Volume I Part 22 (1/2)
”I have am,” he said, ”but the mercury is not perfect”
”It is equal to that which I have sold in Portici, and that is the very letter of your engageeree that the quality is injured, because it is no longer susceptible of further augmentation”
”You knew that to be the case; the point is its equality with the o to law, and you will lose I aratulate yourself, sir, for, if you should gain the lawsuit, you will have obtainedI would never have believed you capable of deceiving me in such a manner”
”Reverend sir, I can assure you that I would not willingly deceive any one”
”Do you know the secret, or do you not? Do you suppose I would have given it to you without the agreement we entered into? Well, there will be some fun over this affair in Naples, and the lawyers will rieved at this turn of affairs, and I am very sorry that I allowed myself to be so easily deceived by your fine talk
In thethe htened to death lest he should accept it, he left the roo that he would not have it He soon returned; we had supper in the same room, but at separate tables; war had been openly declared, but I felt certain that a treaty of peace would soon be signed We did not exchange one word during the evening, but in the ain offered to return the ive ive hiue the ave in I received fifty ounces ether like old friends, and e hiave me an order on his house at Naples for a barrel of muscatel wine, and he presentedtwelve razors with silver handles, manufactured in the Tour-du-Grec We parted the best friends in the world and well pleased with each other
I remained two days in Salerno to provideabout one hundred sequins, and enjoying good health, I was very proud of my success, in which I could not see any cause of reproach to ht into play to insure the sale of my secret could not be found fault with except by the most intolerant of moralists, and such men have no authority to speak on matters of business At all events, free, rich, and certain of presenting myself before the bishop with a respectable appearance, and not like a beggar, I soon recovered ht sufficient experience to insurea second tiamblers, to mercenary women, and particularly to the impudent scoundrels who barefacedly praise so well those they intend to dupe--a species of knaves very cost people who forood society
I left Salerno with two priests ere going to Cosenza on business, and we traversed the distance of one hundred and forty-two miles in twenty-two hours The day after e and drove to Martorano During the journey, fixing hted at finding na Grecia, rendered so celebrated for twenty-four centuries by its connection with Pythagoras I looked with astonishment upon a country renowned for its fertility, and in which, in spite of nature's prodigality, my eyes met everywhere the aspect of terrible misery, the complete absence of that pleasant superfluity which helps radation of the inhabitants sparsely scattered on a soil where they ought to be so nu from the same stock as myself Such is, however the Terra di Lavoro where labour see is cheap, where the ain when they have found anyone disposed to take care of the fruit which the ground supplies alreat abundance, and for which there is no market I felt compelled to admit the justice of the Roood priests hohed at my dread of the tarantula and of the crasydra, for the disease brought on by the bite of those insects appeared to me more fearful even than a certain disease hich I was already too well acquainted They assuredto those creatures were fables; they laughed at the lines which Virgil has devoted to theics as well as at all those I quoted to justifya hard chair near an old table on which he riting I fell on my knees, as it is custome in his arms, embraced me tenderly
He expressed his deep sorrohen I told him that in Naples I had not been able to find any instructions to enable ain when I added that I was indebted to no one for ood health He bade an to talk of his poverty, and ordered a servant to lay the cloth for three persons Besides this servant, his lordshi+p's suite consisted of a ed to be very ignorant fro our e, but badly built and poorly kept The furniture was so miserable that, in order tohis chaive up one of his two htenedthe rules of his order, and this being a fast day, he did not eat any nor was an intelligent man, and, what is still better, an honest man He told h not one of little ino yearly, and that, unfortunately, he had contracted debts to the ah, that his only happiness was to feel himself out of the clutches of the monks, who had persecuted hiatory for fifteen years All these confidences caused me sorrow and mortification, because they proved to me, not only that I was not in the promised land where a mitre could be picked up, but also that I would be a heavy charge for hirieved hie seeood library, whether there were any literary reeable hours He shout his diocese there was not onedecently, and still less of any taste or knowledge in literature; that there was not a single bookseller, nor any person caring even for the newspapers But he proether, as soon as he received the books he had ordered from Naples
That was all very well, but was this the place for a young ood society, without e hts, and almost astounded at the prospect of the ivein his power to secureto officiate in his pontifical robes, I had an opportunity of seeing all the clergy, and all the faithful of the diocese, ht azing upon a troop of brutes for wholy were the women! What a look of stupidity and coarseness in the men! When I returned to the bishop's house I told the prelate that I did not feel in me the vocation to die within a few months a ,” I added, ”and let o; or, rather, come with me I promise you that we shall make a fortune soh repeatedly during the day Had he agreed to it he would not have died two years afterwards in the pri how natural wassu it his duty to sendaware that I had any, he told ive me an introduction to a worthy citizen of Naples ould lend no to enable ratitude, and going to my room I took out of iven ed his acceptance of it as a souvenir ofit upon him, for it orth the sixty ducats, and to conquer his resistance I had to threaten to reaveletter of recommendation for the Archbishop of Cosenza, in which he requested him to forward me as far as Naples without any expense to myself It was thus I left Martorano sixty hours afterbehind, and ept as he was pouring heartfelt blessings upon me
The Archbishop of Cosenza, a ence, offeredthe dinner I y of the Bishop of Martorano; but I railed mercilessly at his diocese and at the whole of Calabria in so cutting a uests, ast ere two ladies, his relatives, who did the honours of the dinner-table
The youngest, however, objected to the satirical style in which I had depicted her country, and declared war againsther that Calabria would be a delightful country if one-fourth only of its inhabitants were like her Perhaps it ith the idea of proving to ave on the following day a splendid supper
Cosenza is a city in which a gentleman can find plenty of amusement; the nobility are wealthy, the woenerally well-informed, because they have been educated in Naples or in Rome I left Cosenza on the third day with a letter from the archbishop for the far-fa coed, from their appearance, to be either pirates or banditti, and I took very good care not to let theuess that I had a well-filled purse I likewise thought it prudent to go to bed without undressing during the whole journey--an excellentin that part of the country
I reached Naples on the 16th of Septe the letter of the Bishop of Martorano It was addressed to a M Gennaro Polo at St Anne's This excellent ivethe bishop's letter, upon receiving me in his house, because he wished me to make the acquaintance of his son, as a poet like myself The bishop had represented my poetry as sublime After the usual ceremonies, I accepted his kind invitation, uest in the house of M Gennaro Polo
CHAPTER IX
My Stay in Naples; It Is Short but Happy--Don Antonio Casanova--Don Lelio Caraffa--I Go to Roreeable Company, and Enter the Service of Cardinal Acquaviva-- Barbara--Testaccio--Frascati
I had no difficulty in answering the various questions which Doctor Gennaro addressed to me, but I was surprised, and even displeased, at the constant peals of laughter hich he received my answers The piteous description of miserable Calabria, and the picture of the sad situation of the Bishop of Martorano, appeared to me more likely to call forth tears than to excite hilarity, and, suspecting that soetting angry when, beco that I hter was a disease which seemed to be endemic in his family, for one of his uncles died of it
”What!” I exclai!”