on Sunday the last day of August, I did not fail to go
there exactly at three o'clock. At once on my arrival, I spoke to a
servant who admitted me without delay; but, my dear friend, I regret
having to send you an unpleasant message. As soon as I handed him the
letter, and before he even opened it, he said to me, 'I always know
Casanova's affairs which trouble me.' After having read hardly more than
a page, he said: 'I know not what to do!' I told him that, on the 6th of
this month, I was to write you at Paris and that, if he would do me the
honor of giving me his reply, I would put it in my letter. Imagine what
answer he gave me! I was much surprised! He told me that I should wish
you happiness but that he would not write to you again. He said no more.
I kissed his hands and left. He did not give me even a sou. That is all
he said to me . . . .

"S. E. Pietro Zaguri sent to me to ask if I knew where you were, because
he had written two letters to Spa and had received no reply . . . ."

II

PARIS

On the night of the 18th or 19th September 1783, Casanova arrived at
Paris.

On the 30th he wrote Francesca that he had been well received by his
sister-in-law and by his brother, Francesco Casanova, the painter. Nearly
all his friends had departed for the other world, and he would now have
to make new ones, which would be difficult as he was no longer pleasing
to the women.

On the 14th October he wrote again, saying that he was in good health and
that Paris was a paradise which made him feel twenty years old. Four
letters followed; in the first, dated from Paris on S. Martin's Day, he
told Francesco not to reply for he did not know whether he would prolong
his visit nor where he might go. Finding no fortune in Paris, he said he
would go and search elsewhere. On the 23rd, he sent one hundred and fifty
lires; "a true blessing," to the poor girl who was always short of money.

Between times, Casanova passed eight days at Fontainebleau, where he met
"a charming young man of twenty-five," the son of "the young and lovely
O'Morphi" who indirectly owed to him her position, in 1752, as the
mistress of Louis XV. "I wrote my name on his tablets and begged him to
present my compliments to his mother."

He also met, in the same place, his own son by Mme. Dubois, his former
housekeeper at Soleure who had married the good M. Lebel. "We shall hear
of the young gentleman in twenty-one years a