Falsehood is the parent of all crimes, and in
no case has it a progeny so numerous as that in which its own birth is
derived from the state. I fear I may have made sacrifices to this
treacherous influence, I could wish forgotten."
Though Don Camillo soliloquized, rather than addressed his companion, it
was evident, by the train of his thoughts, that the narrative of Jacopo
had awakened disagreeable reflections on the manner in which he had
pushed his own claims with the Senate. Perhaps he felt the necessity of
some apology to one who, though so much his inferior in rank, was so
competent to appreciate his conduct, and who had just denounced, in the
strongest language, his own fatal subserviency to the arts of that
irresponsible and meretricious body.
Jacopo uttered a few words of a general nature, but such as had a
tendency to quiet the uneasiness of his companion; after which, with a
readiness that proved him qualified for the many delicate missions with
which he had been charged, he ingeniously turned the discourse to the
recent abduction of Donna Violetta, with the offer of rendering his new
employer all the services in his power to regain his bride.
"That thou mayest know all thou hast undertaken," rejoined Don Camillo,
"listen, Jacopo, and I will conceal nothing from thy shrewdness."
The Duke of Sant' Agata now briefly, but explicitly, laid bare to his
companion all his own views and measures with respect to her he loved,
and all those events with which the reader has already become
acquainted.
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