If the latter personage were not bribed or won over, nothing was more common than for us to receive a sudden order of departure; and so, perforce, we lived a wandering and desultory life.
Though the gains of such a life are, as I have said, very great, yet the expenses are enormous.

Our appearance and retinue was too splendid for the narrow mind of Pippi, who was always crying out at my extravagance, though obliged to own that his own meanness and parsimony would never have achieved the great victories which my generosity had won.

With all our success, our capital was not very great.

That speech to the Duke of Courland, for instance, was a mere boast as far as the two hundred thousand florins at three months were concerned.

We had no credit, and no money beyond that on our table, and should have been forced to fly if his Highness had won and accepted our bills.