— 2.2 —
Martino and Levidolce met in a room in Martino’s house. Martino was Levidolce’s great-uncle, and he was concerned about his great-niece’s bad reputation. The general tongue — general opinion — was that she had had an affair with Lord Adurni.
Martino said, “You cannot answer what a general tongue objects against your folly. I may curse the interest you lay claim to in my blood — I may curse because you are related to me.
“Your mother, my dear niece, died, I thought, too soon, but she is happy; had she lived until now and known the vanities your life has dealt in, she would have wished herself into an early grave.”
Levidolce replied, “Sir, consider my sex. If I were a man, my sword would get revenge for my wounded honor, and reprieve my name from injury, by printing some deadly character on the bosoms of those whose drunken excesses vomit such base aspersions against me.”
In other words, if she were a man, she would fight duels with the men who maliciously gossiped about her.
She continued, “As I am a woman, my scorn and contempt of them is virtuous; what I deserve stands far above their malice.”
In her case, showing only her scorn and contempt of them is virtuous because if she were a man she would duel with them and kill them.
Martino said, “Levidolce, hypocrisy puts on a holy robe, yet never changes its nature. Remember how in your girl’s days, you fell truly in love and married. You married — pay attention now — whom?
“A trencher-waiter!”
He added, sarcastically, “Shrewd preferment!”
A trencher-waiter brings plates of food to the dining table of his master. It is a low-status job.
Martino continued, “But your childhood then excused that fault; for similarly footmen have run away with lusty heirs, and stable-grooms have reached to some fair-ones’ personal chambers.”
Levidolce said, “Please let me not be bandied with and talked about, sir, and baffled and disgraced by your intelligence.”
The intelligence was the information he had heard about her.
“So, you are touched to the quick!” Martino said. “Fine mistress, I will, then, make known at length the progress of your infamy.
“On pretense of disagreement, you must be divorced from your husband. In fact, you were divorced from him, and I must pretend to support the reasons.
“On better hopes, moreover, I took you home, provided you with my care, justified your alteration in marital status, and took delight in entertaining such visitants of worth and rank as tendered civil respects, but then, even then —”
“What then?” Levidolce asked. “Sweet grand-uncle, do not spare me.”
Martino said, “I am more ashamed to fear that my hospitality acted like that of a bawd — and to give it that name — to your unchaste desires, than you are ashamed to hear and know it.”
“Whose whore am I?” Levidolce asked. “For that’s your plainest meaning.”
Martino said, “If you were modest, the word you uttered — ‘whore’ — would at last force a blush from you.
“Lord Adurni is a bounteous lord. It is said that he parts with gold and jewels like a free and liberal purchaser. He wriggles into ladies’ pleasures by a right of pension: He gives them gold and jewels.”
He then said sarcastically, “But you know nothing about this.”
He continued, “You have grown to be a topic of tavern talk and subject matter for fiddlers’ songs. I toil to build up the reputation of my family, and you toil to pluck up the foundation.
“Just this morning,before the common-council, young Malfato — who had been summoned on account of some lands he held, supposed to belong to certain orphans — as I questioned his tenure of the land in particulars, he answered that my worship needed not to flaw his right, for if the mood held him, he could make a jointure to my over-living and over-loving great-niece without being financially oppressed.”
A jointure is wealth settled on a wife to support her in case her husband dies first.
Apparently, Malfato was the custodian of land belonging to some orphans until they reached legal age. By mentioning the jointure, he was making the point that he had enough money that he need not cheat the orphans. He was also hinting that Levidolce wanted to marry him.
Martino continued, “He told me to tell her, too, that she was a kind young soul, and might in time be wooed by a loving man, without doubt.”
He then said, sarcastically, “Here was a jolly breakfast!”
Levidolce replied, “Uncles are privileged more than our parents; some wise man in civic affairs has rectified, no doubt, your knowledge, sir.
“After all the discussion about public business had been completed — then, for lack of other things to talk about, I by chance came to be the topic of grave discourse, but, by your leave, I would rather wish to earn my bread from a stranger’s table than be given bread from a friend’s table if I had to be daily subjected to the friend’s unfitting rebukes.”
Martino said, “Come, come, get to the point.”
Levidolce said, “May all the curses due to a ravisher of sober truth dam up the graceless mouths of those false accusers!”
Martino said, “Now you become out of control, just in the wenches’ trim and garb — the usual style of wanton women. These ‘prayers’ speak your ‘devotions’ purely.”
