ANCIENT ESTIMATION OP PISH. 57 



sauce to which the said Marinarius was known to be 

 partial. When this was placed before him, the cover 

 removed, and the repast duly blessed by his Holiness, he 

 at once attacked the treacherous cord, concealed and 

 smothered in gravy, nor till his utmost efforts to sever the 

 strands had failed, and the whole table was in an uproar 

 of merriment, did he give up the attempt to carve it, 

 and Jay down his knife. Then, perceiving the trick that 

 had been put upon him, ' I wish,' said he, with admir- 

 able presence of mind, looking towards and addressing 

 his pontifical entertainer at the head of the table, ' I 

 wish your Holiness would often condescend to practise 

 such deceptions as the present ; aided by such a sauce as 

 this, I here pledge myself not only to eat up hemp cables, 

 but to bite through iron chains !' 



Jovius relates of a certain Tamisius, a famous epicure 

 of his day, that having posted his servant en quite one 

 whole night in the precincts of the fish-market, and learn- 

 ing from him next morning that a fine umbra had been 

 sent by the fishmongers as a present to the chief magis- 

 trate of the city, he hied to his court on pretended busi- 

 ness, but in reality to worm out the whereabouts of the 

 fish ; and finding it was now despatched to the chief 

 banker, pursued it thither with no better success, the 

 banker having transmitted it, meanwhile, to a cardinal 

 client of his. After another hot and toilsome walk to 

 his Eminence's palazzo across the Sistine Bridge, he had 

 again the mortification to find the fish gone to a second 

 lawyer; and proceeding to make the same inquiry at 

 his bureau, learned that the umbra had been definitively 

 sent to that gentleman's mistress. Thither the un- 

 daunted man proceeded, introduced himself, pleased the 

 lady, and obtained, at last, for all his trouble, the object 

 of it, — an invitation to dinner and a slice of the fish. 



Professional services were often rewarded, and credi- 

 tors sometimes appeased, by a seasonable supply of the 



D 3 



