The painting is not of Jeanne Marie d’Albert de Saint Hippolyte but the subject matter and time is appropriate.

HENRIETTE

Casanova presents a dilemma for readers of his memoirs who want to like him. On the one hand, Casanova was narcissistic, manipulative, scheming, a scam artist, not above humiliating women who offended him, and who in this modern age wouldn’t have been allowed within ten miles of a middle school, and on the other, a child prodigy who entered the University of Padua at 12, a superb conversationalist, a brilliant memoirist, so brutally honest that his mirror reflects uncomfortably human nature as much as his nature. He was more than a mere seducer, making love with a sense of adventure and play, often exerting himself to better the lives of the women he encountered, even after the affair and even for some who did not give him sexual favors. Still, Casanova was a monumental egoist. Few affairs rose above the level of infatuation, yet there was one woman who eclipsed him in his memoirs. It is hard for a reader, even at a distance of two hundred and seventy years, not to fall in love with her as did Casanova.

Casanova is awakened early one morning by a commotion at an inn where he is staying in Cesena. He finds the sbirri—the police—at the open door of another room and an older gentleman yelling at them in Latin. The police, who do not understand Latin, are demanding that the man prove he is married to his consort because the bishop has decided to enforce the law against unmarried couples taking rooms at inns. Casanova, the only other person who speaks Latin, explains the situation to the gentleman, who turns out to be a Hungarian captain. The captain considers the invasion of his room an affront to his honor and adds there was no way they could know the sex of his consort because the person who accompanied him was dressed in a uniform. By the way, the individual in question is hiding under the covers.

Using connections, Casanova intervenes and later that day collects damages for the insult to the honor of the Hungarian captain. In the honor-obsessed 18th century, the truth of the accusation matters less than the fact of the insult. After escorting the sbirri out, Casanova returns and converses with the captain while the person accused of being the paramour remains underneath the covers. Casanova requests breakfast with the pair. The captain, referring to the person under the covers as “him,” says Casanova must first ask his permission. Casanova does so. The head pops out. Casanova writes: “I see a tousled head appear from under the covers, revealing a smiling, fresh, attractive face which leaves me in no doubt of its sex, though the hair is cut like a man’s.”

There is a slight difficulty between the captain and his consort. The captain only speaks Hungarian, German, and Latin. The woman is French and has none of those languages in her repertoire. They communicate by gestures. During breakfast, she seems embarrassed about her predicament and remains quiet. Casanova gives her name as  Henriette. Researchers believe she was Jeanne Marie d’Albert de Saint Hippolyte. 

Casanova decides that the best way to make further acquaintance with this intriguing woman is to become a traveling companion. He offers to take them to their destination, Parma, in his carriage, to which they agree. Casanova has to remedy the minor detail of not owning a carriage, but he manages to acquire one by the time they have to leave.

During the trip, there is further awkwardness in that the woman turns out to be a conversationalist, the equal of Casanova, but when Casanova translates her French wit into Latin prose for the benefit of the Hungarian captain, her stream of bon mots falls flat. 

Apparent now that the woman is educated and from a well-placed family, Casanova asks the officer to tell the story of how he met his companion. With her permission, the Hungarian captain does so. He first spied Henriette dressed as a man in the company of another officer disembarking in the port of Civitavecchia. A series of necessarily convoluted communications resulted in the Hungarian officer picking her up outside Rome. The Hungarian captain sums up his companion thus: “she is as gentle as a lamb, that she seems to have had a most excellent education, that she is in perfect health, and that she must be both intelligent and courageous.”  

Henriette refuses to reveal more about herself, saying, “that the same principle that forbids me to lie does not allow me to tell the truth.” Several times during their acquaintance, the Hungarian officer offered her money, which she always refused even though she obviously had none of her own. 

Halfway to Parma, she requests Casanova translate her farewell to the officer: “I want him to let me go and lodge by myself wherever I see fit and so far to forget me that he will not try to find out what has become of me in Parma and will pretend not to know me if he happens to meet me anywhere.” She then embraces the old Hungarian officer “with far more compassion than love.” 

