t linger longer on this subject, on which I have only touched
to remark that here it was where I acquired that knowledge of forms
and conventionalities which constitute the tactique of life,--those
"gambits" and "openings," to use a chess phrase, by which you at once
obtain an advantage over an equal adversary, and secure yourself
against injury with even a superior player. I learned when to use an
illustration or a story; when to become a mere listener; how to assist
a slow man without his detecting the aid; and how to close a
discussion with an epigram,--and all this without the faintest show
of premeditation or the very slightest sign of forethought. While my
education as a man of the world was progressing, my material fortune was
also advancing. The Spanish Ambassador, who had referred my case to his
court, ascertained that I had been most infamously treated; that not
alone my rank and fortune were indisputable, but that the individual
on whose affirmation I was arrested was himself a Carlist spy, and the
noted agent of a great Northern power. In fact, so manifold were his
infractions against law, in every country in Europe, that the only
difficulty was to what particular power to hand him over, so many laying
claim to the honor of punishing him. In the end, Naples obtained
this distinction! and at the very period I was enjoying the luxurious
pleasures of that capital, "my friend the Consul" was expanding
his chest and his faculties in the less captivating career of a
galley-slave. "Fortune is just," said I, as I arranged my cravat at the
window which overlooked the Bay, on whose glassy surface some half-dozen
boats moved sluggishly, as the red and yellow rowers kept time to the
"stroke" by the clanking of their fetters.

Governments move slowly, particularly when the case is one of refunding
a previous spoliation; meanwhile they admitted my claim; and by way of
keeping me in good-humor, they sent me a cross of the Order of Isabella,
of the first class,--a very gratifying recognition of my noble birth
and merits. My intimacy with the Duke of Medina--the brother of the
king--obtained for me the Neapolitan Order; and thus was I decorated
with three very distinguished cordons, which I wore in my button-hole as
a "tricolor,"--a fact insignificant in itself; but I mention it here, as
many of my imitators have since that affected to be the inventors of the
method.

Periods of expectancy are generally deemed great trials,