my purse.

I was in a terrible state, and my sharpest pang was that I began to
experience a certain abatement of my vigors, the natural result of
advancing years. I had no longer that daring born of youth and the
knowledge of one's strength, and I was not yet old enough to have learnt
how to husband my forces. Nevertheless, I made an effort and took a
sudden leave of my mistress, telling her I would await her at Augsburg.
She did not try to detain me, but promised to rejoin me as soon as
possible; she was engaged in selling her jewellery. I set out preceded by
Le Duc, feeling very glad that Desarmoises had chosen to stay with the
wretched woman to whom he had introduced me. When I reached my pretty
house at Augsburg I took to my bed, determined not to rise till I was
cured or dead. M. Carli, my banker, recommended to me a doctor named
Cephalides, a pupil of the famous Fayet, who had cured me of a similar
complaint several years before. This Cephalides was considered the best
doctor in Augsburg. He examined me and declared he could cure me by
sudorifics without having recourse to the knife. He began his treatment
by putting me on a severe regimen, ordering baths, and applying mercury
locally. I endured this treatment for six weeks, at the end of which time
I found myself worse than at the beginning. I had become terribly thin,
and I had two enormous inguinal tumours. I had to make up my mind to have
them lanced, but though the operation nearly killed me it did not to make
me any better. He was so clumsy as to cut the artery, causing great loss
of blood which was arrested with difficulty, and would have proved fatal
if it had not been for the care of M. Algardi, a Bolognese doctor in the
service of the Prince-Bishop of Augsburg.

I had enough of Cephalides, and Dr. Algardi prepared in my presence
eighty-six pills containing eighteen grains of manna. I took one of these
pills every morning, drinking a large glass of curds after it, and in the
evening I had another pill with barley water, and this was the only
sustenance I had. This heroic treatment gave me back my health in two
months and a half, in which I suffered a great deal of pain; but I did
not begin to put on flesh and get back my strength till the end of the
year.

It was during this time that I heard about Costa's flight with my
diamonds, watches, snuff-box, linen, rich suits, and a hundred louis
which Madame d'Urfe had given him for the journey. The worthy l