CARDAN TAKES A PROFESSORSHIP AT PAVIA. 205 



third child was born to him, a boy, whom he named 

 Aldoi. 



He therefore accepted office, and delivered lectures, like 

 his colleagues, to bare benches until the conclusion of that 

 academic year 3 . The academy proposed then the tide 

 of war having retreated to return to its own groves, and 

 Cardan certainly did not propose to go to Pavia with it, 

 deterred by the old reason, the broken fortunes of the 

 place, and the extreme uncertainty connected with the 

 stipends payable for teaching. Quite prepared to re- 

 main where he was, Jerome went to bed as usual on 

 the night before he was to return his answer to the 

 senate, which required to know whether he would abide 

 by his professorship and teach in Pavia. He went to 

 bed in the usual way with his wife, his eldest boy, Gio- 

 vanni Batista, ten years old, and Aldo, the baby, all 

 under one cover; but wonderful to relate, on that night 

 the house tumbled down. Nobody was hurt, but his home 

 in Milan being thus suddenly and literally broken up, as 

 he believed of course, by a special and miraculous dispen- 

 sation, he changed the tenor of his answer to the senate, 

 and in the year 1544 consented to remove. 



The salary to be received by him at Pavia would be two 

 hundred and forty gold crowns 3 . For the anxiety shown 



1 De Vita Propria, p. 20. 2 Ibid. cap. vi. 



3 De Lib. Propr. Op. Tom. i. p. 108. 



