I SHALL be obliged to digress a little from the history of my art,
unless I were to omit some annoying incidents which have happened in the
course of my troubled career. One of these, which I am about to
describe, brought me into the greatest risk of my life. I have already
told the story of the artists’ club, and of the farcical adventures
which happened owing to the woman whom I mentioned, Pantasilea, the one
who felt for me that false and fulsome love. She was furiously enraged
because of the pleasant trick by which I brought Diego to our banquet,
and she swore to be revenged on me. How she did so is mixed up with the
history of a young man called Luigi Pulci, who had recently come to
Rome. He was the son of one of the Pulcis, who had been beheaded for
incest with his daughter; and the youth possessed extraordinary gifts
for poetry together with sound Latin scholarship; he wrote well, was
graceful in manners, and of surprising personal beauty; he had just left
the service of some bishop, whose name I do not remember, and was
thoroughly tainted with a very foul disease. While he was yet a lad and
living in Florence, they used in certain places of the city to meet
together during the nights of summer on the public streets; and he,
ranking among the best of the improvisatori, sang there. His recitations
were so admirable, that the divine Michel Agnolo Buonarroti, that prince
of sculptors and of painters, went, wherever he heard that he would be,
with the greatest eagerness and delight to listen to him. There was a
man called Piloto, a goldsmith, very able in his art, who, together with
myself, joined Buonarroti upon these occasions. [1] Thus acquaintance
sprang up between me and Luigi Pulci; and so, after the lapse of many
years, he came, in the miserable plight which I have mentioned, to make
himself known to me again in Rome, beseeching me for God’s sake to help
him. Moved to compassion by his great talents, by the love of my
fatherland, and by my own natural tenderness of heart, I took him into
my house, and had him medically treated in such wise that, being but a
youth, he soon regained his health. While he was still pursuing his
cure, he never omitted his studies, and I provided him with books
according to the means at my disposal. The result was that Luigi,
recognising the great benefits he had received from me, oftentimes with
words and tears returned me thanks, protesting that if God should ever
put good fortune in his way, he would recompense me for my kindness. To
this I replied that I had not done for him as much as I desired, but
only what I could, and that it was the duty of human beings to be
mutually serviceable. Only I suggested that he should repay the service
I had rendered him by doing likewise to some one who might have the same
need of him as he had had of me.
The young man in question began to frequent the Court of Rome, where he
soon found a situation, and enrolled himself in the suite of a bishop, a
man of eighty years, who bore the title of Gurgensis. [2] This bishop
had a nephew called Messer Giovanni: he was a nobleman of Venice; and
the said Messer Giovanni made show of marvellous attachment to Luigi
Pulci’s talents; and under the pretence of these talents, he brought him
as familiar to himself as his own flesh blood. Luigi having talked of
me, and of his great obligations to me, with Messer Giovanni, the latter
expressed a wish to make my acquaintance. Thus then it came to pass,
that when I had upon a certain evening invited that woman Pantasilea to
supper, and had assembled a company of men of parts who were my friends,
just at the moment of our sitting down to table, Messer Giovanni and
Luigi Pulci arrived, and after some complimentary speeches, they both
remained to sup with us. The shameless strumpet, casting her eyes upon
the young man’s beauty, began at once to lay her nets for him;
perceiving which, when the supper had come to an agreeable end, I took
Luigi aside, and conjured him, by the benefits he said he owed me, to
have nothing whatever to do with her. To this he answered: “Good
heavens, Benvenuto! do you then take me for a madman?” I rejoined: “Not
for a madman, but for a young fellow;” and I swore to him by God: “I do
not give that woman the least thought; but for your sake I should be
sorry if through her you come to break your neck.” Upon these words he
vowed and prayed to God, that, if ever he but spoke with her, he might
upon the moment break his neck. I think the poor lad swore this oath to
God with all his heart, for he did break his neck, as I shall presently
relate. Messer Giovanni showed signs too evident of loving him in a
dishonourable way; for we began to notice that Luigi had new suits of
silk and velvet every morning, and it was known that he abandoned
himself altogether to bad courses. He neglected his fine talents, and
pretended not to see or recognise me, because I had once rebuked him,
and told him he was giving his soul to foul vices, which would make him
break his neck, as he had vowed.
Note 1. Piloto, of whom we shall hear more hereafter, was a prominent
figure in the Florentine society of artists, and a celebrated practical
joker. Vasari says that a young man of whom he had spoken ill murdered
him. Lasca’s Novelle, 'Le Cene,' should be studied by those who seek an
insight into this curious Bohemia of the sixteenth century.
Note 2. Girolamo Balbo, of the noble Venetian family, Bishop of Gurck,
in Carinthia.