Crying, Levidolce replied, “Sir, alas, what would you have me do? I have no orators, other than my tears, to plead my innocence, since you forsake me and are pleased to lend an open ear against my honest fame.
“I wish all their spite could harass all my contentment and turn it into a desperate ruin!
“Oh, dear goodness! There is a right for wrongs.”
“There is,” Martino said, “but first sit in commission on your own defects. Accuse yourself; be your own jury, judge, and executioner. I take no pleasure in my vexation.”
Levidolce said, “All the short remains of undesired life shall only speak the extremity of penance; your opinion enjoins it, too.”
She was promising to repent her sins for the rest of her short, unwanted life.
Martino said, “Enough; thy tears prevail against credulity.”
His words were ambiguous. Do her tears prevail against belief in her reform? In that case, he did not believe her repentance was sincere. Or do her tears prevail against belief in what people have said about her? In that case, he did not believe what people have said about her.
Levidolce said, “My miseries, as in a mirror, present me the torn face of an unguided youth.”
In ancient Greece and Rome, grief-stricken women would scratch their faces with their fingernails.
Martino said, “No more.”
Trelcatio entered the room, carrying a letter that he had opened and read.
“Trelcatio!” Martino said. “Some business speeds you here.”
Trelcatio said, “Happy news — signor Martino, give me your ear, please.”
He drew him away so that Levidolce could not hear them.
Trelcatio then said, “My nephew Auria has done brave service; and I hear — let’s be exceedingly private — that he has returned high in the Duke of Florence’s respects. It is said — but say no words about this — that he has soundly defeated and knocked about the despicable Turks.”
Martino asked, “Why would you have his merits so unknown? Why not let everyone know about his success?”
Trelcatio said, “I have not yet fully confirmed this news. Withdraw with me, and you shall read all that this paper talks about.”
Martino said, “I see!”
He then said, “Levidolce, you know what I think. Be cheerful.”
He then said, “Come, Trelcatio.”
He added, “Causes of joy or grief do seldom happen without companions near. Thy resolutions have given another birth to my contentment.”
The word “resolutions” was ambiguous.
If he had believed Levidolce’s resolution to reform, that would make him happy.
But another meaning of “resolution” was “an explanatory account” (Oxford English Dictionary). Trelcatio’s explanatory account of Auria’s victory would certainly make him happy.
Possibly, Martino believed both Levidolce’s resolution and Trelcatio’s explanatory account, aka resolution.
Martino and Trelcatio exited.
Levidolce said to herself, “Even so, wise great-uncle! Much good may it do you!
“I have been discovered!”
People had learned about her affair with Lord Adurni, and they probably knew that she had pursued Malfato.
She continued, “I could fly out and mix vengeance with my love — unworthy man, Malfato!
“My good lord, my hot in blood, splendid lord, grows cold toward me, too!”
She was talking about Lord Adurni.
She continued, “Well, raise dotage — excessive love — into rage, and sleep no longer. Affection turned to hatred threatens evil.”
— 2.3 —
Piero, Amoretta, Futelli, and Castanna talked together in an apartment in Lord Adurni’s house. Amoretta lisped. She pronounced S’s and T’s as “Th.”
Piero said, “In the next gallery you may behold such living pictures, lady, such rich pieces of kings and queens and princes, that you’d think that they breathe and smile upon you.”
Amoretta said, “Have they crownths, great crownths oth gold upon their headths?”
“Crowns of pure gold,” Piero said, “Drawn all in state.”
Amoretta asked, “How many horthes, please tell me, are ith their chariots?”
She meant to ask how many horses “pull their chariots,” not how many horses “are is [or possibly, with, pronounced ’ith] their chariots.”
Piero answered, “Sixteen, some twenty.”
“My sister!” Castanna said, referring to Spinella. “Why have we left her alone? Where is she staying, gentlemen?”
Futelli said, “She is viewing the rooms: It is likely that you’ll meet her in the gallery. This house is full of curiosities very fit for ladies’ sights.”
Amoretta said, “Yeth, yeth, the thight of printhes ith a fine thight.”
“Good,” Castanna said. “Let’s find her.”
Piero said, “Sweet ladies, go this way.”
He whispered to Futelli, “See that the doors are secure.”
“Don’t worry,” Futelli whispered back. “I will.”
***
Copyright by Bruce D. Bruce; All Rights Reserved
***
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