she was speaking of M. Querini, the ambassador congratulated her upon her marriage with him, saying that he was glad M. Querini had rendered justice to her merit, and adding, "I was not aware of your marriage." "Yet it took place more than two years since," said Juliette. "I know it for a fact," I said, in my turn; "for, two years ago, the lady was introduced as Madame Querini and with the title of excellency by General Spada to all the nobility in Cesena, where I was at that time." "I have no doubt of it," answered the ambassador, fixing his eyes upon me, "for Querini has himself written to me on the subject." A few minutes afterwards, as I was preparing to take my leave, the ambassador, under pretense of some letters the contents of which he wished to communicate to me, invited me to come into his private room, and he asked me what people generally thought of the marriage in Venice. "Nobody knows it, and it is even rumoured that the heir of the house of Querini is on the point of marrying a daughter of the Grimani family; but I shall certainly send the news to Venice." "What news?" "That Juliette is truly Madame Querini, since your excellency will present her as such to Louis XV." "Who told you so?" "She did." 57 "Perhaps she has altered her mind." I repeated to the ambassador the words which the king had said to M. de Richelieu after looking at Juliette. "Then I can guess," remarked the ambassador, "why Juliette does not wish to be presented to the king." I was informed some time afterwards that M. de Saint Quentin, the king's confidential minister, had called after mass on the handsome Venetian, and had told her that the king of France had most certainly very bad taste, because he had not thought her beauty superior to that of several ladies of his court. Juliette left Fontainebleau the next morning. In the first part of my Memoirs I have spoken of Juliette's beauty; she had a wonderful charm in her countenance, but she had already used her advantages too long, and her beauty was beginning to fade when she arrived in Fontainebleau. I met her again in Paris at the ambassador's, and she told me with a laugh that she had only been in jest when she called herself Madame Querini, and that I should oblige her if for the future I would call her by her real name of Countess Preati. She invited me to visit her at the Hotel de Luxembourg, where she was staying. I often called on her, for her intrigues amused me, but I was wise enough not to meddle with them. She remained in Paris four months, and contrived to infatuate M. Ranchi, secretary of the Venetian Embassy, an amiable and learned man. He was so deeply in love that he had made up his mind to marry her; but through a caprice which she, perhaps, regretted afterwards, she ill-treated him, and the fool died of grief. Count de Canes. ambassador of Maria Theresa, had some inclination for her, as well as the Count of Zinzendorf. The person who arranged these transient and short-lived intrigues was a certain Guasco, an abbe not over-favoured with the gifts of Plutus. He was particularly ugly, and had to purchase small favours with great services. But the man whom she really wished to marry was Count Saint Simon. He would have married her if she had not given him false addresses to make enquiries respecting her birth. The Preati family of Verona denied all knowledge of her, as a matter of course, and M. de Saint Simon, who, in spite of all his love, had not entirely lost his senses, had the courage to abandon her. Altogether, Paris did not prove an 'el dorado' for my handsome countrywoman, for she was obliged to pledge her diamonds, and to leave them behind her. After her return to Venice she married the son of the Uccelli, who sixteen years before had taken her out of her poverty. She died ten years ago. I was still taking my French lessons with my good old Crebillon; yet my style, which was full of Italianisms, often expressed the very reverse of what I meant to say. But generally my 'quid pro quos' only resulted in curious jokes which made my fortune; and the best of it is that my gibberish did me no harm on the score of wit: on the contrary, it procured me fine acquaintances. Several ladies of the best society begged me to teach them Italian, saying that it would afford them the opportunity of teaching me French; in such an exchange I always won more than they did. Madame Preodot, who was one of my pupils, received me one morning; she was still in bed, and told me that she did not feel disposed to have a lesson, because she had taken medicine the night previous. Foolishly translating an Italian idiom, I asked her, with an air of deep interest, whether she had well 'decharge'? "Sir, what a question! You are unbearable." I repeated my question; she broke out angrily again. "Never utter that dreadful word." "You are wrong in getting angry; it is the proper word." "A very dirty word, sir, but enough about it. Will you have some breakfast?" "No, I thank you. I have taken a 'cafe' and two 'Savoyards'." "Dear me! What a ferocious breakfast! Pray, explain yourself." "I say that I have drunk a cafe and eaten two Savoyards soaked in it, and that is what I do every morning." 