Languages & literature > Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane > Volume 4

OF GIL F L A S.
x times even fpare the women the trouble to Juftffy
* themfel-ves. I affirmed (continued the) to the1
*■ Marquis of Marialva, that thou waft my brother.
‘ Pardon me, Mr Santillane, if Lfpeak. to you as-
‘ familiarly as heretofore : but I can’t get rid of
‘ my old habits. 1 tell thee then, that I brazened
* it out“ Don’t you fee, (faid I to the Portu-
* gueze nobleman) that all this is the work of jea*
‘ loufy and rage ? Narciffa, my comrade and rival,
‘ incenfed to fee me in quiet poffeffion of a heart of
which flie was baulked, has played me this trick ;•
M ffie has bribed the under candle-fnuffer, who, as
the minifter of her refentment, has the impudence
k< to fay, that he has feen me Arfenia’s chamber-
f4, maid. Nothing can be more falfe : the widow of
f*- Don Antonio Coello always entertained too noble
l4-fentiments to humble herfelf fo low as to ferve aa
adrefs. Behdes, what proves the fallity of the
accufation, and the confpiracy of rny accufers, is-
the precipitate retreat of my brother : if he was
[“■ prefent, he might confound, their flander : buf
1“' Narciffa has, doubtlefs, employed-fome new arti-
f‘- fice to make him difappear.” “ Though thefe
^'■reafons (purfued Laura) made but an indifferent
j“ apology, the Marquis was fo good as to be fatisfied
!“ with it: and that good-natured nobleman con*
tinued to love me, until the day of his departure
j*‘ from Grenada on his return to Portugal. Indeed,,
he did not ftay long after thee : and the wife
of Zapata had the pleafure of feeing me lofe the
lover of whom I had deprived her.. After that,
I lived fome years at Grenada : then a divi-
ton happening in our company, which is often
j*‘ the cafe, all the players feperated.; fbruc weut to