The person who attacked your veracity is M.Valmarana, the proveditore of the sanitary department, and he contends that, as nobody can pass through the cordon, it would be impossible for you to be here.

Satisfaction, indeed! Have you forgotten who you are ?" "No, I know who I am; and I know likewise that, if I was taken for a coward before leaving Venice, now that I have returned no one shall insult me without repenting it." "Come and dine with me." "No, because the Spanish officer would know it." "He would even see you, for he dines with me every day." "Very well, then I will go, and I will let him be the judge of my quarrel with M.Valmarana." I dined that day with Major Pelodoro and several other officers, who agreed in advising me to enter the service of the Republic, and I resolved to do so.

"I am acquainted," said the major, "with a young lieutenant whose health is not sufficiently strong to allow him to go to the East, and who would be glad to sell his commission, for which he wants one hundred sequins.

But it would be necessary to obtain the consent of the secretary of war." "Mention the matter to him," I replied, "the one hundred sequins are ready." The major undertook the commission.
In the evening I went to Madame Orio, and I found myself very comfortably lodged.

After supper, the aunt told her nieces to shew me, to my room, and, as may well be supposed, we spent a most delightful night.