In the course of my electoral contest, I have been obliged to make public the justification I did not make to you; and I have had the satisfaction of finding that men in masses are more capable than individuals of understanding generous impulses and of distinguishing the honest language of truth. Here are the facts which I related, but more briefly and with less detail, to my electors.
A few months before my departure from Rome, I was in a cafe frequented by the pupils of the Academy, when an Italian musician, named Benedetto, came in, as he usually did every evening. Nominally he was a musician and a tolerable one; but we had been warned that he was also a spy of the Roman police. However that might be, he was very amusing; and as we cared nothing for the police, we not only endured but we encouraged his visits,—which was not hard to do in view of his passion for poncio spongato and spuma di latte.
On his entrance one evening, a member of our party asked him who was the woman with whom he had met him that morning.
“My wife, signore,” answered the Italian.
“Yours, Benedetto!—you the husband of such a beauty!”
“Si, signore.”
“Nonsense! you are ugly and drunken, and people say you are police spy; but she, on the contrary, is as handsome as Diana the huntress.”
“I charmed her with my talent; she adores me.”
“Well, if she is your wife, make her pose to our friend here, Dorlange, who wants a model for his Pandora. He can’t get a finer one.”
“That can be managed,” replied the Italian.