“This, my prince, delayed me so that I could not reach Petervalden by daylight.  I stopped at an evil tavern where, dying of famine and rage, I ate everything I saw; and, wishing to drink and not liking beer, I gulped down some beverage which my host told me was good and which did not seem unpleasant.  He told me that it was Pilnitz Moste.  This beverage aroused a rebellion in my guts.  I passed the night tormented by a continual diarrhoea.  I arrived here the day before yesterday (the 28th), where I found an unpleasant duty awaiting me.  Two months ago, I brought a woman here to cook, needing her while the Count is away; as soon as she arrived, I gave her a room and I went to Leipzig.  On returning here, I found three servants in the hands of surgeons and all three blame my cook for putting them in such a state.  The Count’s courier had already told me, at Leipzig, that she had crippled him.  Yesterday the Count arrived and would do nothing but laugh, but I have sent her back and exhorted her to imitate the Magdalene.  The amusing part is that she is old, ugly and ill-smelling.”

In 1789, 1791 and 1792, Casanova received three letters from Maddalena Allegranti, the niece of J. B. Allegranti the innkeeper with whom Casanova lodged at Florence in 1771.  “This young person, still a child, was so pretty, so gracious, with such spirit and such charms, that she incessantly distracted me.  Sometimes she would come into my chamber to wish me good-morning . . . .  Her appearance, her grace, the sound of her voice . . . were more than I could resist; and, fearing the seduction would excuse mine, I could find no other expedient than to take flight. . . .  Some years later, Maddalena became a celebrated musician.”

At this period of Casanova’s life, we hear again of the hussy who so upset Casanova during his visit to London that he was actually on the point of committing suicide through sheer desperation.  On the 20th September 1789, he wrote to the Princess Clari, sister of the Prince de Ligne:  “I am struck by a woman at first sight, she completely ravishes me, and I am perhaps lost, for she may be a Charpillon.”

There were, among the papers at Dux, two letters from Marianne Charpillon, and a manuscript outlining the story of Casanova’s relations with her and her family, as detailed in the Memoirs:  With the story in mind, the letters from this girl, “the mistress, now of one, now of another,” are of interest: 

“I know not, Monsieur, whether you forgot the engagement Saturday last; as for me, I remember that you consented to give us the pleasure of having you at dinner to-day, Monday, the 12th of the month.  I would greatly like to know whether your ill-humor has left you; this would please me.  Farewell, in awaiting the honor of seeing you.

“Marianne de Charpillon.”

“Monsieur,

“As I have a part in all which concerns you, I am greatly put out to know of the new illness which incommodes you; I hope that this will be so trifling that we will have the pleasure of seeing you well and at our house, to-day or to-morrow.