ul Binetti
killed by excess of amorous enjoyment was a certain Mosciuski, a Pole,
whom fate brought to Venice seven or eight years ago; she had then
reached her sixty-third year!

My life in Venice would have been pleasant and happy, if I could have
abstained from punting at basset. The ridotti were only open to noblemen
who had to appear without masks, in their patrician robes, and wearing
the immense wig which had become indispensable since the beginning of the
century. I would play, and I was wrong, for I had neither prudence enough
to leave off when fortune was adverse, nor sufficient control over myself
to stop when I had won. I was then gambling through a feeling of avarice.
I was extravagant by taste, and I always regretted the money I had spent,
unless it had been won at the gaming-table, for it was only in that case
that the money had, in my opinion, cost me nothing.

At the end of January, finding myself under the necessity of procuring
two hundred sequins, Madame Manzoni contrived to obtain for me from
another woman the loan of a diamond ring worth five hundred. I made up my
mind to go to Treviso, fifteen miles distant from Venice, to pawn the
ring at the Mont-de-piete, which there lends money upon valuables at the
rate of five per cent. That useful establishment does not exist in
Venice, where the Jews have always managed to keep the monopoly in their
hands.

I got up early one morning, and walked to the end of the canale regio,
intending to engage a gondola to take me as far as Mestra, where I could
take post horses, reach Treviso in less than two hours, pledge my diamond
ring, and return to Venice the same evening.

As I passed along St. Job's Quay, I saw in a two-oared gondola a country
girl beautifully dressed. I stopped to look at her; the gondoliers,
supposing that I wanted an opportunity of reaching Mestra at a cheap
rate, rowed back to the shore.

Observing the lovely face of the young girl, I do not hesitate, but jump
into the gondola, and pay double fare, on condition that no more
passengers are taken. An elderly priest was seated near the young girl,
he rises to let me take his place, but I politely insist upon his keeping
it.

CHAPTER XIX

I Fall in Love with Christine, and Find a Husband Worthy of
Her--Christine's Wedding

"Those gondoliers," said the elderly priest, ad dressing me in order to
begin the conversation, "are very fortunate. They took us up at the
Rialto for thirty