"One word more, Signor Lelio. If you want the signora to listen to you, don't tell her that the common people are as good as the people of quality. She is tainted with her nobility. Don't form a bad opinion of her on that account, for it's a family disease; all the Grimanis are like that. But that does not prevent my young mistress from being kind and charitable. It is simply an idea she has got in her head, which makes her fly into a great passion when any one thwarts her. Would you believe that she has already refused I don't know how many handsome young men, and very rich too, because they were not well-born enough for her. However, Signor Lelio, agree with her at first on every subject, and you will soon persuade her of whatever you choose. Oh! if you could only persuade her to marry a young count who proposed for her not long ago!" "Her cousin, Count Hector?" "Oh, no! he is a fool, and he bores everybody to death; even his dogs begin to yawn as soon as they see him." As I listened to Lila's prattle, my fatherly manner having put her completely at her ease, I led her toward the rendezvous. Not that I did not listen to her with profound interest; all these details, trivial as they were in appearance, were very important in my eyes; for they led me by induction to a better knowledge of the enigmatical personage with whom I had to deal. I must confess also, that they cooled my ardor to a considerable extent, and that I began to look upon it as a most absurd thing to be the hero of a romance in competition with the first plaything that might come to hand; with my cat, Soliman, or--who could say?--perhaps with Cousin Hector himself at the very outset. Thus Lila's advice was identical with the advice which I gave myself and which I was most desirous to follow. We found the signora sitting at the foot of the statue, dressed all in white--a costume by no means adapted to a mysterious meeting in the open air, but for that very reason perfectly in harmony with her character. As I approached, she sat so absolutely still that she might easily have been taken for another statue sitting at the feet of the white marble nymph. She made no reply to my first words. With her elbow resting on her knee and her chin on her hand, she was so pensive, so lovely, and her attitude so graceful and stately, draped in her white veil in the moonlight, that I should have believed her to be wrapt in sublime contemplation, had not her love of cats and armorial bearings recurred to my memory. As she seemed determined to take no notice of me, I tried to take one of her hands; but she drew it away with superb disdain, saying in a tone more majestic than Louis XIV. ever had at his command: "I have been obliged to wait!" I could not refrain from laughing at that solemn quotation; but my merriment served only to increase her gravity. "Do not stand on ceremony!" she said. "Laugh on; the hour and the place are admirably suited to that!"