"More plenty than the fabled horn
Thrice emptied could pour forth at banqueting."
--KEATS, _The Earlier Version of_ "_Hyperion_."
"Prosperity is often our worst enemy, making us vicious, frivolous,
and insolent, so that to bear it well is a better test of a man than
to endure adversity."--GICCIARDINI, _Maxims_, No. 64.
I did not know when I first read and translated the following story,
which was obtained for me and written out by Maddalena, that it had any
reference to the celebrated historian and moralist, Guicciardini. How I
did so forms the subject of a somewhat singular little incident, which I
will subsequently relate.