The Book of the Courtier
friend of ours who never suffers us to be without them.”
55.—Then the Magnifico Giuliano said:
“Be that as it may, it cannot be more excellent or more ingenious than
one which a fellow-Tuscan of ours, a merchant of Lucca, affirmed the
other day as a positive fact.”
“Tell it to us,” added my lady Duchess.
The Magnifico Giuliano replied, laughing:
“This merchant, so he tells the story, once finding himself in Poland,
decided to buy a quantity of sables with the intention of carrying them
into Italy and making great profit thereby. And after much effort, being
unable to enter Muscovy himself (by reason of the war that was then
waging between the King of Poland and the Duke of Muscovy), he arranged
with the help of some people of the country, that on an appointed day
certain Muscovite merchants should come with their sables to the
frontier of Poland, and he promised to be there in order to strike the
bargain. Accordingly, proceeding with his companions towards Muscovy,
the man of Lucca reached the Dnieper, which he found all frozen as hard
as marble, and saw that the Muscovites (who on account of the war were
themselves suspicious of the Poles) were already on the other bank, but
approached no nearer than the width of the river. So, having recognized
each other, the Muscovites after some signalling began to speak with a
loud voice, and to ask the price that they wished for their sables; but
such was the extreme cold that they were not heard, for before reaching
the other bank (where the man of Lucca and his interpreters were) the
words froze in the air, and remained there frozen and caught in such
manner that the Poles, who knew the custom, set about making a great
fire in the very middle of the river; because to their thinking that was
the limit reached by the warm voice before it was stopped by freezing,
and the river was quite solid enough to bear the fire easily. So, when
this was done, the words (which had remained frozen for the space of an
hour) in due course began to melt and to fall in a murmur, like snow
from the mountains in May; and thus they were at once heard very well,
although the men had already gone. But as the merchant thought that the
words asked too high a price for the sables, he would not accept the
offer and so returned without them.”[210]
56.—Thereupon everyone laughed, and messer Bernardo said:
“Of a truth the story I wish to tell you is not so ingenious; however it
is a fine one, and runs as follows:
“Speaking a few days since of the country or World recently discovered
by the Portuguese mariners,[211] and of the various animals and other
things which they bring back to Portugal, that friend of whom I told you
affirmed that he had seen a monkey of a form very different from those
we are accustomed to see, which played chess most admirably. And among
other occasions, the gentleman who had brought her, being one day before
the King of Portugal[212] and engaged in a game of chess with her, the
monkey made several moves so skilfully as to press him hard and at last
checkmated him. Being vexed, as all are wont to be who lose at that
game, the gentleman took up the king-piece (which was very large, such
as the Portuguese use) and gave the monkey a smart blow upon the head;
whereupon she leaped aside crying loudly, and seemed to ask justice of
the king for the wrong that had been done her. Then the gentleman
invited her to play again; and after refusing awhile by means of signs,
she finally began to play once more, and, as she had done the first
time, she again had the better of him. At last, seeing that she would be
able to checkmate the gentleman, the monkey tried a new trick to guard
against being struck again; and without showing what she was at, she
quietly put her right paw under the gentleman’s left elbow, which was
luxuriously resting on a taffety[213] cushion, and (quickly snatching
the cushion) with her left paw she at the same time checkmated him with
a pawn, while with her right she held the cushion over her head as a
shield against his blows; she then leaped joyfully to the king as if to
parade her victory. Now you see how wise, wary and discreet the monkey
was.”
Then messer Cesare Gonzaga said:
“It must be that this was a doctor among monkeys, and of great
authority; and I think that the Republic of Indian Monkeys sent her to
Portugal to make a name in a foreign land.”
Thereupon everyone laughed, both at the story and at the addition given
to it by messer Cesare.
57.—So, continuing the discussion, messer Bernardo said:
“You have now heard what occurs to me concerning those pleasantries that
render the effect of a thing by continuous talk; therefore it is now
well to speak of those that consist in a single saying and have a quick
keenness compressed into a phrase or word. And just as in the first
kind,—that of humourous talk,—we must in our narrative and mimicry avoid
resembling buffoons and parasites and those who make others laugh by
their sheer absurdities, so in these short sayings the Courtier must
take care not to appear malicious and spiteful, and not to utter
witticisms and _arguzie_ solely to annoy and cut to the quick; because
for the sin of their tongue such men often suffer in all their members.
58.—“Now of the ready pleasantries that are contained in a short saying,
those are keenest that arise from ambiguity. Yet they do not always move
to laughter, for they are oftener applauded as ingenious than as comic.
As was said a few days since by our friend messer Annibal Paleotto[214]
to someone who was recommending a tutor to teach his sons grammar, and
who, after praising the tutor as very learned, said that by way of
stipend the man desired not only money but a room furnished for living
and sleeping, because he had no _letto_ (bed): whereupon messer Annibal
at once replied: ‘And how can he be learned if he has not _letto_
(read)?’ You see how well he played upon the double meaning of the
phrase, _non aver letto_ [to have no bed, or, not to have read].
