The Book of the Courtier
imagined that he was pretending, and they often turned to each other
with an air of surprise, and said: ‘Listen to this prodigy, how well he
counterfeits the language!’ In short, the conversation lasted so long
that everyone’s sides ached from laughing; and he himself could not help
giving so many tokens of his gentility that even these ladies were at
last convinced, albeit with great difficulty, that he was what he was.
86.—“We meet practical jokes of this kind every day; but among the rest
those are amusing which at first excite alarm and turn out well in the
end; for even the victim laughs at himself when he sees that his fears
were groundless.
“For instance, I was staying at Paglia[309] one night, and in the same
inn where I was there happened to be three companions besides myself
(two from Pistoia and the other from Prato), who sat down to play after
supper, as men often do. They had not been playing long before one of
the two Pistoians lost all he had and was left without a farthing, so
that he began to lament and to curse and swear roundly; and he retired
to sleep blaspheming thus. After gaming awhile, the other two resolved
to play a trick upon the one who had gone to bed. So, making sure that
he was really asleep, they put out all the lights and covered the fire;
then they began to talk loud and to make as much noise as they could,
pretending to quarrel over their play, and one of them said: ‘You’ve
drawn the under card;’ and the other denied it, saying: ‘And you have
wagered on four of a suit; let us deal again;’[310] and the like, with
such an uproar that the sleeper awoke. And perceiving that his friends
were playing and talking as if they saw the cards, he rubbed his eyes a
little, and seeing no light in the room, he said: ‘What the devil do you
mean by shouting all night?’ Then he lay back again as if to go to
sleep.
“His two friends made no reply, but went on as before; whereat the man
began to wonder (now that he was more awake) and seeing that there was
really no fire or glimmer of any kind, and that still his friends were
playing and quarrelling, he said: ‘And how can you see the cards without
light?’ One of the two replied: ‘You must have lost your sight along
with your money; don’t you see with these two candles we have here?’ The
man who was abed lifted himself upon his arms, and said rather angrily:
‘Either I am drunk or blind, or you are lying.’ The two got up and
groped their way to the bed, laughing and pretending to think that he
was making sport of them; and still he answered: ‘I say I do not see
you.’ Finally the two began to feign great surprise, and one said to the
other: ‘Alas, methinks he speaks the truth. Hand me that candle, and let
us see if perchance there is something wrong with his sight.’ Then the
poor fellow took it for certain that he had become blind, and weeping
bitterly he said: ‘Oh my brothers, I am blind;’ and he at once began to
call on Our Lady of Loreto, and to implore her to pardon the blasphemies
and maledictions that he had heaped upon her for the loss of his money.
His two companions kept comforting him, and said: ‘It can’t be that you
do not see us; ’tis some fancy you’ve got into your head.’ ‘Alas,’
replied the other, ‘this is no fancy, for I see no more than as if I had
never had any eyes in my head.’ ‘Yet your sight is clear,’ replied the
two, and one said to the other: ‘See how well he opens his eyes! And how
bright they are! Who could believe that he doesn’t see?’ The unhappy man
wept more loudly all the while, and begged mercy of God.
“At last they said to him: ‘Make a vow to go in penance to Our Lady of
Loreto,[311] barefoot and naked, for this is the best remedy that can be
found; and meanwhile we will go to Acquapendente[312] and those other
places hard by to see some doctor, nor will we fail to do everything we
can for you.’ Then the poor fellow quickly knelt by his bed, and with
endless tears and bitter penitence for his blasphemy he made a solemn
vow to go naked to Our Lady of Loreto, and to offer her a pair of silver
eyes, and to eat no flesh on Wednesday or eggs on Friday, and to fast on
bread and water every Saturday in honour of Our Lady, if she would grant
him the mercy of restoring his sight. His two companions went into
another room, struck a light, and laughing their very loudest, came back
to the unhappy man, who was relieved of his great anguish, as you may
imagine, but was so stunned by the terror that he had passed through,
that he could neither laugh nor even speak; and his two companions did
nothing but tease him, saying that he must fulfil all his vows, because
he had obtained the mercy which he sought.
87.—“Of the other kind of practical joke, where a man deceives himself,
I shall give no other example than the one that was played on me not
very long ago.
“During the last carnival, my friend Monsignor of San Pietro ad
Vincula[313] (who knows how fond I am of playing tricks on the friars
when I am masked, and who had carefully arranged beforehand what he
meant to do) came one day with Monsignor of Aragon[314] and a few other
cardinals, to certain windows in the _Banchi_,[315] ostensibly for the
purpose of seeing the maskers pass, as the custom is at Rome. I came
along in my mask, and seeing a friar (somewhat apart) who had a little
air of hesitation, I thought I had found my chance and rushed upon him
like a hungry falcon on its prey. And first having asked him who he was
and received his answer, I pretended to know him, and with many words
began to make him think that the chief constable was out in search of
him (because of certain evil reports that had been received against
him), and to urge him to go with me to the Chancery,[316] where I would
put him in safety. Frightened and trembling from head to foot, the friar
seemed not to know what to do and said he feared being taken if he went
far from San Celso.[317] I said so much to encourage him, however, that
he mounted my crupper; and then I thought I had fully succeeded in my
scheme. So I at once began to make for the _Banchi_, my horse frisking
and kicking the while. Now imagine what a fine sight a friar made on a
masker’s crupper, with cloak flying and head tossed to and fro, and
looking all the time as if he were about to fall.
