CHAPTER VI 



IT has been noted that Cardan quitted Pavia at the 

 end of 1544 on account of the bankruptcy of the 

 University, and that in 1546 a generous offer was made 

 to him on condition of his entering the service of Pope 

 Paul III.; an offer which after some hesitation he deter- 

 mined to refuse. In the autumn of this same year he 

 resumed his teaching at Pavia, a fact which sanctions 

 the assumption that this luckless seat of learning must 

 have been once more in funds. In the year following, in 

 1547, there came to him another offer of employment 

 accompanied by terms still more munificent than the 

 Pope's, conveyed through Vesalius 1 and the ambassador 

 of the King of Denmark. " The emolument was to be 

 a salary of three hundred gold crowns per annum of the 

 Hungarian currency, and in addition to these six hundred 

 more to be paid out of the tax on skins of price. This 

 last-named money differed in value by about an eighth 

 from the royal coinage, and would be somewhat slower 

 in coming in. Also the security for its payment was 

 not so solid, and would in a measure be subject to risk. 

 To this was farther added maintenance for myself and 



1 Vesalius had certainly lectured on anatomy at Pavia, but it 

 would appear that Cardan did not know him personally, seeing 

 that he writes in De Libris Propriis (Opera, torn. i. p. 138) : " Bra- 

 savolum . . . nunquam vidi, ut neque Vesalium quamquam intimum 

 mihi amicum." , 



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