last as
he of himself could never have blown. It rang far and wide all over
Florence, it was heard beyond Fiesole, it wakened the dead in old
Etrurian graves, for an instant, to think they had been called by Tinia
to meet the eleven gods; it caused all the _folletti_, _fate_, _diavoli_,
_strege_, and _maliardi_ to stop for an instant their deviltries or
delights. For it was the Great Blast of the Horn of the Fairies, which
only plays second fiddle to the last trump. {24}

"And at that sound all Florence came running to see what was the matter.
The Grand Duke and his household came; the Council of the Eight burst
their bonds, and left the Palazzo Vecchio; everybody came, and they
fished out the Signore, and listened with awe to his tale. The priests
said that the goblin was San Zenobio, the more liberal swore it was
Crescenzio, the people held to plain San Antonino. The Signore became a
great man.

"'My son,' said the goblin to him in confidence the following evening,
'as they sat over their wine,' (here I follow the text of Maddalena),
'this is our last night together. Thou art saved, and I have fulfilled
my duty to thee. Once I, too, was a man like thee, and in that life thou
didst save mine by rescuing me from assassins. And I swore to watch over
thee in every peril, and bring thee to a happy end.'

"'Il momenta e arrivato;
Addio, Via del Corno!
Addio, palazzo, addio!
Addio, padrone, nel altro mondo!'

"'The final hour has come for me;
Street of the Horn, farewell to thee!
Farewell, O palace, farewell, O street!
My lord, in another world we'll meet.'

"Then the goblin told the Signore that he would ere long contract a happy
marriage, and that it was for this that he had hitherto kept him from
forming alliances which would have prevented it; and that if in future he
should ever be in great need of assistance, to sound the horn, and he
would come to him, but that this must always be in the palace alone after
midnight. And having said this he vanished.

"The Signore grieved for a long time at the loss of his goblin friend,
but he married happily, as had been predicted, and his life was long and
prosperous. So he put the horn in his shield, and you may see it to this
day on the Church of Santa Maria Novella. And so it was that the Via del
Corno got its name."

* * * * *

"From which we may learn," saith Flaxius, "that wherever a man is