, before
entrusting his person to the hazards of war, he had taken care to be
provided with safe-conduct passes for both armies, as befitted a prudent
man of peace--"or sense; it is one, mesdames."

Notwithstanding his terror at the guns, and disgust at the soldiery and
the bad fare at the inn, Vittoria's presence kept him lingering in this
wretched place, though he cried continually, "I shall have
heart-disease." He believed at first that he should subdue her; then it
became his intention to carry her off.

It was to see Merthyr that she remained. Merthyr came there the day after
the engagement at Santa Lucia. They had not met since the days at Meran.
He was bronzed, and keen with strife, and looked young, but spoke not
over-hopefully. He scolded her for wishing to taste battle, and compared
her to a bad swimmer on deep shores. Pericles bounded with delight to
hear him, and said he had not supposed there was so much sense in Powys.
Merthyr confessed that the Austrians had as good as beaten them at Santa
Lucia. The tactical combinations of the Piedmontese were wretched. He was
enamoured of the gallantly of the Duke of Savoy, who had saved the right
wing of the army from rout while covering the backward movement. Why
there had been any fight at all at Santa Lucia, where nothing was to be
gained, much to be lost, he was incapable of telling; but attributed it
to an antique chivalry on the part of the king, that had prompted the
hero to a trial of strength, a bout of blood-letting.

"You do think he is a hero?" said Vittoria.

"He is; and he will march to Venice."

"And open the opera at Venice," Pericles sneered. "Powys, mon cher, cure
her of this beastly dream. It is a scandal to you to want a woman's help.
You were defeated at Santa Lucia. I say bravo to anything that brings you
to reason. Bravo! You hear me."

The engagement at Santa Lucia was designed by the king to serve as an
instigating signal for the Veronese to rise in revolt; and this was the
secret of Charles Albert's stultifying manoeuvres between Peschiera and
Mantua. Instead of matching his military skill against the wary old
Marshal's, he was offering incentives to conspiracy. Distrusting the
revolution, which was a force behind him, he placed such reliance on its
efforts in his front as to make it the pivot of his actions.

"The volunteers North-east of Vicenza are doing the real work for us, I
believe," said Merthyr; and it seemed so then, as it mi