those airs, just like geometrical patterns, which are so much admired in the world of fashion that you move in.  But as soon as I made a little way I met with insuperable obstacles raised by my rivals, all hypercritical or unappreciative.

“I had heard of France as being a country where novelties were favorably received, and I wanted to get there; my wife had a little money and we came to Paris.  Till then no one had actually laughed in my face; but in this dreadful city I had to endure that new form of torture, to which abject poverty ere long added its bitter sufferings.  Reduced to lodging in this mephitic quarter, for many months we have lived exclusively on Marianna’s sewing, she having found employment for her needle in working for the unhappy prostitutes who make this street their hunting ground.  Marianna assures me that among those poor creatures she has met with such consideration and generosity as I, for my part, ascribe to the ascendency of virtue so pure that even vice is compelled to respect it.”

“Hope on,” said Andrea.  “Perhaps you have reached the end of your trials.  And while waiting for the time when my endeavor, seconding yours, shall set your labors in a true light, allow me, as a fellow-countryman and an artist like yourself, to offer you some little advances on the undoubted success of your score.”