You have seen in these Memoirs what I have said of the relations of imagination and destiny that seem to have existed between the historian of _René_ and the poet of _Childe Harold._ Here I point to another of those conjunctures so nattering to my pride. Does not the dark-haired Fornarina of Lord Byron bear a certain family likeness to the fair-haired Velléda of the _Martyrs_, her elder? [Sidenote: Velléda.] "'Hidden among the rocks, I waited some time, but nothing appeared. Suddenly, my ear was struck by sounds which the wind carried to me from the middle of the lake. I listened and distinguished the accents of a human voice; at the same time I discovered a skiff poised on the crest of a wave; it came down again, disappeared between two billows, and then showed itself once more on the summit of a heavy swell; it approached the shore. A woman was steering; she sang as she struggled against the storm and seemed to sport amidst the winds: one would have thought that they were in her power, from the manner in which she seemed to defy them. I saw her throw into the lake by turns, as a sacrifice, pieces of linen, sheep's fleeces, cakes of wax and little gold and silver grindstones. "Soon she touched land, sprang on shore, fastened her bark to the trunk of a willow and darted into the wood, leaning on the poplar oar which she held in her hand. She passed quite close to me without seeing me. Her figure was tall; a dark, short, sleeveless tunic scarce served to veil her nudity. She carried a golden sickle slung from a brass girdle and her head was encircled with an oaken branch. The whiteness of her arms and complexion, her blue eyes, her rosy lips, her long fair hair that waved dishevelled in the air bespoke the daughter of the Gauls and contrasted, by their gentleness, with her proud and fierce gait She sang words full of terror in a melodious voice, and her uncovered breast rose and fell like the foam of the waves[134].'" I should blush to show myself between Byron and Jean-Jacques, without knowing what place posterity will award me, if these Memoirs were to appear during my life; but, when they see the light, I shall have gone and for all time, like my illustrious predecessors, to a distant shore; my shade will be delivered to the breath of opinion, vain and light like the little that will remain of my ashes.