A PORTENT GIANBATISTA MARRIED. 187 



that Gianbatista had brought home Brandonia Seroni as 

 his wife, a girl whom he loved, but who was destitute of 

 all good qualities. I drew near, saw that the deed was 

 done. That was, indeed, the beginning of all ills. 



" I thought that a divine messenger had wished by 

 night to signify to me what he knew to have been settled on 

 the evening before. At dawn, before he quitted my 

 roof, I had gone to my son and said (not so much ad- 

 monished by the portent as by his manner, for he was not 

 like himself), ' Son, take care of yourself to-day, or you 

 may be doing some great harm.' I remember the spot 

 from which I spoke, for I was in the doorway ; but I do 

 not remember whether I named to him the portent. 



" Not many days afterwards I again felt the chamber 

 tremble; I tried with my hand, and found that my heart 

 was palpitating, for I was lying on my left side. I raised 

 myself, and the tumult and palpitation ceased : I lay down 

 again, and then when both returned I knew that they de- 

 pended upon that. It must have been so on the former 

 occasion; but I thought that the trembling might have 

 had a double cause, partly supernatural and partly natural." 



As usual, in Jerome's superstition there is no dishonesty. 

 So, when he had read among his father's papers that 

 prayer to the Virgin at a certain time on a certain morn- 

 ing in the year would be a cure for gout, he tried it, and 

 he adds, that a few months after trying it he was relieved, 



