means I thought I had made a good
bargain. Agatha, whom I told of my good luck, was delighted to have
helped me to procure it.

Two or three days after I gave a dinner to my English friends, the two
Saxons, Bartoldi their governor, and Goudar and his wife.

We were all ready, and only waiting for M. and Madame Goudar, when I saw
the fair Irishwoman come in with Count Medini. This piece of insolence
made all the blood in my body rush to my head. However, I restrained
myself till Goudar came in, and then I gave him a piece of my mind. It
had been agreed that his wife should come with him. The rascally fellow
prevaricated, and tried hard to induce me to believe that Medini had not
plotted the breaking of the bank, but his eloquence was in vain.

Our dinner was a most agreeable one, and Sara cut a brilliant figure, for
she possessed every pleasing quality that can make a woman attractive. In
good truth, this tavern girl would have filled a throne with any queen;
but Fortune is blind.

When the dinner was over, M. de Buturlin, a distinguished Russian, and a
great lover of pretty women, paid me a visit. He had been attracted by
the sweet voice of the fair Sara, who was singing a Neapolitan air to the
guitar. I shone only with a borrowed light, but I was far from being
offended. Buturlin fell in love with Sara on the spot, and a few months
after I left he got her for five hundred Louis, which Goudar required to
carry out the order he had received, namely, to leave Naples in three
days.

This stroke came from the queen, who found out that the king met Madame
Goudar secretly at Procida. She found her royal husband laughing heartily
at a letter which he would not shew her.

The queen's curiosity was excited, and at last the king gave in, and her
majesty read the following:

"Ti aspettero nel medesimo luogo, ed alla stessa ora, coll' impazienza
medesima che ha una vacca che desidera l'avicinamento del toro."

"Chi infamia!" cried the queen, and her majesty gave the cow's husband to
understand that in three days he would have to leave Naples, and look for
bulls in other countries.

If these events had not taken place, M. de Buturlin would not have made
so good a bargain.

After my dinner, Goudar asked all the company to sup with him the next
evening. The repast was a magnificent one, but when Medini sat down at
the end of a long table behind a heap of gold and a pack of cards, no
punters came forward. Madame Goudar tri