"We read Byron's letters there [in Venice] together. Then we were going up in the world, having the bloody government pay for our holidays. . . Venice revived him [Byron]. It restored him," Michael insisted. "Venice is the happiest place on the planet, in my opinion. That's why I can't stand the Thomas Mann business." I laughed. "A damn travesty," Michael asserted. "Venice is not like that at all. Stendhal's got all that in--how and why it was the best place in that time ... He was staying with his wonderful woman--whatever she is called--at the time that Napoleon escaped from Elba. He had just established his relations with the woman,and nothing was going to break that. Not even Napoleon. He [Stendhal] stayed there throughout the whole of the one hundred days."