Casanova is in love and, unfortunately, is in doubt that his love is reciprocated. He spends a night working himself into a fever. He imagines Henriette surrendering; he imagines her refusing; he imagines himself avenging her refusal. By the time he actually gets around to asking her to be his companion in the morning, he is in a wrathful temper. Henriette teases him saying she had never imagined a declaration of love made in anger, but she agrees.

Casanova and Henriette set up house in Parma. He begins to call her “his wife.” She asks that he not inquire into her past, but she does drop a few dark hints. She mentions that she is sought and will be forced to return if found out. The first officer that accompanied her in Civitavecchia turned out to be her father-in-law, who wanted to put her in a convent. In the 18th century, a common way of dealing with inconvenient women was to bury them in convents. Henriette refers to her father-in-law and husband as monsters. She is not the kind of person who uses that word lightly. 

Hesitatingly, they go out into society. Henriette confesses to loving music. After hearing a concerto with violoncello at a party, she asks the orchestra to play again but this time with her as the soloist. She plays brilliantly. When the amazed Casanova asks her what other secret talents she might have kept from him, she replies, “No, my dear love, I have emptied my sack, and now you know your Henriette completely.”

Throughout most of his memoirs, there is a sense Casanova is on the lookout for the next sexual adventure. That is absent in the chapters with Henriette. Explaining his love, Casanova writes: “They who believe that a woman is incapable of making a man equally happy all the twenty-four hours of a day have never known an Henriette. The joy which flooded my soul was far greater when I conversed with her during the day than when I held her in my arms during the night.” That he was fully capable of appreciating her was likely the reason Henriette returned Casanova’s love. After marriage into an abusive and maybe dimwitted family, this gallant and, in the broadest sense, sympathetic man must have not only taken her heart but also healed it.

The Duchy of Parma was not the place for an aristocratic French woman to remain anonymous. Through the confusing shuffle of duchies, principalities, and kingdoms that takes up a lot of European history, Parma becomes the domain of the second son of the Bourbon King Philip V of Spain and his wife, Louise Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of Louis XV. When the royal couple visit, a friend of the Infante Duke Philip recognizes Henriette. There follows a lengthy negotiation where the man who can expose her promises protection if she returns. Henriette fears “violent proceedings” if she doesn’t comply but has full confidence this man can guarantee her safety. 

She travels by coach to Geneva with Casanova, where they part. She tells Casanova she will never have another lover. She gives him 500 louis d’or as a parting gift—roughly equivalent to two hundred thousand dollars in today’s money. This does not in the least soften the blow of their parting.

Casanova is upstaged in his memoirs by Henriette’s intelligence and her affectionate kindness towards all the people she encounters—the Hungarian captain, the professor who gives Italian lessons, the seamstress who makes her dress, and even the man who recognizes and threatens to expose her. I would call her attitude toward her situation both wise and valiant. She tells Casanova as they near the end of the affair: “But remember that inevitable circumstances may compel us to consider our separation our best course, and that then we must adapt in such a way that we may hope not to be unhappy. Trust in me. Be sure I shall find a way to assure myself of all the happiness that can be supposed possible, if I am reduced to the idea of living without you.” 

Thus, Henriette gracefully rises above her misfortune. In her final letter, she writes: “Let us imagine we have had a pleasant dream, and let us not complain of our destiny, for never was an agreeable dream so long. Let us boast of having succeeded in being happy for three months on end; there are few mortals who can say as much… Rest assured, my dear, that I have ordered my affairs that for the rest of my life I shall be as happy as I can without you.”

Despite this memorable last letter to Casanova, Henriette wasn’t immune to despair. In the room where they stayed, she scratched into the glass with a small diamond: “You will forget your Henriette too.”

Casanova’s response in his memoirs is, “No. I have not forgotten her, and it is balm to my soul every time I remember her.” 

Fifteen years later, Casanova encounters Henriette but does not speak to her as she had requested before they parted. Six more years pass when he sees her once more but doesn’t recognize her.