ser Torlota's young wife welcomed to her bed the handsomest and most
proper cavaliers of the city. But the pleasure she took therein came
from herself, not from them at all. It was her own self she loved, and
not her lovers. All her enjoyment was of the loveliness of her own
proper flesh, and of nothing else. Herself was her own desire and
delight, and her own fond concupiscence. Whereby, methinks, the sin of
carnal indulgence was, in her case, enormously aggravated.

For, albeit, this sin must ever divide us from God--a sufficient sign of
its gravity--yet is it true to say that carnal offenders are regarded by
the Sovereign Judge, both in this world and the next, with less
indignation than are covetous men, traitors, murderers, and wicked men
who have made traffic of holy things. And the reason of this is that the
naughty desires sensualists entertain, being directed towards others
rather than to themselves, do still show some degraded traces of true
love and gentle charity.

But nothing of the kind was to be seen in the adulterous amours of the
Signora Eletta, who in every passion loved herself and herself only. And
herein was she much wider separated from God than so many other women
who gave way to their wanton desires. For in their case these desires
were towards others, whereas the Lady Eletta's had none but herself for
their object. What I say hereanent, I say to make more understandable
the conclusion of the matter, which I must now relate.

At the age of twenty she fell sick and felt herself to be dying. Then
she bewailed her fair body with the most piteous tears. She made her
women dress her out in her richest attire, looked long and steadfastly
at herself in the mirror, fondled with both hands her bosom and hips, to
enjoy for the last time her own exceeding beauty. And, aghast at the
thought of this body she so adored being eaten of the worms in the damp
earth, she said, as she breathed her last, with a great sigh of faith
and hope:

"Satan, best beloved Satan! take thou my soul and my body; Satan, gentle
Satan! hear my prayer: take, take my body along with my soul."

She was borne to San Zenone, as custom ordains, with her face uncovered;
and, within the memory of man, none had ever seen a dead woman look so
lovely. While the priests were chanting the offices for the dead around
her bier, she lay as if swooning with delight in the arms of an
invisible lover. When the ceremony was over, the Signora Eletta