ripe for my great design.  After worship, relaxation, the release from pain; after pain, pleasure comes.  On that third day, my children, we will set up a faro-bank, the profits of which, if skill be employed, will more than counterbalance what we have cheerfully lost in our efforts to do good.  The reward, I say, is certain, and who shall call it undeserved?  Not I, for one.  Now, children, to the road once more!  Happy fortunes attend us!  Pray for old Palamone, who loves you dearly and thinks about you night and day.”

He got up as he was finishing this speech of his and took to the road before I could object—­as I did object—­to some of his propositions.  But I told Virginia that I intended to leave him at Prato and push on to Florence, as I had no intention of helping him cheat his neighbours.  “What!” I cried, “a Strelley of Upcote, a gentleman and an old Catholic, to clown it in a fair!  Never in the world!”

Virginia, walking staidly beside me, considered this outburst in silence before she delivered herself. ’"You speak,” she then said, “as I would have you speak, but not at all as you have decided to speak.  You cannot at one and the same moment be Francesco of Upcote and Francesco Ignoto; you cannot exalt yourself and degrade yourself.  If you choose to be a gentleman, why did you discard your coat?”

I laughed at her.  “My child,” said I, “on your showing a man cannot be a gentleman in his bed—­or in his bath.”  But she held to her opinion.

“I think you understand me very well.  You choose to go a pilgrimage, to encounter dangers and humiliations, and yet the moment a fine one is proposed to you, you jump back after your gentleman’s estate.  You tell me that you have peddled crucifixes:  what more does Palamone expect of you?  Be what you choose, Don Francis; kiss me or kiss your Aurelia; go afoot or in a coach; beg or give, sink or swim.  You have two hands, you will say.  It is true; but you have only one person.  If, with a fistful of gold in your right hand, you go about begging with your left, you will be contemptible as well as ridiculous.”

“I agree with that,” I said, “but—­”

“Here again,” said she, breaking in upon me, “you have a choice; and it is obvious.  I am not able to speak for Donna Aurelia, or so you will tell me; but I will give a great golden heart to the Girdle of Prato that while she may love a ridiculous Don Francis, she will turn her back on the other.”

“Love!” I said, echoing her.  “Love, my good girl!  Of what are you speaking?  Donna Aurelia love me?  You must be mad.”

“It is certain that I must be,” she replied, “unless it is your honour who is mad.  Pray let me understand what it is that you want of the lady when you find her.”

“Her pardon,” I said, and made her furious.  She glared, bit her lip, stamped.  With arms tight folded to restrain her heaving chest, she stopped short and nodded her words into me one by one, as if she were directing artillery at a siege.  “Well, very well, Don Francis,” she said; “then I tell you plainly that you will find misery and her together, if you propose to pray at her feet instead of taking her in your arms—­she of Siena!  She of Siena, my word!—­you will be miserable, and make her miserable.”