Tales From the Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio

by Giovanni Boccaccio

  When he had arrived at a ripe old age without ever wearying of dispensing his largesse, his reputation chanced to reach the ears of a young man called Mithridanes, who lived in that same part of the world, and who, feeling himself to be no less wealthy than Nathan, grew jealous of Nathan’s fame and excellence, and resolved, through a display of greater liberality, either to nullify or darken the old man’s name. And so, having built a palace similar to Nathan’s, he began to entertain all those who came and went on a more lavish scale than any ever previously known, and there is no doubt that within a short time he became very famous.

  Now one day, whilst the young man was sitting all alone in the main courtyard, a woman happened to enter the palace by one of the gates, ask him for alms, and be given them. She then returned by way of a second gate, approached him again, and was given a further sum of money. This happened twelve times in succession, and when she returned for the thirteenth time, Mithridanes said to her:

  ‘My good woman, you are very persistent with this begging of yours.’ But he gave her the alms just the same.

  On hearing what he had said, the old woman exclaimed:

  ‘Ah, how wonderful is the generosity of Nathan! For his palace has thirty-two gates, just like this one, and I passed through each of them in turn, asked him for alms, and obtained them every time, without his ever so much as hinting that he knew who I was. Yet here I have only to pass through thirteen before I am recognized and given a scolding.’ And so saying, she went away and never returned.

  Mithridanes took the old woman’s words about Nathan as a slight on his own reputation, and flying into a violent rage, he exclaimed:

  ‘Poor fool that I am! How can I ever hope to match Nathan’s generosity in greater things, let alone surpass him as I sought, when even in the most trivial affairs I cannot even approach him? All my efforts will be quite futile until he is removed from the face of the earth. He shows no sign of dying from old age, so I shall have to do the job with my own hands, and the sooner the better.’

  He then leapt angrily to his feet, and without revealing his intentions to a living soul, set out on horseback with a there handful of companions; and after the third day he came to the place where Nathan lived. Evening was now approaching, and having bidden his companions to pretend he was a total stranger to them, and find themselves somewhere to stay pending further instructions, he was left to his own devices. Not very far from Nathan’s fair palace he came across its owner, all alone and very plainly attired, taking a pleasant stroll in the cool of the evening; and not realizing who it was, he asked him whether he could direct him to Nathan’s house.

  ‘My son,’ Nathan gaily replied, ‘nobody in these parts could show you better than I how to get there. So if you have no objection, I’ll take you there myself.’

  The young man gladly accepted his offer, but told him that if possible he did not want Nathan to see him or to know that he was there.

  ‘Since you want it to be so,’ said Nathan, ‘I shall attend to that as well.’

  Mithridanes therefore dismounted, and, walking along with Nathan, who was very soon entertaining him with a stream of fine talk, he made his way to the beautiful palace.

  On reaching the palace, Nathan got one of his servants to take the young man’s horse, and, whispering into the servant’s ear, instructed him to pass the word immediately through the entire household that no one was to tell the young man that he himself was Nathan. And this command was carried out.

  Once they were inside the palace, he saw that Mithridanes was lodged in an exquisite room, to which no one was admitted except the servants he had deputed to wait upon him. And making the visitor feel completely at home there, Nathan himself kept him company.

  Thus they spent the evening together, and although Mithridanes treated Nathan with the deference of a son conversing with a father, he was unable to refrain from asking him who he was.

  ‘I am one of Nathan’s menial servants,’ replied Nathan, ‘and although I have been with him ever since my infancy, he has never raised me above my present station; so that, even if everyone else praises him to the skies, I myself have little to thank him for.’

  The old man’s words raised hopes in Mithridanes of being able to carry out his evil purpose more safely and discreetly, especially when Nathan went on to ask him very politely to tell him who he was and the nature of his business in that part of the world, offering him all the advice and assistance he could give.

  Mithridanes paused for somelittle time before replying, but eventually decided to take him into his confidence. After much beating about the bush he came to the point; and having sworn him to secrecy he requested his help and advice, revealing exactly who he was, why he was there, and what had prompted him to come.

  On hearing Mithridanes speak, and learning of his cruel resolve, Nathan was extremely perturbed. But he was not deficient in courage, and scarcely paused for a moment before replying, without batting an eyelid:

  ‘Your father was a man of excellent worth, Mithridanes, and you are clearly intent upon following his example by this lofty enterprise of yours, wherein you extend a generous hand to all who come to you. Moreover, I warmly commend your envy of Nathan, for if this form of jealousy were more widespread, the world, which is very miserly, would soon become a better place to live in. I shall certainly keep your intentions a secret, but rather than render you any great assistance, I can offer you some useful advice, which is this. Some half a mile from where we stand, you can see a copse where practically every morning Nathan goes for a long walk, entirely alone; it will be a simple matter for you to find him there and deal with him as you please. But if you kill him, and wish to make good your escape, you must leave the copse, not by the way you entered, but along the path you see over there to the left, for although it is a little more difficult, it will lead you home by a shorter and safer route.’

