of which the oracle must be informed.
The oracle, naturally opposed to the Jesuit, told him to consult his own
feelings and nothing else. After this I went to the lady.

She began by telling me the whole story. She introduced her son to me,
and told me that if the marriage could be performed, a deed would be
delivered in my favour by which, at the death of M. de Bragadin, I should
become entitled to an estate worth five thousand crowns per annum.

As I guessed without much trouble that this was the same matter which De
la Haye had proposed to M. de Bragadin, I answered without hesitation
that since De la Haye was before me I could do nothing, and thereupon
made her my bow.

I could not help wondering at this Jesuit's continually intriguing to
marry my old friends without my knowledge. Two years ago, if I had not
set my face against it, he would have married M. Dandolo. I cared not a
whit whether the family of Bragadin became extinct or not, but I did care
for the life of my benefactor, and was quite sure that marriage would
shorten it by many years; he was already sixty-three, and had recovered
from a serious apoplectic stroke.

I went to dine with Lady Murray (English-women who are daughters of lords
keep the title), and after dinner the ambassador told me that he had told
M. Cavalli the whole story of the false nun, and that the secretary had
informed him, the evening before, that everything had been done to his
liking. Count Capsucefalo had been sent to Cephalonia, his native
country, with the order never to return to Venice, and the courtezan had
disappeared.

The fine part, or rather the fearful part, about these sentences is that
no one ever knows the reason why or wherefore, and that the lot may fall
on the innocent as well as the guilty. M. M. was delighted with the
event, and I was more pleased than she, for I should have been sorry to
have been obliged to soil my hands with the blood of that rascally count.

There are seasons in the life of men which may be called 'fasti' and
'nefasti'; I have proved this often in my long career, and on the
strength of the rubs and struggles I have had to encounter. I am able, as
well as any man, to verify the truth of this axiom. I had just
experienced a run of luck. Fortune had befriended me at play, I had been
happy in the society of men, and from love I had nothing to ask; but now
the reverse of the medal began to appear. Love was still kind, but
Fortune had quite l