“We had a very pious and humane imam, who made them a most excellent sermon on this occasion, exhorting them not to kill us all at once.

“ ‘Only cut off one of the buttocks of each of those ladies,’ said he, ‘and you will fare extremely well; if ye are still under the necessity of having recourse to the same expedient again, ye will find the like supply a few days hence. Heaven will approve of so charitable an action, and work your deliverance.’

“By the force of this eloquence he easily persuaded them, and all underwent the operation. The imam applied the same balsam as they do to children after circumcision. We were all ready to give up the ghost.

“The janissaries had scarcely time to finish the repast with which we had supplied them, when the Russians attacked the place by means of flat-bottomed boats, and not a single janissary escaped. The Russians paid no regard to the condition we were in; but as there are French surgeons in all parts of the world, a skilful operator took us under his care, and made a cure of us; and I shall never forget, while I live, that as soon as my wounds were perfectly healed, he made me certain proposals. In general, he desired us all to have a good heart, assuring us that the like had happened in many sieges; and that it was the law of war.

“As soon as my companions were in a condition to walk, they were sent to Moscow. As for me, I fell to the lot of a boyard, who put me to work in his garden, and gave me twenty lashes a day. But this nobleman having, in about two years afterwards, been broken alive upon the wheel, with about thirty others, for some court intrigues, I took advantage of the event, and made my escape. I travelled over a great part of Russia. I was a long time an innkeeper’s servant at Riga, then at Rostock, Wismar, Leipsic, Cassel, Utrecht, Leyden, The Hague, and Rotterdam: I have grown old in misery and disgrace, living with only one buttock, and in the perpetual remembrance that I was a pope’s daughter. I have been an hundred times upon the point of killing myself, but still was fond of life. This ridiculous weakness is, perhaps, one of the dangerous principles implanted in our nature. For what can be more absurd than to persist in carrying a burden of which we wish to be eased? to detest, and yet to strive to preserve our existence? In a word, to caress the serpent that devours us, and hug him close to our bosoms till he has gnawed into our hearts?

“In the different countries which it has been my fate to traverse, and the many inns where I have been a servant, I have observed a prodigious number of people who held their existence in abhorrence, and yet I never knew more than twelve who voluntarily put an end to their misery; namely, three negroes, four Englishmen, as many Genoese, and a German professor named Robek. My last place was with the Jew, Don Issachar, who placed me near your person, my fair lady; to your fortunes I have attached myself, and have been more affected by your adventures than my own. I should never have even mentioned the latter to you, had you not a little piqued me on the head of sufferings; and if it were not customary to tell stories on board a ship in order to pass away the time. In short, my dear miss, I have a great deal of knowledge and experience of the world, therefore take my advice; divert yourself, and prevail upon each passenger to tell his story, and if there is one of them all that has not cursed his existence many times, and said to himself over and over again, that he was the most wretched of mortals, I give you leave to throw me headforemost into the sea.”