  Having imparted this information to Mithridanes, Nathan took his leave, and Mithridanes secretly sent word to his companions, who had likewise found lodging in the palace, about where they were to wait for him on the following day. Meanwhile Nathan had no misgivings about the advice he had offered, and when the next day came, not having changed his mind in the slightest, he set off alone for the copse to meet his doom.

  Mithridanes had no other weapons but a sword and a bow, and as soon as he had risen he girded them on, mounted his horse, and rode over to the copse, where from some distance away he espied the solitary figure of Nathan sauntering among the trees. He galloped towards him, but being resolved to see his face and hear him speak before attacking him, he seized him by the turban he was wearing and exclaimed:

  ‘Greybeard, your hour has come!’

  By way of answer, all that Nathan said was:

  ‘In that case I have only myself to blame.’

  On hearing his voice and observing his features, Mithridanes recognized him at once as the man who had been so hospitable and sociable towards him, and had given him such faithful advice; hence his fury immediately subsided and his anger gave way to a feeling of shame. And having thrown away his sword, which he had already drawn in readiness to strike, he dismounted from his horse and flung himself in tears at Nathan’s feet, saying:

  ‘How clearly, dearest father, do I perceive your liberality, seeing the ingenious way in which you have come to offer me the life which without any reason I was eager to take, as you discovered for yourself from my own lips. But God was more heedful than I of my obligations, and in this moment of supreme need He has opened my eyes, which vile envy had kept so tightly sealed. And because you have been so compliant towards my evil design, I am all the more conscious of the debt of penitence that I owe you. Avenge yourself upon me, therefore, in whatever way you think my crime deserves.’

  Having helped Mithridanes to his feet, Nathan kissed and embraced him affectionately and said:

  ‘My son, as to your evil design, as you call it, there is no need either to ask or to grant forgiveness, because
you pursued it, not out of hatred but in order to be better thought of. Fear me not, then, and rest assured that in view of the loftiness of your motives, no other living person loves you as greatly as I, for you do not devote your energies to the accumulation of riches, as misers do, but to spending what you have amassed. Nor should you feel ashamed for having wanted to kill me to acquire fame, or imagine that I marvel to hear it. In order to extend their dominions, and hence their fame, the mightiest emperors and greatest kings have practised virtually no other art than that of killing, not just one person as you intended, but countless thousands, setting whole provinces ablaze and razing whole cities to the ground. So that if, to enhance your personal fame, it was only me that you wanted to kill, there was nothing marvellous or novel about what you were doing, which on the contrary was very commonplace.’

  Without wishing to excuse himself, Mithridanes praised Nathan for presenting his wicked design in so seemly a light, and concluded by expressing his utter astonishment that Nathan had been prepared to supply him not only with the means but also with advice for achieving his object. Whereupon Nathan replied:

  ‘Mithridanes, neither my compliance nor my advice should astonish you, for ever since I became my own master, and began to pursue those same ideals by which you too are now inspired, I have always sought, so far as it lay within my power, to grant the desires of anyone crossing my threshold. You came here with the desire of taking my life, and when I heard what it was that you wanted, so that you would not be the only person ever to leave my house empty-handed, I forthwith resolved to present it to you: and with this purpose in mind, I gave you the advice I considered most apt for taking my life without losing your own. Therefore I repeat: if this is what you want, I implore you to take my life and do whatever you please with it, for I can think of no better way of bestowing it. I have had the use of it now these eighty years, during which it has brought me all the pleasures and joys I could desire; and I realize that, like all other men and nearly everything under the sun, I am subject to the laws of Nature, and have very little of it left. Hence I consider it far preferable to give it away now, just as I have always given away and spent my treasures, than to cling to it until such time as Nature deprives me of it against my will.

  ‘Even if one were to give away a hundred years, it would not amount to much of a gift; and surely it is a much more trivial matter to give away the six or eight years of my life that still remain to me. Take it then, if you want it, I do implore you; for during all the years I have lived here, I have never yet found anyone who wanted it, and if you do not take it, now that you have asked for it, I doubt whether I shall ever find anyone else. But even if I should happen to do so, I realize that the longer I keep it, the less valuable it becomes. Take it therefore, I beg you, before it loses its worth entirely.’

  ‘God forbid,’ said Mithridanes, feeling deeply ashamed, ‘that I should even contemplate taking so precious a thing as your life, as until just now I was thinking of doing, let alone that I should actually deprive you of it. Far from wanting to shorten its years, I would gladly augment them with some of my own, if such a thing were possible.’

  ‘Supposing it were,’ Nathan promptly replied, ‘would you really oblige me to accept them, and thus serve you as I have never served another living soul, by taking something of yours, when I have never before taken anything from anyone?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mithridanes, without a moment’s hesitation.

  ‘Then do as I suggest,’ said Nathan. ‘You remain here in my house, young as you are, and assume the name of Nathan, whilst I go to live in yours, and henceforth call myself Mithridanes.’

