, and where he seemed likely to
spend the remainder of his days. He did not even know precisely why
he had been arrested. All that Giacomo Casanova knew was that he
was accounted a disturber of the public peace. He was notoriously a
libertine, a gamester, and heavily in debt: also--and this was more
serious--he was accused of practising magic, as indeed he had done, as a
means of exploiting to his own profit the credulity of simpletons of all
degrees. He would have explained to the Inquisitors of State of the Most
Serene Republic that the books of magic found by their apparitors in
his possession--"The Clavicula of Solomon," the "Zecor-ben," and other
kindred works--had been collected by him as curious instances of human
aberration. But the Inquisitors of State would not have believed him,
for the Inquisitors were among those who took magic seriously. And,
anyhow, they had never asked him to explain, but had left him as if
forgotten in that abominable verminous cell under the leads, until his
patrician friend had obtained him the mercy of this transfer to better
quarters.

This Casanova was a man of iron nerve and iron constitution. Tall and
well-made, he was boldly handsome, with fine dark eyes and dark brown
hair. In age he was barely one and twenty; but he looked older, as
well he might, for in his adventurer's way he had already gathered more
experience of life than most men gain in half a century.

The same influence that had obtained him his change of cell had also
gained him latterly the privilege--and he esteemed it beyond all
else--of procuring himself books. Desiring the works of Maffai, he
bade his gaoler purchase them out of the allowance made him by the
Inquisitors in accordance with the Venetian custom. This allowance was
graduated to the social status of each prisoner. But the books being
costly and any monthly surplus from his monthly expenditure being
usually the gaoler's perquisite, Lorenzo was reluctant to indulge him.
He mentioned that there was a prisoner above who was well equipped with
books, and who, no doubt, would be glad to lend in exchange.

Yielding to the suggestion, Casanova handed Lorenzo a copy of Peteau's
"Rationarium," and received next morning, in exchange, the first volume
of Wolf. Within he found a sheet bearing in six verses a paraphrase of
Seneca's epigram, "Calamitosus est animus futuri anxius." Immediately
he perceived he had stumbled upon a means of corresponding with one who