“Three years ago a certain Count Seriman came and asked me to take from him five hundred sequins, to put them in my business, and to give him half profits.  All he asked for was an obligation in which I promised to return him the whole sum on demand.  At the end of a year I sent him seventy-five sequins, which made fifteen per cent. on his money; he gave me a receipt for it, but was ill pleased.  He was wrong, for I was in no need of money, and had not used his for business purposes.  At the end of the second year, out of pure generosity, I sent him the same amount; but we came to a quarrel and he demanded the return of the five hundred sequins.  ‘Certainly,’ I said, ’but I must deduct the hundred and fifty you have already received.’  Enraged at this he served me with a writ for the payment of the whole sum.  A clever lawyer undertook my defence and was able to gain me two years.  Three months ago I was spoken to as to an agreement, and I refused to hear of it, but fearing violence I went to the Abbe Justiniani, the Spanish ambassador’s secretary, and for a small sum he let me a house in the precincts of the Embassy, where one is safe from surprises.  I was quite willing to let Count Seriman have his money, but I claimed a reduction of a hundred sequins on account of the costs of the lawsuit.  A week ago the lawyers on both sides came to me.  I shewed them a purse of two hundred and fifty sequins, and told them they might take it, but not a penny more.  They went away without saying a word, both wearing an ill-pleased air, of which I took no notice.  Three days ago the Abbe Justiniani told me that the ambassador had thought fit to give permission to the State Inquisitors to send their men at once to my house to make search therein.  I thought the thing impossible under the shelter of a foreign ambassador, and instead of taking the usual precautions, I waited the approach of the men-at-arms, only putting my money in a place of safety.  At daybreak Messer-Grande came to the house, and asked me for three hundred and fifty sequins, and on my telling him that I hadn’t a farthing he seized me, and here I am.”

I shuddered, less at having such an infamous companion than at his evidently considering me as his equal, for if he had thought of me in any other light he would certainly not have told me this long tale, doubtless in the belief that I should take his part.  In all the folly about Charron with which he tormented me in the three days we were together, I found by bitter experience the truth of the Italian proverb:  ’Guardati da colui che non ha letto che un libro solo’.  By reading the work of the misguided priest he had become an Atheist, and of this he made his boast all the day long.  In the afternoon Lawrence came to tell him to come and speak with the secretary.  He dressed himself hastily, and instead of his own shoes he took mine without my seeing him.  He came back in half an hour in tears, and took out of his shoes two purses containing three hundred and