“Do you pray to God?” he said.

“From the morning unto the evening, and from the evening unto the morning, for, placed as I am, all that I feel—­my anxiety, my grief, all the wanderings of my mind—­can be but a prayer in the eyes of the Divine Wisdom which alone sees my heart.”

The Jesuit smiled slightly and replied by a discourse rather metaphysical than moral, which did not at all tally with my views.  I should have confuted him on every point if he had not astonished me by a prophecy he made.  “Since it is from us,” said he, “that you learnt what you know of religion, practise it in our fashion, pray like us, and know that you will only come out of this place on the day of the saint whose name you bear.”  So saying he gave me absolution, and left me.  This man left the strongest possible impression on my mind.  I did my best, but I could not rid myself of it.  I proceeded to pass in review all the saints in the calendar.

The Jesuit was the director of M. Flaminio Corner, an old senator, and then a State Inquisitor.  This statesman was a famous man of letters, a great politician, highly religious, and author of several pious and ascetic works written in Latin.  His reputation was spotless.

On being informed that I should be set free on the feast-day of my patron saint, and thinking that my informant ought to know for certain what he told me, I felt glad to have a patron-saint.  “But which is it?” I asked myself.  “It cannot be St. James of Compostella, whose name I bear, for it was on the feast-day of that saint that Messer-Grande burst open my door.”  I took the almanac and looking for the saints’ days nearest at hand I found St. George—­a saint of some note, but of whom I had never thought.  I then devoted myself to St. Mark, whose feast fell on the twenty-fifth of the month, and whose protection as a Venetian I might justly claim.  To him, then, I addressed my vows, but all in vain, for his feast came round and still I was in prison.  Then I took myself to St. James, the brother of Christ, who comes before St. Philip, but again in the wrong.  I tried St. Anthony, who, if the tale told at Padua be true, worked thirteen miracles a day.  He worked none for me.  Thus I passed from one to the other, and by degrees I got to hope in the protection of the saints just as one hopes for anything one desires, but does not expect to come to pass; and I finished up by hoping only in my Saint Bar, and in the strength of my arms.  Nevertheless the promise of the Jesuit came to pass, since I escaped from The Leads on All Hallows Day; and it is certain that if I had a patron-saint, he must be looked for in their number since they are all honoured on that day.

A fortnight after Easter I was delivered from my troublesome Israelite, and the poor devil instead of being sent back to his home had to spend two years in The Fours, and on his gaining his freedom he went and set up in Trieste, where he ended his days.