192 JEROME CARDAN. 



beseemed me to have taken this travaile in some discourse 

 of armes (being your lordship's chiefe profession and mine 

 also), then in philosopher's skill to have thus busied 

 myselfe : yet sith your pleasure was such, and your know- 

 ledge in eyther great, I do (as I will ever) most willingly 

 obeye you." But in his modesty he begged of the earl 

 so far to keep his labour secret as " either not to make 

 any partakers thereof, or at the leastwise those, whoe for 

 reuerence to your lordship or loue to mee, will willingly 

 beare with mine errors," &c. &c. To this request the 

 earl replied in an elaborate epistle. ' ' After I had perused 

 youre letters good Maister Bedingfeld, finding in them 

 your request farre differing from the desert of your labour, 

 I could not chose but greatly doubt, whether it were 

 better for me to yelde you your desyre,' ; &c. &c. In 

 fine, he determined to print the book, and bade Bedingfeld 

 be proud rather than ashamed of it, inasmuch as it dis- 

 played a kind of gift that " ornifyeth a gentleman." His 

 lordship also called in " Thomas Churchyarde, gentleman," 

 to introduce Cardanus Comforte to the English public 

 with the proper flourish of commendatory verse. Church- 

 yarde first scolded in prose the expected readers of the 

 volume, who, he said, must not go to sleep " and loose 

 but labour with slobberinge handes or head to blot or 

 blemish the beauty of this booke." He then put on his 

 singing robes, and invited them to come for consolation 

 to Cardan in proper form ; as for example thus : 



