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 returned from the visit he died of most terrible convulsions: but this is a mere trifle. My mother, in despair, and yet less afflicted than me, determined to absent herself for some time from so fatal a place. As she had a very fine estate in the neighbourhood of Gaeta, we embarked on board a galley which was gilded like the high altar of St. Peter’s at Rome. In our passage we were boarded by a Sallee corsair. Our men defended themselves like true Pope’s soldiers; they flung themselves upon their knees, laid down their arms and begged the corsair to give them absolution in articulo mortis.

“The Moors presently stripped us as bare as monkeys. My mother, my maids of honour, and myself, were served all in the same manner. It is amazing how quick these gentry are at undressing people. But what surprised me most was that they thrust their fingers into that part of our bodies where we women seldom permit anything but enemas to enter. I thought it a very strange kind of ceremony; for thus we are generally apt to judge of things when we have not seen the world. I afterwards learnt that it was to discover if we had any diamonds concealed. This practice has been established since time immemorial among those civilized nations that scour the seas. I was informed that the religious Knights of Malta never fail to make this search, whenever any Moors of either sex fall into their hands. It is a part of the law of nations from which they never deviate.

“I need not tell you how great a hardship it was for a young princess and her mother to be made slaves and carried to Morocco. You may easily imagine what we must have suffered on board a corsair. My mother was still extremely handsome, our maids of honour, and even our common waiting-women, had more charms than were to be found in all Africa. As to myself, I was enchanting; I was beauty itself, and then I had my virginity. But, alas! I did not retain it long; this precious flower, which was reserved for the lovely Prince of Massa-Carrara, was cropped by the captain of the Moorish vessel, who was a hideous negro, and thought he did me infinite honour. Indeed, both the Princess of Palestrina and myself must have had very strong constitutions to undergo all the hardships and violences we suffered till our arrival at Morocco. But I will not detain you any longer with such common things; they are hardly worth mentioning.

“Upon our arrival at Morocco, we found that kingdom bathed in blood. Fifty sons of the Emperor Muley Ishmael were each at the head of a party. This produced fifty civil wars of blacks against blacks, of blacks against tawnies, 1em