e had been a stormy and adventurous one, and it
might have been expected that he would have found his patron's library a
pleasant refuge after so many toils and travels. But the man carried
rough weather and storm in his own heart, and found daily opportunities
of mortification and resentment. The coffee was ill made, the maccaroni
not cooked in the true Italian style, the dogs had bayed during the
night, he had been made to dine at a small table, the parish priest had
tried to convert him, the soup had been served too hot on purpose to
annoy him, he had not been introduced to a distinguished guest, the count
had lent a book without telling him, a groom had not taken off his hat;
such were his complaints. The fact is Casanova felt his dependent
position and his utter poverty, and was all the more determined to stand
to his dignity as a man who had talked with all the crowned heads of
Europe, and had fought a duel with the Polish general. And he had another
reason for finding life bitter--he had lived beyond his time. Louis XV.
was dead, and Louis XVI. had been guillotined; the Revolution had come;
and Casanova, his dress, and his manners, appeared as odd and antique as
some "blood of the Regency" would appear to us of these days. Sixty years
before, Marcel, the famous dancing-master, had taught young Casanova how
to enter a room with a lowly and ceremonious bow; and still, though the
eighteenth century is drawing to a close, old Casanova enters the rooms
of Dux with the same stately bow, but now everyone laughs. Old Casanova
treads the grave measures of the minuet; they applauded his dancing once,
but now everyone laughs. Young Casanova was always dressed in the height
of the fashion; but the age of powder, wigs, velvets, and silks has
departed, and old Casanova's attempts at elegance ("Strass" diamonds have
replaced the genuine stones with him) are likewise greeted with laughter.
No wonder the old adventurer denounces the whole house of Jacobins and
canaille; the world, he feels, is permanently out of joint for him;
everything is cross, and everyone is in a conspiracy to drive the iron
into his soul.

At last these persecutions, real or imaginary, drive him away from Dux;
he considers his genius bids him go, and, as before, he obeys. Casanova
has but little pleasure or profit out of this his last journey; he has to
dance attendance in ante-chambers; no one will give him any office,
whether as tutor, librarian, or chambe