te to countenance me, as any
articles the Tribunal might have against me were in no degree prejudicial
to my honour.

"The ambassador," he continued, "proposes to introduce you at Court next
week, and he wants you to dine with him to-day; there will be a numerous
company at dinner."

"I am engaged to Mengs."

"No matter, he shall be asked as well; you must come. Consider the effect
of your presence at the ambassador's the day after your triumph."

"You are right. Go and ask Mengs, and tell the ambassador that I have
much pleasure in accepting his invitation."

CHAPTER V

Campomanes--Olavides--Sierra Morena--Aranjuez--Mengs--The
Marquis Grimaldi--Toledo--Madame Pelliccia--My Return to
Madrid

Different circumstances in my life seem to have combined to render me
somewhat superstitious; it is a humiliating confession, and yet I make
it. But who could help it? A man who abandons himself to his whims and
fancies is like a child playing with a billiard cue. It may make a stroke
that would be an honour to the most practised and scientific player; and
such are the strange coincidences of life which, as I have said, have
caused me to become superstitious.

Fortune, which under the humbler name of luck seems but a word, is a very
divinity when it guides the most important actions of a man's life.
Always it has seemed to me that this divinity is not blind, as the
mythologists affirm; she had brought me low only to exalt me, and I found
myself in high places, only, as it seems, to be cast into the depths.
Fortune has done her best to make me regard her as a reasoning, almighty
power; she has made me feel that the strength of my will is as nothing
before this mysterious power, which takes my will and moulds it, and
makes it a mere instrument for the accomplishment of its decrees.

I could not possibly have done anything in Spain without the help of the
representative of my country, and he would not have dared to do anything
for me without the letter I had just given him. This letter, in its turn,
would probably have had but slight effect if it had not come to hand so
soon after my imprisonment, which had become the talk of the town,
through the handsome satisfaction the Count of Aranda had given me.

The letter made the ambassador sorry that he had not interposed on my
behalf, but he hoped people would believe that the count would not have
acted as he did if it had not been for his interposition. His