Breda, I packed my trunks, and some hours afterwards set out for Amsterdam.
I have already said, and now repeat, that certain portions of this adventure may appear unnatural, and some may call them altogether false, but nothing is more true. The initials I have given will suffice to explain it to any person who knew Brussels thirty years ago. Besides, there is nothing uncommon in the affair, nothing more than is read of in the commonest romance. If I have entered into minute details, it is not to ensure a melo-dramatic effect, but with the intention of putting too credulous persons on their guard against a species of deception more frequently employed, and with more success than may be generally thought, in all classes of society; and such is the aim of these Memoirs. Let them be reflected on in every particular, and who knows but that some fine morning the duties of attorney-general, judge, gendarme, and agent of police, may be discovered to have become sinecures.
My stay at Amsterdam was very short. Having converted into cash two bills of those left me by the baroness, I set out, and on the 2d of March 1796 made my entrance into the capital, where at a future day my name was destined to make some noise. I put up at the hotel du Gaillard-Bois in Rue de l'Échelle, and first employed myself in changing my ducats into French money, and in selling a quantity of small jewellery and trinkets, now superfluous to me, as I resolved on establishing myself in some village in the environs, and entering into some business; but this project was not to be resized. One evening, one of those persons who are always to be found in hotels seeking acquaintance with travellers, proposed to present me at a house where there was a party. I unfortunately consented, confiding in my experience of the Café Turc and the Café de la Monnaie; but I soon found that gamblers of Brussels were but bunglers in comparison with these gentlemen, of whose society I now
