“And King Louis,[[250]] who is to-day king of France, being told soon after his accession that then was the time to punish his enemies who had so grievously wronged him while he was Duke of Orleans, replied that it was not seemly for the King of France to avenge the wrongs of the Duke of Orleans.
66.—“Taunts are also often humourously uttered with a grave air and without exciting laughter. As when Djem Othman,[[251]] brother to the Grand Turk,[[252]] being a captive at Rome, said that jousting as we practise it in Italy seemed to him too great a matter for play and too paltry for earnest. And on being told how agile and active King Ferdinand the Younger was in running, leaping, vaulting, and the like,—he said that in his country slaves practised these exercises, while gentlemen studied the liberal arts from boyhood, and prided themselves thereon.
“Almost of the same kind, too, but somewhat more laughable, was what the Archbishop of Florence said to the Alexandrian cardinal:[[253]] that men have only their goods, their body, and their soul; their goods are put in peril by the lawyers, their body by the physicians, and their soul by the theologians.”
Then the Magnifico Giuliano replied:
“To this you might add what Nicoletto[[254]] said: that we seldom find a lawyer who goes to law, a physician who takes physic, or a theologian who is a good Christian.”
67.—Messer Bernardo laughed, then went on:
“Of these there are countless instances, uttered by great lords and very weighty men. But we often laugh at similes also, such as the one that our friend Pistoia[[255]] wrote to Serafino: ‘Send back the wallet that looks like you;’ because, if you remember rightly, Serafino looked very like a wallet.
“Moreover there are some who delight to liken men and women to horses, dogs, birds, and often to chests, stools, carts, candle-sticks; which is sometimes good and sometimes very flat. Therefore in this it is needful to consider time, place, persons, and the other things that we have mentioned so many times.”
Then my lord Gaspar Pallavicino said:
“An amusing comparison was the one that our friend my lord Giovanni Gonzaga[[256]] made between Alexander the Great and his own son Alessandro.”[[257]]