  To which Mithridanes replied:

  ‘If I were able to comport myself so impeccably as you do now, and as you have always done in the past, I should accept your offer without a second thought; but because I feel quite certain that my deeds would only diminish the fame of Nathan, and because I have no intention of impairing another’s name for that to which I cannot myself aspire, I am obliged to refuse it.’

  After conversing agreeably together on these and many other matters, they returned as Nathan wished to the palace, where for several days on end he entertained Mithridanes in sumptuous style, giving him every encouragement to persevere in his great and noble resolve. And when Mithridanes wanted to return home with his companions, Nathan let him go, having made it abundantly clear that his liberality could never be surpassed.

  FOURTH STORY

  Messer Gentile de’ Carisendi comes from Modena and takes from the tomb the lady he loves, who has been buried for dead. She revives and gives birth to a male child, and later Messer Gentile restores her and the child to Niccoluccio Caccianimico, the lady’s husband.

  Miraculous indeed did it seem to all those present that anyone should be liberal with his own blood; and everyone agreed that Nathan’s generosity had certainly exceeded that of the King of Spain or the Abbot of Cluny. But after they had debated the matter at some length, the king fixed his gaze on Lauretta, thus showing that he wanted her to tell the next story; and Lauretta began forthwith, as follows:

  Fair young ladies, so goodly and magnificent are the things we have been told, so fully has the ground already been covered, that those of us who have not yet told our tales would surely be left with no area to explore, unless of course we turn to the deeds of lovers, wherein a most copious supply of tales on any topic is always to be found. For this reason, and also because matters of this sort are especially fascinating for people of our age, I should like to tell you of a generous deed performed by one who was in love. And if it is true that in order to possess the object of their love men will give away whole fortunes, set aside their enmities, and place their lives, their honour, and (what is more important) their reputation in serious jeopardy, then possibly you will conclude, all things considered, that his action was no less striking than some of the ones already described.

  In Bologna, then, that illustrious city in the Lombard plain, there once lived a gentleman called Messer Gentile de’ Carisendi,1 distinguished for his valour and noble blood, who whilst still in his youth became enamoured of a gentlewoman, Madonna Catalina by name, who was the wife of a certain Niccoluccio Caccianimico. But because his love for the lady was ill-requited he almost despaired of it and went away to Modena, where he had been appointed to the office of podestà.

  At the time of which we are speaking, Niccoluccio was absent from Bologna, and his wife, being pregnant, was staying at an estate of his, some three miles distant from the city, where she had the misfortune to contract a sudden and cruel malady, whose effects were so powerful and serious that all sign of life in her was extinguished, and consequently she was adjudged, even by her physicians, to be dead. Since her closest women relatives claimed to have heard from her own lips that she had not been pregnant sufficiently long for the unborn creature to be perfectly formed, they troubled themselves no further on that score, and after shedding many tears, they buried her, just as she was, in a tomb in the local church.

  The news of the lady’s demise was immediately reported to Messer Gentile by one of his friends, and despite the fact that she had never exactly smothered him with her favours, he was quite overcome with sorrow. But at length he said to himself:

  ‘So, Madonna Catalina, you are dead! You never accorded me so much as a single glance when you were alive; but now that you are dead, and cannot reject my love, I am determined to steal a kiss or two from you.’

  Night had already fallen, and having made arrangements to depart in secret, he took horse with one of his servants, riding without pause2 till he came to the place where the lady was buried. Having opened up the tomb, he made his way cautiously inside, and lying down beside her, he drew his face to hers and kissed her again and again, shedding tears profusely as he did so.

  But as every woman knows, no sooner does a man obtain one thing, especially if he happens to be in love, than he wants something else; and just as Messer Gentile had made up his mind to ta
rry there no longer, he said to himself: ‘Ah! why should I not place my hand gently on her breast, now that I am here? I have never touched her before, and I shall never have another opportunity.’

  And so, overcome by this sudden longing, he placed his hand on the lady’s bosom, and after keeping it there for some little time, he thought he could detect a faint heartbeat. Whereupon, subduing all his fears, he examined her more closely and discovered that she was in fact still alive, though the actual signs of life were minimal and very weak. He then removed her from the tomb as gently as possible with the aid of his servant, and having set her across his saddle-bow, he conveyed her in secret to his house in Bologna.

  His mother, a wise and resourceful woman, was living in the house, and on hearing her son’s lengthy account of all that had happened she was filled with compassion and skilfully restored Catalina to life by putting her in a warm bath and then setting her in front of a well-stoked fire. On coming to her senses, she cast a deep sigh, and said:

  ‘Alas! where am I now?’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ the worthy lady replied, ‘you are in good hands.’

  When she had fully recovered her wits, she looked about her and discovered to her amazement that she was in totally strange surroundings, with Messer Gentile standing before her. She turned to his mother and asked her to explain how she came to be there, whereupon Messer Gentile gave her a faithful account of all that had happened. At this she began to sob, but eventually she thanked him as best she could and implored him out of the love he had borne her and his sense of honour to do nothing to her in his house that would bring herself or her husband into discredit, and to let her return home as soon as daylight came.