“Zounds!  Did I not?  It is only a week since I paid a visit to the very same place myself, and I believe the creature was all right before my visit.”

“Then I have to thank you for the present she has bestowed upon me.”

“Most likely; but it is only a trifle, and you can easily get cured if you care to take the trouble.”

“What!  Do you not try to cure yourself?”

“Faith, no.  It would be too much trouble to follow a regular diet, and what is the use of curing such a trifling inconvenience when I am certain of getting it again in a fortnight.  Ten times in my life I have had that patience, but I got tired of it, and for the last two years I have resigned myself, and now I put up with it.”

“I pity you, for a man like you would have great success in love.”

“I do not care a fig for love; it requires cares which would bother me much more than the slight inconvenience to which we were alluding, and to which I am used now.”

“I am not of your opinion, for the amorous pleasure is insipid when love does not throw a little spice in it.  Do you think, for instance, that the ugly wretch I met at the guard-room is worth what I now suffer on her account?”

“Of course not, and that is why I am sorry for you.  If I had known, I could have introduced you to something better.”

“The very best in that line is not worth my health, and health ought to be sacrificed only for love.”

“Oh! you want women worthy of love?  There are a few here; stop with us for some time, and when you are cured there is nothing to prevent you from making conquests.”

O’Neilan was only twenty-three years old; his father, who was dead, had been a general, and the beautiful Countess Borsati was his sister.  He presented me to the Countess Zanardi Nerli, still more lovely than his sister, but I was prudent enough not to burn my incense before either of them, for it seemed to me that everybody could guess the state of my health.

I have never met a young man more addicted to debauchery than O’Neilan.  I have often spent the night rambling about with him, and I was amazed at his cynical boldness and impudence.  Yet he was noble, generous, brave, and honourable.  If in those days young officers were often guilty of so much immorality, of so many vile actions, it was not so much their fault as the fault of the privileges which they enjoyed through custom, indulgence, or party spirit.  Here is an example: 

One day O’Neilan, having drunk rather freely, rides through the city at full speed.  A poor old woman who was crossing the street has no time to avoid him, she falls, and her head is cut open by the horse’s feet.  O’Neilan places himself under arrest, but the next day he is set at liberty.  He had, only to plead that it was an accident.

The officer Laurent not having called upon me to redeem his promisory note of six sequins during the week, I told him in the street that I would no longer consider myself bound to keep the affair secret.  Instead of excusing himself, he said,