As my voice and my skill were remarkable, my parents made me early an object of speculation, and I was forced into practising cruelly. They made me sing, or play the piano eight hours a day, which inspired me with an insurmountable detestation of that instrument.
If my master complained of my inattention, I was shut up in the music-room from six in the morning till eight in the evening and given hardly anything to eat. If by chance I got a good report, I was pretty well treated, my father made me a present of twopence, and my mother told me ghost stories, which terrified me to such an extent that I scarcely dared to be alone during the night.
One day when they had forgotten to open my prison at the usual hour, I was suddenly seized with a panic of terror, and, quite beside myself, I opened the window and threw myself out into the garden, without doing myself any harm, however.
About this time great rejoicings were taking place in Pisa in honour of their Neapolitan Majesties, who were on a visit to the Grand Duke Leopold.
My mother, wishing to take the opportunity of going to see her sister, who lived in that town, my father gave his consent, on condition that my aunt and I should be of the party.
With what transports of joy did I receive this agreeable news! What a delightful and lively satisfaction it would be to let my dear piano rest!
Great preparations were made for my toilette; several frocks were bought for me; my father gave me two gold watches and a very valuable ring. He did not forget to make me take my shoes with their very high red heels, whose sound much delighted me.
We embarked on a public boat, and, although it was my first journey by water, my young imagination, far from dreading the perils of the furious element, was at once wonderfully diverted.
In twenty-four hours we landed at Pisa, where my uncle and aunt Fillipini, as well as their son and daughters, received us with open arms. They were greatly surprised to see me so richly clad, and said to my mother that no doubt her husband was very well off.
She answered only that I was a bastard, a name she gave me pretty often, and the meaning of which I did not understand.