“To whom do you allude?” interrupted Charney, expecting that the superstitious Ludovico would attribute his recovery to the interposition of some favourite saint. “Who has deigned to become my protector?”
“Say protectress, and you will be nearer the mark,” cried Ludovico.
“The Madonna—eh?” demanded Charney, with an ironical smile.
“Neither saint nor Madonna!” replied the jailer, stoutly. “She who has preserved you from the jaws of death and the claws of Satan (for dying without confession you were damned as well as dead), is no other than my pretty little god-daughter.”
“Your god-daughter!” said the Count, lending a more attentive ear to his rhapsodies.
“Ay, Eccellenza, my god-daughter, Picciola, Picciolina, Piccioletta. Was not I the first to baptize your favourite? Did I not give her the name of Picciola? Have you not often told me so yourself? Ergo—the plant is my god-daughter, and I her godfather—per Bacco! I’m growing proud of the distinction!”
“Picciola!” exclaimed Charney, starting up, and resting his elbow on his pillow, while an expression of the deepest interest took possession of his countenance. “Explain yourself, my good Ludovico, explain yourself!”
“Come, come, no shamming stupid, my dear lord!” said the jailer, resuming the customary wink of the eye, “as if ’twas the first time that she had saved your life!”
“The first time?”
“Didn’t you tell me yourself that the herb was the only specific against the disorder to which you were subject? Lucky job I hadn’t forgotten it; for the Signora Picciola proves to have more wisdom in one of her leaves, than the whole faculty of Montpellier in the noddles that fill its trencher-caps. Trondidio, my little god-daughter is able to defeat a regiment of doctors! ay, in full complements—four battalions, and four hundred picked men to each. Pray, did not your three humbugs in black throw back the coverlid on your nose, and pronounce you to be a dead man? while Picciola, the stout-hearted little weed (God send her seed in her harvest!), brought you round in the saying of a paternoster? ’Tis a recipe I mean to keep like the apple of my eye; and if ever poor little Antonio should fall sick, he shall drink broths of the herb, and eat salads of it; though, good truth, ’tis as bitter as wormwood. A single cup of the infusion, and all acted like a charm. Vittoria! Viva l’illustrissima Signorina Picciola!”