A NEW PATRON SFONDRATO. 167 



not of his illegitimate birth, but of his dreaded superiority 

 of genius. Sfondrato, feeling warmly the wrong done 

 to the poor lecturer, narrated his own experience of 

 Jerome's skill to the whole senate, engaged on his behalf 

 the interest of the Marquis d'Avalos, and of other minis- 

 ters and men robed in the purple of authority. Would 

 the physicians remain obdurate ? 



I add here one or two other examples of Cardan's 

 medical practice which belong to this part of his career. 

 Branda Scoto, brother to Ottaviano, from whose press the 

 Bad Practice of Doctors had issued, being, like his 

 brother, a familiar friend, took Jerome to see Martha 

 Mott, a woman of thirty, who lived in the Via Sozza. 

 She had been for thirteen years confined to a chair by an 

 ulcer in the left leg, which limb was too weak to support 

 her. She had also flying pains, and a general wasting of 

 the body. After two years, under Cardan's treatment, she 

 retained nothing to remind her of her disease but a limp 

 in walking. Twenty years afterwards she was a healthy 

 married woman. 



A tradesman, Jerome Tibbold, was induced, by what 

 he heard of the preceding case, to apply to Cardan for the 

 cure of his own cough, attended by spitting of blood and 

 matter. He was wasted by consumption. Under the new 

 doctor's care he got to all appearance well, and became 

 fat. The physicians said that he could not have had true 



