A little behind his comrades, upon a fine gray horse, rode a young Florentine named Vicenzo, the most skilful rider of the troop. Although but five-and-twenty years old, he had gone through many vicissitudes and occupations. Of respectable family, he had studied at Pisa, had been expelled for misconduct, had then enlisted in an Austrian regiment, whence his friends had procured his discharge, but only to cast him off for his dissolute habits. Alternately a professional gambler, a stage player, and a smuggler on the Italian frontier, he had now followed, for upwards of a year, the vagabond life of a horse-rider. Of handsome person and much natural intelligence, he covered his profligacy and taste for low associations with a certain varnish of good breeding. This had procured him in the troop the nickname of the _Marchese_, and had made him a great favourite with the female portion of the strollers, amongst whom more than one fierce quarrel had arisen for the good graces of the fascinating Vicenzo.
The Florentine was accompanied by a stranger, who had fallen in with the troop at Nice, and had won their hearts by his liberality. He had given them a magnificent supper at their _albergo_, had made them presents of wine and trinkets--all apparently out of pure generosity and love of their society. He it was who had chiefly determined them to visit Marseilles, instead of proceeding north, as they had originally intended, by Avignon to Lyons. He marched with the troop, on horseback, wrapped in a long loose coat, and with a broad hat slouched over his brow, and bestowed his companionship chiefly on Vicenzo, to whom he appeared to have taken a great affection. The strollers thought him a strange eccentric fellow, half cracked, to say the least; but they cared little whether he were sane or mad, so long as his society proved profitable, his purse well filled, and ever in his hand.
The wanderers were within three miles of Marseilles when they came to one of the _bastides_, or country-houses, so thickly scattered around that city. It was of unusual elegance, almost concealed amongst a thick plantation of trees, and having a terrace, in the Italian style, overlooking the road. Upon this terrace, in the cool shade of an arbour, two ladies were seated, enjoying the sweet breath of the lovely spring morning. Books and embroidery were on a table before them, which they left on the appearance of the horse-riders, and, leaning upon the stone parapet, looked down on the unusual spectacle. The elder of the two had nothing remarkable, except the gaudy ribbons that contrasted with her antiquated physiognomy. The younger, in full flush of youth, and seen amongst the bright blossoms of the plants that grew in pots upon the parapet, might have passed for the goddess of spring in her most sportive mood. Her hair hung in rich clusters over her alabaster neck; her blue eyes danced in humid lustre; her coral lips, a little parted, disclosed a range of sparkling pearls. The sole fault to be found with her beauty was its character, which was sensual rather than intellectual. One beheld the beautiful and frivolous child of clay, but the ray of the spirit that elevates and purifies was wanting. It was the beauty of a Bacchante rather than of a Vestal--Aurora disporting herself on the flower banks, and awaiting, in frolic mood, the advent of Cupid.