Cheerful as I was by nature, those pleasant guests easily managed to put me in the best of humours.  Everyone expressed a wish to know the reasons which could have induced M. Grimani to send me to the fortress, so I gave a faithful account of all my adventures since my grandmother’s death.  I spoke for three hours without any bitterness, and even in a pleasant tone, upon things which, said in a different manner, might have displeased my audience; all expressed their satisfaction, and shewed so much sympathy that, as we parted for the night, I received from all an assurance of friendship and the offer of their services.  This is a piece of good fortune which has never failed me whenever I have been the victim of oppression, until I reached the age of fifty.  Whenever I met with honest persons expressing a curiosity to know the history of the misfortune under which I was labouring, and whenever I satisfied their curiosity, I have inspired them with friendship, and with that sympathy which was necessary to render them favourable and useful to me.

That success was owing to a very simple artifice; it was only to tell my story in a quiet and truthful manner, without even avoiding the facts which told against me.  It is simple secret that many men do not know, because the larger portion of humankind is composed of cowards; a man who always tells the truth must be possessed of great moral courage.  Experience has taught me that truth is a talisman, the charm of which never fails in its effect, provided it is not wasted upon unworthy people, and I believe that a guilty man, who candidly speaks the truth to his judge, has a better chance of being acquitted, than the innocent man who hesitates and evades true statements.  Of course the speaker must be young, or at least in the prime of manhood; for an old man finds the whole of nature combined against him.

The major had his joke respecting the visit paid and returned to the seminarist’s bed, but the chaplain and the ladies scolded him.  The major advised me to write out my story and send it to the secretary of war, undertaking that he should receive it, and he assured me that he would become my protector.  All the ladies tried to induce me to follow the major’s advice.

CHAPTER VII

My Short Stay in Fort St. Andre—­My First Repentance in Love Affairs I Enjoy the Sweets of Revenge, and Prove a Clever Alibi—­Arrest of Count Bonafede—­My Release—­Arrival of the Bishop—­Farewell to Venice

The fort, in which the Republic usually kept only a garrison of one hundred half-pay Sclavonians, happened to contain at that time two thousand Albanian soldiers, who were called Cimariotes.