“But while this punning witticism has much sharpness, where a man takes
words in a sense different from that in which everyone else takes them,
it seems (as I have said) to excite wonderment rather than laughter,
except when it is combined with some other kind of saying.
“Now that kind of witticism which is most used to excite laughter, is
when we are prepared to hear one thing and the speaker says another, and
it is called ‘the unexpected.’ And if punning be combined with this, the
witticism becomes most spicy: as the other day, when there was a
discussion about making a fine brick floor (_un bel mattonato_) for my
lady Duchess’s closet, after much talk you, Giancristoforo, said: ‘If we
could fetch the Bishop of Potenza[215] and flatten him out well, it
would be the very thing, for he is the craziest creature born (_il più
bel matto nato_).’ Everyone laughed heartily, for by dividing the word
_matto-nato_ you made the pun. Moreover saying that it would be well to
flatten out a bishop and lay him in the floor of a room, was unexpected
to the listener; and so the sally was very keen and laughable.
59.—“But of punning witticisms there are many kinds; therefore we must
be careful and play very lightly with our words, and avoid those that
make the sally flat or that seem forced; and also those (as we have
said) that are too biting. As where several companions found themselves
at the house of one of their friends who was blind of one eye, and the
blind man bade the company stay to dinner, all took their leave save
one, who said: ‘I will stay with you because I see you have a vacant
place for one;’ and at the same time he pointed with his finger to the
empty socket. You see this is too bitter and rude, for it wounded
without cause, and the speaker had not first been stung himself.
Moreover he said that which might be said of all blind men; and such
universal things give no pleasure, because it seems possible that they
may have been thought out beforehand. And of this kind was that gibe at
a man without nose: ‘And where do you hang your spectacles?’[216] or
‘With what do you smell the roses in their season?’
60.—“But among other witticisms those have very good grace that are made
by taking the very words and sense from another man’s taunt and turning
them against him and striking him with his own weapons; as where a
litigant—whose adversary had said to him in the judge’s presence: ‘Why
do you bark so?’—at once replied: ‘Because I see a thief.’
“And another instance of this was when Galeotto da Narni,[217] on his
way through Siena, stopped in the street to ask for the inn; and a
Sienese, seeing how fat he was, said, laughing: ‘Other men carry their
wallets behind, but this one carries his in front.’ Galeotto at once
replied: ‘That is the way we do in a land of thieves.’
61.—“There is still another kind, which we call playing on words,[218]
and this consists in changing a word by either adding or omitting a
letter or a syllable; as when someone said: ‘You are better versed in
the Lat_r_in tongue than in the Greek.’ And you, my Lady, had a letter
addressed to you, ‘To my lady Emilia _Im_pia.’[219]
“Moreover it is a pleasant thing to quote a verse or two, applying it to
a purpose different from that which the author intends, or some other
familiar saw; sometimes to the same purpose, but changing some word. As
when a gentleman, who had an ugly and disagreeable wife, was asked how
he was, he replied: ‘Judge yourself of my state, when _Furiarum maxima
juxta me cubat_.’[220] And messer Geronimo Donato,[221] while going the
rounds of the _Stazioni_[222] at Rome in Lent with several other
gentlemen, met a bevy of beautiful Roman ladies; and one of the
gentlemen saying: ‘_Quot coelum stellas, tot habet tua Roma
puellas_,’[223] he at once replied: _Pascua quotque haedos, tot habet
tua Roma cinaedos_,[224] pointing to a company of young men who were
coming from the other direction.
Enlarged from a cast, kindly furnished by M. Pierre Valton, of an
anonymous medal in his collection at Paris. See Armand’s _Les
Médailleurs Italiens_, ii, 35, no. 25.
“In like fashion messer Marcantonio della Torre[225] addressed the
Bishop of Padua. There being a nunnery at Padua in charge of a friar
reputed to be of very pure life and learned as well, it came to pass
that, as the friar frequented the convent familiarly and often confessed
the nuns, five of them (more than half of all there were) became
pregnant; and the affair being discovered, the friar wished to flee but
knew not how. The bishop had him taken into custody, and he soon
confessed that he had brought the five nuns to this pass, being tempted
of the devil; wherefore the bishop was firmly resolved to punish him
roundly. But as the man was learned, he had many friends who all tried
to help him, and along with the rest messer Marcantonio went to the
bishop to implore some measure of pardon for him. The bishop would in no
wise listen to them; and after they had pleaded hard, and recommended
the culprit, and urged in excuse the opportunities of his position, the
frailty of human nature, and many other things,—at last the bishop said:
‘I will do nothing for him, because I shall have to render God an
account of the matter.’ And when they repeated their arguments, the
bishop said: ‘What answer shall I make to God on the Day of Judgment,
when he says to me, _Give an account of thy stewardship_?’[226] Then
messer Marcantonio at once said: ‘My Lord, say that which the Evangelist
says: _Lord, thou deliveredst unto me five talents: behold I have gained
besides them five talents more_.’[227] Whereupon the bishop could not