er eyes fixed on a napkin,
replying in monosyllables to those who addressed her, and glancing at the
speaker with large blue eyes, the beauty of which it would be difficult
to describe. Her husband was seated at the other end of the table--a man
of a kind that inspires contempt at the first glance. He was young,
marked with the small-pox, a greedy eater, a loud talker, laughing and
speaking at random, and altogether I took him for a servant in disguise.
Feeling sure that such a fellow did not know how to refuse, I sent him a
glass of champagne, which he drank off to my health forthwith. "May I
have the pleasure of sending a glass to your wife?" He replied, with a
roar of laughter, to ask her myself; and with a slight bow she told me
that she never took anything to drink. When the dessert came in she rose,
and her husband followed her to their room.

A stranger who like myself had never seen her before, asked me who she
was. I said I was a newcomer and did not know, and somebody else said
that her husband called himself the Chevalier Stuard, that he came from
Lyons, and was going to Marseilles; he came, it appeared, to Avignon a
week ago, without servants, and in a very poor carriage.

I intended staying at Avignon only as long as might be necessary to see
the Fountain or Fall of Vaucluse, and so I had not got any letters of
introduction, and had not the pretext of acquaintance that I might stay
and enjoy her fine eyes. But an Italian who had read and enjoyed the
divine Petrarch would naturally wish to see the place made divine by the
poet's love for Laura. I went to the theatre, where I saw the vice-legate
Salviati, women of fashion, neither fair nor foul, and a wretched comic
opera; but I neither saw Astrodi nor any other actor from the Comedie
Italienne at Paris.

"Where is the famous Astrodi?" said I, to a young man sitting by me, "I
have not seen her yet."

"Excuse me, she has danced and sang before your eyes."

"By Jove, it's impossible! I know her perfectly, and if she has so
changed as not to be recognized she is no longer herself."

I turned to go, and two minutes after the young man I had addressed came
up and begged me to come back, and he would take me to Astradi's
dressing-room, as she had recognized me. I followed him without saying a
word, and saw a plain-looking girl, who threw her arms round my neck and
addressed me by my name, though I could have sworn I had never seen her
before, but she did not