The count let him say on, and then forced him into a chair, and the unworthy ecclesiastic not only ate but got drunk.  Thus peace was concluded, and the abbe forgot all his wrongs.

A few days later two Capuchins came to visit him at noon.  They did not go, and as he did not care to dismiss them, dinner was served without any place being laid for the friars.  Thereupon the bolder of the two informed the count that he had had no dinner.  Without replying, the count had him accommodated with a plateful of rice.  The Capuchin refused it, saying that he was worthy to sit, not only at his table, but at a monarch’s.  The count, who happened to be in a good humour, replied that they called themselves “unworthy brethren,” and that they were consequently not worthy of any of this world’s good things.

The Capuchin made but a poor answer, and as I thought the count to be in the right I proceeded to back him up, telling the friar he ought to be ashamed at having committed the sin of pride, so strictly condemned by the rules of his order.

The Capuchin answered me with a torrent of abuse, so the count ordered a pair of scissors to be brought, that the beards of the filthy rogues might be cut off.  At this awful threat the two friars made their escape, and we laughed heartily over the incident.

If all the count’s eccentricities had been of this comparatively harmless and amusing nature, I should not have minded, but such was far from being the case.

Instead of chyle his organs must have distilled some virulent poison; he was always at his worst in his after dinner hours.  His appetite was furious; he ate more like a tiger than a man.  One day we happened to be eating woodcock, and I could not help praising the dish in the style of the true gourmand.  He immediately took up his bird, tore it limb from limb, and gravely bade me not to praise the dishes I liked as it irritated him.  I felt an inclination to laugh and also an inclination to throw the bottle at his head, which I should probably have indulged in had I been twenty years younger.  However, I did neither, feeling that I should either leave him or accommodate myself to his humours.

Three months later Madame Costa, the actress whom he had gone to see at Gorice, told me that she would never have believed in the possibility of such a creature existing if she had not known Count Torriano.

“Though he is a vigorous lover,” she continued, “it is a matter of great difficulty with him to obtain the crisis; and the wretched woman in his arms is in imminent danger of being strangled to death if she cannot conceal her amorous ecstacy.  He cannot bear to see another’s pleasure.  I pity his wife most heartily.”

I will now relate the incident which put an end to my relations with this venomous creature.

Amidst the idleness and weariness of Spessa I happened to meet a very pretty and very agreeable young widow.  I made her some small presents, and finally persuaded her to pass the night in my room.  She came at midnight to avoid observation, and left at day-break by a small door which opened on to the road.