"A great nobleman, a very great nobleman, became so enamoured of the portrait--naturally he saw it abroad--that he came, post-haste, all the way to Pressburg, to convince himself that the subject of the portrait really lived in our city.

He came to our house, and you should have seen his despair when he was told that you lived there no longer.

At first he wanted to blow his brains out.

He succeeded, subsequently, however, in finding out where you were--saw you, and since then he has been worse than ever.

He would come to our house, sit down on the sofa which he knew you had embroidered, and stare at your portrait for hours at a stretch.