212 JEROME CARDAN. 



one day set up a fierce quarrel with the nurse who at- 

 tended at the bedside. The mother ran at the nurse to 

 box her ears, the nurse endeavoured to avoid the blow 

 -by scrambling over the sick bed, and in so doing fell with 

 her whole weight upon the patient. When the fight was 

 at an end, Brandonia was dead 1 . The day was the 14th 

 *of February, 1560. On the day following, Gianbatista, 

 Aldo, and the famulus were seized 3 . 



Again the scene has to be changed to Pavia. One day, 

 in the month of February, chancing to look into his right 

 hand, Cardan observed a mark at the root of his ring finger 

 like a bloody sword 3 . He trembled suddenly. What more? 

 That evening, it was on a Saturday, a person came to him 

 -with letters from his daughter's husband telling him that 

 his son was in prison, that he must come at once to Milan. 

 Lines upon hands differ of course; but whoever looks 

 into his own probably will see that straight lines run 

 down from the roots of each of the two middle fingers, 

 and it is likely that one of them may have a short line 



1 Hier. Card. Medic. Mediol. Eesponsio ad Criminationem D. Evan- 

 gelistae Seroni (appended also to De Ut. ex Adv. Cap.), p. 1145. 



2 De Vita Propria, cap. xxvii. Where the date is said to be the 26th 

 of February. The correction in the text is from an incidental state- 

 ment in Cardan's defence of his son that the eleventh day before Bran- 

 donia's confinement was the 25th of January. This was said when 

 the facts were recent, and leads to the true date of the murder; one 

 that harmonises with all other portions of the story. 



3 Ibid. cap. xxxvii. 