58 "You are stupid, my good friend. A cafe is the establishment in which coffee is sold, and you ought to say that you have drunk 'use tasse de cafe'" "Good indeed! Do you drink the cup? In Italy we say a 'caffs', and we are not foolish enough to suppose that it means the coffee-house." "He will have the best of it! And the two 'Savoyards', how did you swallow them?" "Soaked in my coffee, for they were not larger than these on your table." "And you call these 'Savoyards'? Say biscuits." "In Italy, we call them 'Savoyards' because they were first invented in Savoy; and it is not my fault if you imagined that I had swallowed two of the porters to be found at the corner of the streets--big fellows whom you call in Paris Savoyards, although very often they have never been in Savoy." Her husband came in at that moment, and she lost no time in relating the whole of our conversation. He laughed heartily, but he said I was right. Her niece arrived a few minutes after; she was a young girl about fourteen years of age, reserved, modest, and very intelligent. I had given her five or six lessons in Italian, and as she was very fond of that language and studied diligently she was beginning to speak. Wishing to pay me her compliments in Italian, she said to me, "'Signore, sono in cantata di vi Vader in bona salute'." "I thank you, mademoiselle; but to translate 'I am enchanted', you must say 'ho pacer', and for to see you, you must say 'di vedervi'." "I thought, sir, that the 'vi' was to be placed before." "No, mademoiselle, we always put it behind." Monsieur and Madame Preodot were dying with laughter; the young lady was confused, and I in despair at having uttered such a gross absurdity; but it could not be helped. I took a book sulkily, in the hope of putting a stop to their mirth, but it was of no use: it lasted a week. That uncouth blunder soon got known throughout Paris, and gave me a sort of reputation which I lost little by little, but only when I understood the double meanings of words better. Crebillon was much amused with my blunder, and he told me that I ought to have said after instead of behind. Ah! why have not all languages the same genius! But if the French laughed at my mistakes in speaking their language, I took my revenge amply by turning some of their idioms into ridicule. "Sir," I once said to a gentleman, "how is your wife?" "You do her great honour, sir." "Pray tell me, sir, what her honour has to do with her health?" I meet in the Bois de Boulogne a young man riding a horse which he cannot master, and at last he is thrown. I stop the horse, run to the assistance of the young man and help him up. "Did you hurt yourself, sir?" "Oh, many thanks, sir, au contraire." "Why au contraire! The deuce! It has done you good? Then begin again, sir." And a thousand similar expressions entirely the reverse of good sense. But it is the genius of the language. I was one day paying my first visit to the wife of President de N----, when her nephew, a brilliant butterfly, came in, and she introduced me to him, mentioning my name and my country. 59 "Indeed, sir, you are Italian?" said the young man. "Upon my word, you present yourself so gracefully that I would have betted you were French." "Sir, when I saw you, I was near making the same mistake; I would have betted you were Italian." Another time, I was dining at Lady Lambert's in numerous and brilliant company. Someone remarked on my finger a cornelian ring on which was engraved very beautifully the head of Louis XV. My ring went round the table, and everybody thought that the likeness was striking. A young marquise, who had the reputation of being a great wit, said to me in the most serious tone, "It is truly an antique?" "The stone, madam, undoubtedly." Everyone laughed except the thoughtless young beauty, who did not take any notice of it. Towards the end of the dinner, someone spoke of the rhinoceros, which was then shewn for twenty-four sous at the St. Germain's Fair. "Let us go and see it!" was the cry. We got into the carriages, and reached the fair. We took several turns before we could find the place. I was the only gentleman; I was taking care of two ladies in the midst of the crowd, and the witty marquise was walking in front of us. At the end of the alley where we had been told that we would find the animal, there was a man placed to receive the money of the visitors. It is true that the man, dressed in the African fashion, was very dark and enormously stout, yet he had a human and very masculine form, and the beautiful marquise had no business to make a mistake. Nevertheless, the thoughtless young creature went up straight to him and said, "Are you the rhinoceros, sir?" "Go in, madam, go