“At this fine spectacle those gentlemen began to throw eggs on us from
the windows, as did all the _Banchi_ people and everyone who was
there,—so that hail never fell from heaven with greater violence than
from those windows fell the eggs, most of which came on me. Being masked
as I was, I did not care and thought that all the laughter was for the
friar and not for me; and so I went up and down the _Banchi_ several
times with this fury always at my back, although the friar with tears in
his eyes begged me to let him dismount and not to shame his cloth in
this way. Then the knave had eggs given him on the sly by some lackeys
stationed there for the purpose, and pretending to hold me fast to keep
from falling, he broke them over my breast, often over my head, and
sometimes on my very brow, until I was completely bedaubed. Finally,
when everyone was weary both of laughing and of throwing eggs, he jumped
off my crupper, and pushing back his cowl showed me his long hair, and
said: ‘Messer Bernardo, I am one of the grooms at San Pietro ad Vincula,
and it is I who take care of your little mule.’
“I know not which was then greatest, my grief, my anger, or my shame.
However, as the least of evils, I set out fast for home, and dared not
make an appearance the next morning; but the laughter raised by this
trick lasted not only the next day, but nearly until now.”
88.—And so, after they had again laughed awhile at the story, messer
Bernardo continued:
“There is another very amusing kind of practical joke, which gives
opportunity for pleasantry as well, when we pretend to think that a man
wishes to do something which in fact he does not wish to do. For
instance, one evening after supper, when I was on the bridge at Lyons
and jesting with Cesare Beccadello[318] as we walked along, we began to
seize each other by the arm as if we were bent on wrestling, for by
chance no one else appeared on the bridge at the time. While we were
standing thus, two Frenchmen came up, and on seeing our dispute they
asked what the matter was, and stopped to try to separate us, thinking
that we were quarrelling in earnest. Then I said quickly: ‘Help me,
Sirs, for this poor gentleman loses his reason at certain changes of the
moon, and you see he is now trying to throw himself off the bridge into
the water.’ Thereupon these two men ran, and with my aid seized Cesare
and held him very tight; and he, telling me all the while that I was
mad, tried harder to free himself from their hands, and they held him
all the tighter. Thus the passers-by gathered to look at the
disturbance, and everyone ran up. And the more poor Cesare struck out
with his hands and feet (for he was now beginning to grow angry), the
more people arrived; and from the great effort that he made, they fully
believed he was trying to jump into the river, and on that account held
him the tighter. So that a great crowd of men carried him bodily to the
inn, all dishevelled, capless, pale with anger and shame; for nothing he
said availed him, partly because the Frenchmen did not understand him,
and also partly because, as I walked along leading them to the inn, I
kept lamenting the poor man’s misfortune in being thus stricken mad.
89.—“Now, as we have said, it would be possible to talk at length about
practical jokes; but suffice it to repeat that the occasions which give
opportunity for them are the same as in the case of pleasantries.
Moreover we have an infinity of examples because we see them every day.
Among others there are many amusing ones in the _Novelle_ of Boccaccio,
like those which Bruno and Buffalmacco played upon their friend
Calandrino and upon master Simone,[319] and many others played by women,
that are truly clever and fine.
“I remember having known in my time many other amusing men of this sort,
and among others a certain Sicilian student at Padua, called
Ponzio;[320] who once saw a peasant with a pair of fat capons. And
pretending that he wished to buy them, he struck a bargain, and told the
fellow to come home with him and get some breakfast besides the price
agreed on. So he led the peasant to a place where there was a bell-tower
standing apart from its church[321] so that one could walk around it;
and just opposite one of the four sides of the tower was the end of a
little lane. Here Ponzio, who had already settled what he meant to do,
said to the peasant: ‘I have wagered these capons with one of my
friends, who says that this tower measures quite forty feet around,
while I say it does not. And just before I found you, I had bought this
twine to measure it. Now, before we go home I wish to find out which of
the two has won.’ And so saying, he drew the twine from his sleeve, gave
one end of it to the peasant, and said: ‘Hand them here.’ Thereupon he
took the capons, and holding the other end of the twine as if he were
going to measure, he started to walk around the tower, first making the
peasant stay and hold the twine against that side of it which was
farthest from the one that looked up the little lane. When he reached
this other side, he stuck a nail into the wall, tied the twine to it,
and leaving the man there he quietly went off with the capons up the
little lane. The peasant stood still a long time waiting for Ponzio to
finish the measurement; at last,—after he had several times said: ‘What
are you doing there so long?’—he went to look, and found that it was not
Ponzio who was holding the twine, but a nail stuck in the wall, and that