18 JEROME CARDAN. 



fever seized the child, and between them they were kill- 

 ing it 1 . The old geometer he was then sixty-four years 

 old had learned to feel that there was something to be 

 valued in his boy, therefore both physic and divinity were 

 summoned to his aid. Two physicians, Barnabo della 

 Croce and Angelo Gira 1 , and one saint, St. Jerome, were 

 called into request. The old man was accustomed to 

 assert that he enjoyed a favour which had been conferred 

 on Socrates and others in being benefited by the society 

 and advice of a familiar demon 2 . He did not apply, 

 however, to the demon for a prescription in his son's case, 

 but more piously devoted him to the most holy and most 

 happy St, Jerome, whom he elected to be his godfather 

 and his tutelary saint, upon condition that St. Jerome, by 

 his intercession, would procure the boy's return to health 1 . 

 Why Fazio chose Jerome for his saint it is not possible to 

 tell; but it happened that he was lodging in the house of 

 one Ermenulfo 3 , who had Girolamo for his own baptismal 

 name, and I am inclined to think that Ermenulfo as men 

 in our day recommend to one another their own tea- 

 dealers or tailors recommended to the lodgers his 

 own patron saint. The boy recovered, and the father, 



1 De Propr. Vita, p. 14. 



2 He said it had attended him for thirty-eight years. De Ut. ex 

 Adv. Cap. p. 428. De Propr. Vit. p. 14. 



3 De Propr. Vit. cap. xxiv. p. 92. There may he something to the 

 purpose in the fact, that there was a large religious house dedicated to 

 St. Jerome situated between the Pavian and Vercelline gates. 



