He
assured the jeunesse doree of Ravenna that they lost nothing in any
such point of view by their exclusion from her intimacy, for that
all their enterprises in that line would be quite thrown away.
The Conte Leandro Lombardoni, indeed, always carried about with him
in his breast-pocket, a carefully preserved little letter on pink
notepaper, which he gave the world to understand was part of a
correspondence carried on between him (reconciled as he was to the
bel sesso) and the Diva; and had more than once contrived to be seen
hanging about the door of her house at hours when honest Divas, as
well as mortals, ought to be in bed and asleep. But nobody believed
him, or imagined that anything save a bad cold was at all likely to
result from his vigils beneath the cold stars. He showed, indeed,
with many mysterious precautions against the remainder of the letter
being seen, that the little pink sheet of notepaper did indeed bear
the signature of "Bianca Lalli." But when one of the ingenuous youth
picked his pocket of it, it was found to be a very coldly courteous
acknowledgment of a copy of verses, which the Diva promised to read
as soon as her avocations would permit her to do so!
"Any way," said the discomfited poet, "that is more than any of you
others have got. And it's not so small a matter, when you come to
think of it!"
"Per Bacco, no! Leandro is in the right of it!" said the young Conte
Beppo Farini; "a small matter to find somebody who promises even to
read his verses! I should think not, indeed! Where will you find
another to do as much?"
"Riconciliato col bel sesso! I should think you were, indeed!" cried
another; "she absolutely thanks you for sending her your rhymes!
Nobody ever did as much as that before, Leandro mio! No wonder you
haunt the street before her door!"
"I don't haunt the street before her door.
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