A BOOK. A BABY. 5 



paratory to the correction of the original figures and the 

 amendment of the text. He knew, however, that a work 

 so difficult would at no time be undertaken ; not for 

 want of men learned enough Heaven forbid that he 

 should be so arrogant as to suppose it! but for the 

 trouble's sake, the work, though useful, would remain 

 undone. Therefore he, Fazio Cardan, had done it. On 

 the threshold of his task, however, since he had great 

 need of a patron's countenance, he committed his book to 

 one who was as grave as Camillus, as dexterous as Scipio, 

 and so on 1 . That was the book, and that was the manner 

 of dedication to the book published by "the excellent 

 doctor in the arts as well of medicine as law, and most 

 experienced mathematician, Fazio Cardano, of Milan, re- 

 siding in the venerable college of the Milanese juriscon- 

 sults." This offspring of the mind of Fazio was about 

 twenty years old 2 when Chiara Micheria, flying for re- 

 fuge from the plague to Pavia 3 , took with, her off- 

 spring of another kind, to which he also was the father, a 

 child yet unborn. 



Whatever pains Fazio had taken to protect his literary 

 bantling against any risk of dropping dead into the world, 

 the care that preceded the birth of his true child was 



1 Op. cit. In dedication. 



2 Its date of 1480 is assigned on the authority of Burnet. The 

 copy in the British Museum has no title-page. 



3 De Libr. Tropr. Ed. ultima. Opera cura Spon. Vol. i. p. 96. 



