The Fool Errant Being the Memoirs of Francis-Anthony Strelley, Esq., Citizen of Lucca

"Was not that fine comedy in an old grey-bearded Capuchin dog?" cried the frate, leaping about and cracking his fingers. "Could you have bettered it? Could any man living have b...

My present situation was of that shocking description which defies thought and paralyses the will. I was utterly alone, deprived of the means of joining the only person in Italy...

I slept like a log until the hour of noon--perfectly dreamless sleep. It was Virginia who awoke me then by shaking my shoulder, not (as usually) by opening the shutter. I heard...

I lived in Pistoja for a month or more, very happily, without money in my pocket or a house to my name, to the benefit of my health and spirits and with no injury to my heart's...

Past fatigues and present danger did not disturb my happy meditations. I paced the cloister of San Lorenzo without regard for them, absorbed in considering my future conduct, an...

The aspect of Florence, surveyed from the crags of Fiesole, or from that gentler eyrie of Bellosguardo, is one of the most enchanting visions open to the eye of man, so cunningl...

He replied, "My dear lad, I am paid already, and twice paid. It is the certain conviction that I am hereafter to be much blessed in your society that has forced me to take this...

I might have continued I know not how long upon a theme so noble, but for his astonishment, which, though it kept him stupid, must have a vent. "Who the devil--" stammers he, "W...

I shall not deny that the overnight's tenderness may have wrought in me the dangerous ecstasy which was to prove so cruel a requital of it; for it is of the nature of love to be...

One evening--I believe, as I said, that it was after nearly six months' calm and temperate life that our troubles began--upon returning from my day's work, I found Virginia in a...

It had been my hope to be able to buy, exercising great economy, a new store of crucifixes in Bologna, and to find a country beyond it where I might, without scruple, sell them...

If we soberly reflect upon the part which the trappings and mantlings of men have played in their affairs, we shall not hesitate, I believe, to put into that category many thing...

I hope I may say that, in the painful position in which I found myself, I did what was becoming to a man of honour more jealous of his wife's than of his own. I reasoned with my...

I took up my lodgings at the Bear, in Arezzo, and made all such preparations to receive my wife as were becoming. I engaged a woman to wait upon her, had a withdrawing-room--as...

I do not know whether any other man in the world has been so unfortunate as I in making resolutions and finding opportunities to break them, but I am persuaded none can have mad...

Destitute as we were of anything but the sinews of our backs and arms, we were forced, if we would live, to work our way to Arezzo; and it often fell out that the piece-work we...

Issacher, as well as being a cheerful, loquacious fellow and of ready wits, was so exceedingly kind as to support my weight upon his sparer frame. My arm was heavy, I am sure, u...

For his second day's campaign, when he set up as a dentist (in spectacles and a fine black beard), Fra Palamone chose me to be arrayed in a loose punchinello suit of red cotton,...

I am conscious that the reader may find much to condemn in my last chapter. He may think my schemes chimerical, my methods undisciplined; he may say that I am perverse. I shall...

Francis Antony Strelley, Tennis-ball of Fate, should be inscribed upon my tomb, unless like the wandering Jew I were not destined to have any other than that restless globe upon...

We sat down upon the steps of a church--San Pietro was its name, a very old church. For a while we were silent; Virginia, it was to be seen, was now timid--timid to the verge of...

The company, of which I was now enrolled a member, moved on towards Siena, that city for which--as Aurelia's cradle--I had a feeling of profound reverence; towards which now, in...

My forebodings were more than fulfilled. The next time, which was at a week's interval, that I presented myself at the Villa San Giorgio, Donna Aurelia, in full reception, turne...

A sudden desire, whose origin I could not have defined, unless it sprang directly from alarm on her account, moved me away from the window towards the door of Virginia's room. I...

Free in every sense of the term--free, of prison, free of debt (for if Aurelia had paid me, I had now paid her husband), free of every obligation but guilt, I was all on fire fo...

I was fairly diligent during my year of study at Padua, fairly punctual in attendance at my classes and lectures, fairly regular in my letter- writing home. I acquired no vices,...

Virginia was pleased to be very mysterious on the subject of our marriage, keeping me in the Sagrestia for three or four days, visiting me only to give me food and such news as...

I was to dine that night with the Prior of Saint Mark's, a former acquaintance of mine, and I kept my engagement, though I left the party early. My wound, which was painful but...

I confess that I have never been able to feel the force of that argument which says, for example, that because a man is a sheep-stealer he must needs be a bad husband. As well m...

I could not see his face, for besides that it was now very dark, he kept his cloak up, and had pulled his hat downwards over his brow; but his voice was perfectly familiar. His...

Father Carnesecchi, of the Society of Jesus, who had charge of the penitents in the college of his Order, and to whom I was formally handed over by my indurate captor, was a mem...

On returning to my house I ended a day of agitation by an interview with Virginia. I found her in an abject way, scarcely able to speak, and very unwilling to raise her eyes. Sh...

I arose from bed, some two or three days after the terrible occurrence related--and how I had got into it, except for the charity of the doorkeeper, there's no telling. I arose,...

The servant, an old one of Donna Giulia's, who knew me well by sight, had grimaced pleasantly as he saluted. "Buon di, signoria," he had said, and "Servitore del 'lustrissimo."...

It was, I know very well, the aim and desire of this beautiful lady to approve herself mother to the exile thus cast upon her hands, and it was so as much by reason of her innat...

If needs must have it that I was to accommodate crime by falling into it myself, it would appear that I was to do it with a certain air. When I awoke I found a very decent suit...

Upon my arrival in the capital, my first care, after securing a lodging on the Lung' Arno, was to pay a visit to the Ghetto, where I had spent those happy three days with my new...

The Capuchin's employment was precisely what I have stated, though all probability is against it. I was curious enough to watch him and could make no mistake. He had a copious b...

My new friend, as I must call him, since so he professed himself a dozen times a week, was Count Amadeo Giraldi, one of the three members of the Secret Cabinet of the Grand Duke...

Whatever trick Virginia may have designed for the humiliation of the cavaliere--and I never inquired of her what it was--it failed of any apparent effect. He presented himself b...

The mingling of emotions, like that of two waters, may produce a volume whose direction cannot be calculated by any previous knowledge of the separate streams. In my case, just...

I must return to the natural order of my history, and relate my first interview with Aurelia in order that I may prepare the reader for the last. It was brought about by Father...

When the day drew near upon which I had appointed to depart from Florence, I saw that I must come to terms with the fellow. I sent Belviso out to look for him--and to find him a...

Bob Malcolm came to see me early in the morning with news that the count's cartel had been delivered in form. He told me that I might as well fight the Grand Duke--"For if you k...

The hopes of a young man upon his travels may be lighter than feathers whirled about by the wind, but they soar as high and are as little to be reasoned with. Going to Pistoja t...

I did not go immediately to the Villa San Giorgio; it was necessary that I should be clear why I was to go there at all. How did I stand with regard to Donna Aurelia--did I love...

Under this superscription we consigned to the dust the dust of our dear benefactor; and that reverently done, we settled ourselves in Lucca, where we have remained ever since, w...

It was to the sympathetic ears of Donna Giulia, first of all, that I imparted the state of my feelings, my hopes, fears and prayers with regard to Aurelia. There was that about...