THE LEGEND OF MICHAEL SCOT — CONCLUSION 223 



present year of grace would make of the name and 

 fame of Michael Scot were clearly a curious and 

 interesting inquiry. It is one which, on actual 

 trial, has yielded two tales differing considerably 

 from any hitherto published.^ As these are certainly 

 the very latest additions to the legend, they deserve 

 a place here at the close of our collection. Freely 

 rendered into English they run as follows : 



' Mengot was a notable astrologer and magician. 

 Mengot was his true name,^ but he had many 

 surnames besides ; among which was that of Scotto. 

 This name of Scotto was given him by a princess. 

 One night the Prince, her husband, happened to 

 be in a company where the talk turned on the 

 virtue of women, and the Prince said he would put 

 his hand in the fire if his wife were not faithful to 

 him ; so sure was he of her virtue. Then spoke 

 up another of the company, who made light of the 

 caresses and compliments with which women use 

 to deceive, and told a tale for the Prince's warning. 

 " There was once a man," said he, " who thought as 

 you do, dear Prince ; for he took his wife for a 

 pattern of virtue, and would have pledged, not his 

 hand only, but his very life that she was so. It 



^ My readers owe these tales to the kindness of Mr. C. G. Leland, 

 who procured them for me from an old Florentine woman. She is 

 familiar to Mr. Leland's friends as ' Maddalena,' and is the depository 

 of that traditional lore on which he has so happily drawn in his Legends 

 of Florence. Her stories are interesting if only as an example of folk- 

 lore up to date, and of the way in which an Italian mind deals with the 

 legend of Michael Scot, while some points they offer are certainly 

 original and highly curious. 



2 This may be a variant of 'Maugis' or Merlin. In the romance of 

 Maugis d'Aygremont we find the following passage : ' II n'y avoit 

 meilleur maistre que lui . . . et I'appelloit-on Maistre Maugis.' On 

 the other hand Mengot is a genuine early Teutonic name. 'Et hie 

 liber finitus est per manus Mengoti Itelbrot, Anno domini m°ccc°lxxxv.' 

 is the colophon to a manuscript of the Almagest of Ptolemy in the 

 Vatican, Fondo Palatino, 1365, p. 206ro. 



