“I am the happiest of women!  We have nothing to do in Rimini; suppose we do not get up; we can have our dinner in bed, and go away to-morrow well rested after our fatigues.”

We left Rimini the next day, and stayed for breakfast at Pesaro.  As we were getting into the carriage to leave that place, an officer, accompanied by two soldiers, presented himself, enquired for our names, and demanded our passports.  Bellino had one and gave it, but I looked in vain for mine; I could not find it.

The officer, a corporal, orders the postillion to wait and goes to make his report.  Half an hour afterwards, he returns, gives Bellino his passport, saying that he can continue his journey, but tells me that his orders are to escort me to the commanding officer, and I follow him.

“What have you done with your passport?” enquires that officer.

“I have lost it.”

“A passport is not so easily lost.”

“Well, I have lost mine.”

“You cannot proceed any further.”

“I come from Rome, and I am going to Constantinople, bearing a letter from Cardinal Acquaviva.  Here is the letter stamped with his seal.”

“All I can do for you is to send you to M. de Gages.”

I found the famous general standing, surrounded by his staff.  I told him all I had already explained to the officer, and begged him to let me continue my journey.

“The only favour I can grant you is to put you under arrest till you receive another passport from Rome delivered under the same name as the one you have given here.  To lose a passport is a misfortune which befalls only a thoughtless, giddy man, and the cardinal will for the future know better than to put his confidence in a giddy fellow like you.”

With these words, he gave orders to take me to the guard-house at St. Mary’s Gate, outside the city, as soon as I should have written to the cardinal for a new passport.  His orders were executed.  I was brought back to the inn, where I wrote my letter, and I sent it by express to his eminence, entreating him to forward the document, without loss of time, direct to the war office.  Then I embraced Therese who was weeping, and, telling her to go to Rimini and to wait there for my return, I made her take one hundred sequins.  She wished to remain in Pesaro, but I would not hear of it; I had my trunk brought out, I saw Therese go away from the inn, and was taken to the place appointed by the general.

It is undoubtedly under such circumstances that the most determined optimist finds himself at a loss; but an easy stoicism can blunt the too sharp edge of misfortune.

My greatest sorrow was the heart-grief of Therese who, seeing me torn from her arms at the very moment of our union, was suffocated by the tears which she tried to repress.  She would not have left me if I had not made her understand that she could not remain in Pesaro, and if I had not promised to join her within ten days, never to be parted again.  But fate had decided otherwise.