II

Corbolo descended by steep stairs from the piazza to a cool arched cellar set with wine casks, of which the master was a German named Tibaldo. The shoemaker greeted the company, and sitting down by his friend Scarabullo the tinman, ordered a flask of wine and hot pastry flavoured with thyme; then he drank a long slow draught, filled his mouth, and said:

'Scarabullo, if you desire wisdom, take unto yourself no wife.'

'Why not?' demanded Scarabullo.

'Because, friend, to marry is to thrust your hand into a bag of serpents in order to draw out an eel. Better have the gout than a wedded wife, Scarabullo.'

At the table beside them, surrounded by a hungry and credulous crowd, Mascarello, the jolly goldsmith, was singing the praises of a fabulous land, where the vines are hung with sausages, and a goose and a gosling together cost a single penny; where there are mountains of cheese ready grated, and gnocchi and macaroni are cooked in the fat of capons and thrown to him who asketh; and vernaccia, the best white wine, into which enters not one drop of water, springs from the soil in a natural fountain. A little man named Gorgoglio, a glass-blower, at this moment came running into the tavern: by reason of the king's evil, his eyes were half-shut, like those of a new-born puppy. He was bibulous and a great lover of talk.

'Sirs, sirs!' he cried, raising his hat and wiping his streaming face, 'I have seen the Frenchmen!'

'Gorgoglio, you dream. 'Tis impossible they be here yet.'

'I' faith, they be here; they are at Pavia. Let me but breathe! 'Tis not weather for running, and I have run the whole course to be first with the news.'

'Take my bottle. Drink and recount: of what sort be these French?'

'A bad sort, friends; a very bad sort. Heaven defend us from them! trust not your fingers in their mouths, friends. Choleric, savage infidels, like ferocious brutes; in a word, barbarians. They carry arquebuses eight braccia long, partisans of brass, iron bombards which belch stones; their horses are sea-monsters, shaggy, with docked ears and tails.'

'Be they many?'

'Ay, a crowd; they beset the plain as locusts; you can see no end to them. The Lord hath sent them for the chastisement of our sins, this Black Death, these northern devils.'

'But why, Gorgoglio, speak thus ill of them?' asked Mascarello; 'they come as our friends—our allies.'

'Allies! Hold your peace. Look after your pockets, say I, for that kind of ally is worse than an enemy. He'll buy the horn and steal the bullock.'

'Rave not, Gorgoglio. Expound simply why you hold these French inimical.'

'Because they trample down our crops; because they fell our trees, carry off our beasts, ravish our women. Their king is a baboon; no soul behind his teeth; but he is a great lover of women. He carries a book, pictures of our handsomest women. And they say that, God helping them, they will not leave a maid between Milan and Naples.'

'The villains!' cried Scarabullo, thumping with his fist so that the glasses rang.

'And our Moro,' continued Gorgoglio, 'dances on his hind legs to the sound of the French pipe. And they don't count us to be men, neither. "You," they say, making their grimaces, "you are all thieves and assassins. You have poisoned your rightful duke, you have murdered an innocent boy. For this God punishes you and gives us your land." And we, friends, are receiving them into our arms and feeding them!'

'These be old wives' tales, Gorgoglio.'

'Blind me, cut out my tongue if I speak not the truth! Nor have I told all. Hearken, signori miei, to what they have the audacity to say. They say "We are destined to overcome all the peoples of Italy, to subdue all the seas and the nations of the sea, to destroy the grand Turk, and plant the true cross on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem; then we will come back to you, and we will execute on you the fury of God. And if you submit not yourselves, your name shall be wiped off from the face of the earth." That's what they say!'

''Tis ill news,' sighed Mascarello the goldsmith. 'Unheard-of news!'

The rest were silent.

Then Fra Timotea, the lean Domenican, who had been disputing in the cathedral with Fra Cipolla about the saints in glory, raised his hands to heaven and said solemnly:—

'Such were the words of Fra Girolamo Savonarola, that great prophet of the Lord. "Behold," said he, "the man cometh who is destined to conquer Italy without drawing the sword from the scabbard. O Florence! O Rome! O Milan! Past is the hour of feasting and of song! Repent ye, repent! The blood of Gian Galeazzo, the blood of Abel which was spilt by Cain, crieth for vengeance before the throne of God."'