as usual, and seeing that she was better he prophesied that nature’s remedy, without which only art could keep her alive, would make all right before the autumn.  Her mother looked upon me as an angel sent by God to cure her daughter, who for her part shewed me that gratitude which with women is the first step towards love.  I had made her dismiss her old dancing master, and I had taught her to dance with extreme grace.

At the end of these ten or twelve days, just as I was going to give her her lesson, her breath failed instantaneously, and she fell back into my arms like a dead woman.  I was alarmed, but her mother, who had become accustomed to see her thus, sent for the surgeon, and her sister unlaced her.  I was enchanted with her exquisite bosom, which needed no colouring to make it more beautiful.  I covered it up, saying that the surgeon would make a false stroke if he were to see her thus uncovered; but feeling that I laid my hand upon her with delight, she gently repulsed me, looking at me with a languishing gaze which made the deepest impression on me.

The surgeon came and bled her in the arm, and almost instantaneously she recovered full consciousness.  At most only four ounces of blood were taken from her, and her mother telling me that this was the utmost extent to which she was blooded, I saw it was no such matter for wonder as Righelini represented it, for being blooded twice a week she lost three pounds of blood a month, which she would have done naturally if the vessels had not been obstructed.

The surgeon had hardly gone out of the door when to my astonishment she told me that if I would wait for her a moment she would come back and begin her dancing.  This she did, and danced as if there had been nothing the matter.

Her bosom, on which two of my senses were qualified to give evidence, was the last stroke, and made me madly in love with her.  I returned to the house in the evening, and found her in her room with the sister.  She told me that she was expecting her god-father, who was an intimate friend of her father’s, and had come every evening to spend an hour with her for the last eighteen years.

“How old is he?”

“He is over fifty.”

“Is he a married man?”

“Yes, his name is Count S——.  He is as fond of me as a father would be, and his affection has continued the same since my childhood.  Even his wife comes to see me sometimes, and to ask me to dinner.  Neat autumn I am going into the country with her, and I hope the fresh air will do me good.  My god-father knows you are staying with us and is satisfied.  He does not know you, but if you like you can make his acquaintance.”

I was glad to hear all this, as I gained a good deal of useful information without having to ask any awkward questions.  The friendship of this Greek looked very like love.  He was the husband of Countess S——­, who had taken me to the convent at Muran two years before.