"He gambled at Monaco, he engaged in equivocal business, and did I not send him sufficient money at any time, he pursued me like a spy, like a shadow. He read of my successes in the papers, he kept a book of them, he calculated my receipts. In Milan, not long after, began the era of my triumphs, the most distinguished circles were opened to me. I became intimate with Princess Dolgia, and she invited we to her villa at Stresa. "It was then that I saw you for the first time, when my heart burned for you with glowing passion, when I experienced all the charms of love and life, and felt the shame of my chains doubly heavy; then, too, he spied upon me by the lake shore, he had been dissatisfied with the last remittance; he demanded more. At the same time his heart was inflamed with savage jealousy, or was it rather an emotion of hatred--he saw that we loved one another. I feared for your life, only a great price could assuage his wrath. But, carried away with delight that knew no bounds, as if to raise me in blissful dreams above the unworthiness with which my life was filled, I would not curb my glowing love, and greater than the sin of loving was the wicked doubt, whether the welfare of my soul was more imperilled by your love than by the mad passion of a brutal criminal. "Since then my only thought has been for you and your love; he followed me upon my career of triumph which I commenced through Europe. I would fly from you, only entwine your love like a transient dream in my life--and ever again it urged me to seek you; therefore I came here and stayed so long on the shores of the northern lakes. It drew me to your native land, to your own home. I visited your Castle while you were absent; then I tore myself away from the glowing dreams of my longing--for almost two years I lingered in Russia. Owing to no fault of mine, Baluzzi had lost all traces of me for a considerable time; he had been guilty of some breach of the laws in Russia, and was, I know not why, banished to Siberia, but he discovered me again, and, like a leech, he clung to my heels. "My increasing fame gave me the _entrée_ to good society, I gained the friendship of princes and princesses. Intercourse with Baluzzi could only injure my name. Little as he fulfilled his duties as a chorus singer in Florence, he was known as one of those musical assistants who stood upon a subordinate step of the ladder of art, in those circles I had risen far above his horizon. I often let him feel it, and he rebelled with double defiance against my 'impudent overbearing.' Yet he saw that, for his own sake, he must not disturb my career; he agreed only to see and speak to me secretly, and before the world to assume the semblance of friendship; he often came after dissipated entertainments and asserted his rights, rousing my anger.