"Ah! Can you resign yourself to play a degrading part--in spite of the
noblest face to be seen in Italy? Can you drop from the blue sky where
you dwell, into the bed of a courtesan? In short, can you, an angel of
refinement, of pure and spotless beauty, condescend to imagine what
the love must be of a Tinti--in her room, and so effectually as to
deceive the ardor of Emilio, who is indeed too drunk to be very
clear-sighted?"
"Is that all?" said she, with a smile that betrayed to the Frenchman a
side he had not as yet perceived of the delightful nature of an
Italian woman in love. "I will out-do la Tinti, if need be, to save my
friend's life."
"And you will thus fuse into one two kinds of love, which he sees as
distinct--divided by a mountain of poetic fancy, that will melt away
like the snow on a glacier under the beams of the midsummer sun."
"I shall be eternally your debtor," said the Duchess, gravely.
When the French doctor returned to the gallery, where the orgy had by
this time assumed the stamp of Venetian frenzy, he had a look of
satisfaction which the Prince, absorbed by la Tinti, failed to
observe; he was promising himself a repetition of the intoxicating
delights he had known.
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