was no theatre then in Augsburg, but there were masked balls in
which all classes mingled freely. There were also small parties where
faro was played for small stakes. I was tired of the pleasure, the
misfortune, and the griefs I had had in three capitals, and I resolved to
spend four months in the free city of Augsburg, where strangers have the
same privileges as the canons. My purse was slender, but with the
economical life I led I had nothing to fear on that score. I was not far
from Venice, where a hundred ducats were always at my service if I wanted
them. I played a little and waged war against the sharpers who have
become more numerous of late than the dupes, as there are also more
doctors than patients. I also thought of getting a mistress, for what is
life without love? I had tried in vain to retrace Gertrude; the engraver
was dead, and no one knew what had become of his daughter.

Two or three days before the end of the carnival I went to a hirer of
carriages, as I had to go to a ball at some distance from the town. While
the horses were being put in, I entered the room to warm my hands, for
the weather was very cold. A girl came up and asked me if I would drink a
glass of wine.

"No," said I; and on the question being repeated, repeated the
monosyllable somewhat rudely. The girl stood still and began to laugh,
and I was about to turn angrily away when she said,--

"I see you do not remember me?"

I looked at her attentively, and at last I discovered beneath her
unusually ugly features the lineaments of Anna Midel, the maid in the
engraver's house.

"You remind me of Anna Midel," said I.

"Alas, I was Anna Midel once. I am no longer an object fit for love, but
that is your fault."

"Mine?"

"Yes; the four hundred florins you gave me made Count Fugger's coachman
marry me, and he not only abandoned me but gave me a disgusting disease,
which was like to have been my death. I recovered my health, but I never
shall recover my good looks."

"I am very sorry to hear all this; but tell me what has become of
Gertrude?"

"Then you don't know that you are going to a ball at her house to-night?"

"Her house?"

"Yes. After her father's death she married a well-to-do and respectable
man, and I expect you will be pleased with the entertainment."

"Is she pretty still?"

"She is just as she used to be, except that she is six years older and
has had children."

"Is she gallant?"

"I don't think so."

An