[43] Mettigli l'ale, è un angiolel di amore.—Perticari.
[44] The wherefore.
[45] Ahasuerus is said to be a Jew, who, while Christ was ascending Golgotha, denied Him water to quench his thirst, and would not let him rest beneath the shadow of his house; he was therefore condemned to wander, for ever cursed and despised. This legend, very common in Germany, is only a fable, as any one may see. Edgar Quinet composed a drama on this subject, the personages represented being sphinxes, winds, trophies of arms, ruins, rivers, and even the ocean. It cannot be denied, however, that among so many and so strange fancies, this drama contains some noble passages of splendid poetry.
[46] Achille della Volta stabbed severely the satirical poet Pietro Aretino in Rome, and on this account his arm was lame daring his lifetime. Tintoretto, the painter, hearing that Aretino spoke very badly of him, meeting him one day near his studio, invited him very courteously to walk in, and look at his pictures. Aretino went, and Tintoretto, after bolting the door, without saying a word went to a closet and took out a cutlass, and advanced with threatening aspect towards Aretino. "Alas! Tonio," exclaimed Pietro, trembling, "what do you mean to do? Do not allow yourself to be tempted by the devil! Would you kill me without sacrament, like a dog?" Tintoretto quietly approached him, who was trembling from head to foot, and measured him with the cutlass, and seeing he was almost ready to die with fright, said: "Fear not, Sir Pietro; for taking a fancy to paint your portrait, I wanted to measure you: you can go now; you are exactly three cutlasses and a half high!" and opening the door he dismissed him. Aretino always spoke well of Tintoretto after that. Aretino having been very intimate with John dei Medici of the black-bands, continued his attachment to the Grand Duke Cosimo his son, from whom he received many presents, as shown by his letters; therefore, adverse to Piero Strozzi at the time of the war with Siena, he wrote a humorous sonnet upon him, which began thus:
E, Piero Strozzi arma virumque cano, etc.
Piero, after that, warned him to carry the extreme unction in his pocket, for he would cause him to be murdered even were he in his own bed. Aretino, frightened, dared not go out of his house for a year or more. I cannot conclude this note without recording the epitaphs or epigrams, in the true meaning of the word (since the ancients meant by epigrams those funeral inscriptions, full of contumelies, written for men yet living), which Paolo Giovio and Pietro Aretino exchanged.
Giovio said:
Qui giace l'Aretin, poeta Tosco:
Di tutti disse mal, fuorchè di Cristo,
Scusandosi col dir: non lo conosco.