supernaturally
preserved and very great. "This is no place for thee, Tonelli mine," the
secretary had said to himself, after a week had passed, and he had
understood all the waywardness of that unhappy lady's intentions. "Thou
art not too old, but thou art too wise, for these follies, though no
saint"; and so had gathered up his personal effects, and secretly
quitted the palace. But such was the countess's fury at his escape that
she never paid him his week's salary; nor did she manifest the least
gratitude that Tonelli, out of regard for her son, a very honest young
man, refused in any way to identify her, but, to all except his closest
friends, pretended that he had passed those terrible eight days on a
visit to the country village where he was born. It showed Pennellini's
ignorance of life that he should laugh at this history; and I prefer to
treat it seriously, and to use it in explaining the precipitation with
which Tonelli's latest inamorata returned his love.

Though, indeed, why should a lady of thirty, and from an obscure country
town, hesitate to be enamored of any eligible suitor who presented
himself in Venice? It is not my duty to enter upon a detail or summary
of Carlotta's character or condition, or to do more than indicate that,
while she did not greatly excel in youth, good looks, or worldly gear,
she had yet a little property, and was of that soft prettiness which is
often more effective than downright beauty. There was, indeed, something
very charming about her; and, if she was a blonde, I have no reason to
think she was as fickle as the Venetian proverb paints that complexion
of woman; or that she had not every quality which would have excused any
one but Tonelli for thinking of marrying her.

After their first mute interview in the Piazza, the two lost no time in
making each other's acquaintance; but though the affair was vigorously
conducted, no one could say that it was not perfectly in order. Tonelli
on the following day, which chanced to be Sunday, repaired to St. Mark's
at the hour of the fashionable mass, where he gazed steadfastly at the
lady during her orisons, and whence, at a discreet distance, he followed
her home to the house of the friends whom she was visiting. Somewhat to
his discomfiture at first, these proved to be old acquaintances of his;
and when he came at night to walk up and down under their balconies, as
bound in true love to do, they made nothing of asking him indoors, and