I managed to squeeze my fair neighbour’s hand, and she returned the pressure with all her strength.  From that time I knew that my fate with Mariuccia was sealed.  I left them at midnight, begging the worthy Momolo to ask me again in two days’ time, that we might rejoice together over our gains.  On our way home my brother said I had either become as rich as Croesus or had gone mad.  I told him that both suppositions were incorrect, but that Mariuccia was as handsome as an angel, and he agreed.

Next day Mengs returned to Rome, and I supped with him and his family.  He had an exceedingly ugly sister, who for all that, was a good and talented woman.  She had fallen deeply in love with my brother, and it was easy to see that the flame was not yet extinguished, but whenever she spoke to him, which she did whenever she could get an opportunity, he looked another way.

She was an exquisite painter of miniatures, and a capital hand at catching a likeness.  To the best of my belief she is still living at Rome with Maroni her husband.  She often used to speak of my brother to me, and one day she said that he must be the most thankless of men or he would not despise her so.  I was not curious enough to enquire what claim she had to his gratitude.

Mengs’s wife was a good and pretty woman, attentive to her household duties and very submissive to her husband, though she could not have loved him, for he was anything but amiable.  He was obstinate and fierce in his manner, and when he dined at home he made a point of not leaving the table before he was drunk; out of his own house he was temperate to the extent of not drinking anything but water.  His wife carried her obedience so far as to serve as his model for all the nude figures he painted.  I spoke to her one day about this unpleasant obligation, and she said that her confessor had charged her to fulfil it, “for,” said he, “if your husband has another woman for a model he will be sure to enjoy her before painting her, and that sin would be laid to your charge.”

After supper, Winckelmann, who was as far gone as all the other male guests, played with Mengs’s children.  There was nothing of the pedant about this philosopher; he loved children and young people, and his cheerful disposition made him delight in all kinds of enjoyment.

Next day, as I was going to pay my court to the Pope, I saw Momolo in the first ante-chamber, and I took care to remind him of the polenta for the evening.

As soon as the Pope saw me, he said,—­

“The Venetian ambassador has informed us that if you wish to return to your native land, you must go and present yourself before the secretary of the Tribunal.”

“Most Holy Father, I am quite ready to take this step, if Your Holiness will grant me a letter of commendation written with your own hand.  Without this powerful protection I should never dream of exposing myself to the risk of being again shut up in a place from which I escaped by a miracle and the help of the Almighty.”