d that he
had also profited by the opportunity to sign a contract of marriage with
a Venetian lady.

These excuses and the apparently polite tone in which they were uttered
induced me to prolong my stay with the extraordinary count.

He drew the whole of his income from vineyards, which produced an
excellent white wine and a revenue of a thousand sequins a year. However,
as the count did his best to spend double that amount, he was rapidly
ruining himself. He had a fixed impression that all the tenants robbed
him, so whenever he found a bunch of grapes in a cottage he proceeded to
beat the occupants unless they could prove that the grapes did not come
from his vineyards. The peasants might kneel down and beg pardon, but
they were thrashed all the same.

I had been an unwilling witness of several of these arbitrary and cruel
actions, when one day I had the pleasure of seeing the count soundly
beaten by two peasants. He had struck the first blow himself, but when he
found that he was getting the worst of it he prudently took to his heels.

He was much offended with me for remaining a mere spectator of the fray;
but I told him very coolly that, being the aggressor, he was in the
wrong, and in the second place I was not going to expose myself to be
beaten to a jelly by two lusty peasants in another man's quarrel.

These arguments did not satisfy him, and in his rage he dared to tell me
that I was a scurvy coward not to know that it was my duty to defend a
friend to the death.

In spite of these offensive remarks I merely replied with a glance of
contempt, which he doubtless understood.

Before long the whole village had heard what had happened, and the joy
was universal, for the count had the singular privilege of being feared
by all and loved by none. The two rebellious peasants had taken to their
heels. But when it became known that his lordship had announced his
resolution to carry pistols with him in all future visits, everybody was
alarmed, and two spokesmen were sent to the count informing him that all
his tenants would quit the estate in a week's time unless he gave them a
promise to leave them in peace in their humble abodes.

The rude eloquence of the two peasants struck me as sublime, but the
count pronounced them to be impertinent and ridiculous.

"We have as good a right to taste the vines which we have watered with
the sweat of our brow," said they, "as your cook has to taste the dishes
before they ar