208 THE LIFE AND LEGEND OF MICHAEL SCOT 



Hac, licet obsistant, coguntur amore puellae. 

 Q , A Ecce idem Scotus qui stando sub arboris umbra 

 T; Ante characteribus designet millibus orbem. 

 Quatuor inde vocat magna cum voce diablos. 

 Unus ab occasu properat, venit alter ab ortu, 

 t Meridies terzum mandat, septentrio quartum. 

 -> Consecrare facit freno conforme per ipsos 



Cum quo vincit equum nigrum, nulloque vedutum, 

 Quern, quo vult, tanquam Turchesca sagitta, cavalcat, 

 TT t Sacrificatque comas eiusdem saepe cavalli. 



, En quoque dipingit Magus idem in littore navem 

 writ Quae vogat totum octo remis ducta per orbem. 

 are ' Humanae spinae suffimigat inde medullam. 

 y En docet ut magicis cappam sacrare susurris 

 I Quam sacrando f remunt plorantque per aera turbae 

 tak( Spiritum quoniam verbis nolendo tiramur. 



Hanc quicumque gerit gradiens ubicumque locorum 

 , 3 Aspicitur nusquam ; caveat tamen ire per altum 

 base Solis splendorem, quia tune sua cernitur umbra.' 1 



lege a 



stuc^'s the legend is not only considerably enriched, 

 whir it has recovered much of its original tone, 

 the ^hael Scot again appears rather as the mighty 

 with 1 ' 6 than as the adroit juggler which Dante had 

 cred: esented him to be. One would say Folengo 

 mad( rea d the spell of Cordova, where a circle similar 

 and <ia t described by him is actually proposed. The 

 nam< f magical images too, on which he insists, is 

 real very art which the Arabian author of the 

 E r }ntrix professes to teach. 



nobl'These then, or such as these, must have been 

 subd ' old wives' tales ' spoken of by Dempster, who 

 whit that store of them passed current in his day. 2 

 go 'was, like Michael Scot himself, a Scotsman long 

 dent in Italy, who taught in the universities 

 *isa and Bologna at the commencement of the 

 its htoteenth century : 3 an origin and situation 



1 JL Maccheronea, xviii. 



Seemiy Innumerabiles fabulae aniles circumferuntur, et jam nunc hodie. 

 in 121! Eccl. p. 494. 3 Obiit 1625. 



