length at the feet of Mad. * * * *, murmured forth, in
half-forgotten Irish Italian, eternal vows of indelible constancy.
The lady screamed, and exclaimed, 'Who are you?' The Colonel cried,
'What! don't you know me? I am so and so,' &c. &c. &c.; till, at
length, the Marchesa, mounting from reminiscence to reminiscence,
through the lovers of the intermediate twenty-five years, arrived
at last at the recollection of her _povero_ sub-lieutenant. She
then said, 'Was there ever such virtue?' (that was her very word)
and, being now a widow, gave him apartments in her palace,
reinstated him in all the rights of wrong, and held him up to the
admiring world as a miracle of incontinent fidelity, and the
unshaken Abdiel of absence.

"Methinks this is as pretty a moral tale as any of Marmontel's.
Here is another. The same lady, several years ago, made an escapade
with a Swede, Count Fersen (the same whom the Stockholm mob
quartered and lapidated not very long since), and they arrived at
an Osteria on the road to Rome or thereabouts. It was a summer
evening, and, while they were at supper, they were suddenly regaled
by a symphony of fiddles in an adjacent apartment, so prettily
played, that, wishing to hear them more distinctly, the Count rose,
and going into the musical society, said, 'Gentlemen, I am sure
that, as a company of gallant cavaliers, you will be delighted to
show your skill to a lady, who feels anxious,' &c. &c. The men of
harmony were all acquiescence--every instrument was tuned and
toned, and, striking up one of their most ambrosial airs, the whole
band followed the Count to the lady's apartment. At their head was
the first fiddler, who, bowing and fiddling at the same moment,
headed his troop and advanced up the room. Death and discord!--it
was the Marquis himself, who was on a serenading party in the
country, while his spouse had run away from town. The rest may be
imagined--but, first of all, the lady tried to persuade him that
she was there on purpose to meet him, and had chosen this method
for an harmonic surprise. So much for this gossip, which amused me
when I heard it, and I send it to you, in the hope it may have the
like effect. Now we'll return to Venice.

"The day after to-morrow (to-morrow being Christmas-day) the
Carnival beg