towards the loving bosom and welcoming arms of my Virginia--this new
shame had come upon me? Alas, what malign influence drew thee, lady, to
Siena, to rekindle my flame, to melt my conjugal desires, to betray me
into the old passion, to draw me into the old despair? Thus I bitterly
questioned myself as, guarded on either hand by mounted men, I descended
the silent street on the way to what I must needs consider perpetual
imprisonment.

Going out of the Porta Romana, where we were obliged to wait in the cold
drizzle of a cheerless dawn for the porter to open the gate, a deeply
veiled, respectably dressed young woman asked the favour of our escort
from the corporal, and received it, probably on account of her good
looks, which should be extraordinary. She was going, she said, to join
her husband at Volterra, and feared the brigands who were notoriously
rife in that country. The corporal offered to take her pillion behind
him. "Willingly, sir," she said, and was lifted up by the troopers. As
we went out of the gate she raised her veil to use her handkerchief and
to look at me. In a moment I saw that it was my brave and affectionate
Belviso, and was no little comforted by the thought that here, at any
rate, was one heart in Siena generously inclined to mine.

We baited at Colle, and rested there two or three hours; from thence we
mounted a very steep hill and reached a country of abounding desolation
and misery, where bare grey hills alternated with dense thickets, and
were told that there was not a human habitation for the rest of the
journey to Volterra. Our guards saw to the priming of their muskets
before they started from Colle, and kept a sharp lookout on all sides of
the way. We met nothing, however, threatening or otherwise, for nearly
half our journey, but somewhere about four o'clock of the afternoon,
when we were traversing a barren moor, the corporal gave a sharp cry and