“How did you make this nice acquaintance?” I asked the ambassador.

“Six months ago,” he replied, “while standing at the convent gate with Mr. Smith, our consul, in whose company I had been to see some ceremony or other, I remarked to him, as we were talking over some nuns we had noticed, ’I would gladly give five hundred sequins for a few hours of Sister M——­ M——­ s company.’  Count Capsucefalo heard what I said, but made no remark.  Mr. Smith answered that one could only see her at the grating as did the ambassador of France, who often came to visit her.  Capsucefalo called on me the next morning, and said that if I had spoken in good faith he was sure he could get me a night with the nun in whatever place I liked, if she could count on my secrecy.  ’I have just been speaking to her,’ said he, ’and on my mentioning your name she said she had noticed you with Mr. Smith, and vowed she would sup with you more for love than money.  ‘I,’ said the rascal, ’am the only man she trusts, and I take her to the French ambassador’s casino in Venice whenever she wants to go there.  You need not be afraid of being cheated, as you will give the money to her personally when you have possessed yourself of her.’  With this he took her portrait from his pocket and shewed it me; and here it is.  I bought it of him two days after I believed myself to have spent a night with the charming nun, and a fortnight after our conversation.  This beauty here came masked in a nun’s habit, and I was fool enough to think I had got a treasure.  I am vexed with myself for not having suspected the cheat—­at all events, when I saw her hair, as I know that nuns’ hair should be cut short.  But when I said something about it to the hussy, she told me they were allowed to keep their hair under their caps, and I was weak enough to believe her.”

I knew that on this particular Murray had not been deceived, but I did not feel compelled to tell him so then and there.

I held the portrait Murray had given me in my hand, and compared it with the face before me.  In the portrait the breast was bare, and as I was remarking that painters did those parts as best they could, the impudent wench seized the opportunity to shew me that the miniature was faithful to nature.  I turned my back upon her with an expression of contempt which would have mortified her, if these creatures were ever capable of shame.  As we talked things over, I could not help laughing at the axiom, Things which are equal to the same thing are equal to one another, for the miniature was like M. M. and like the courtezan, and yet the two women were not like each other.  Murray agreed with me, and we spent an hour in a philosophical discussion on the matter.  As the false M. M. was named Innocente, we expressed a wish to know how her name agreed with her profession, and how the knave had induced her to play the part she had taken; and she told us the following story: