ll for you to answer
questions instead of bandying them. Now did you, or did you not report
that my sister Selvaggia touched your lips with a coal and set you off
singing?"

Cino, with folded arms, bent his head in assent: "I have said it,
Messere."

"Good! Now, such singing, though it is not to her taste, might be very
much to ours. In fact we have come to hear it, and that you might be
robbed of all excuse, we have brought the key with us. Brother, pray
blow up the brazier."

Ridolfo, with his great cheeks like bladders, blew the coals to a white
heat. "Now then," he said, grinning to Ugolino, "now then, the concert
may begin."

Cino, who by this time had seen what was in the wind, saw also what his
course must be. Whatever happened he could not allow a poet to be made
ridiculous. It was ridiculous to struggle with two armed men, and
unseemly; but suffering was never ridiculous. Patience, therefore! He
anticipated the burly Ridolfo, who, having done his bellows-work, was
now about to pin his victim from behind.

"Pray do not give yourself the pain to hold me, Messere," said he; "I am
not the man to deny you your amusement. Do what you will, I shall not
budge from here."

He stood where he was with his arms crossed, and he kept his word. The
red cinder hissed upon his lips; he shut his eyes, he ground his teeth
together, the sweat beaded his forehead and glistened in his hair. Once
he reeled over, and would have fallen if Ridolfo had not been there to
catch him; but he did not sing the tune they had expected, and presently
they let him alone. So much for Italian humour, which, you will see,
does not lack flavour. It was only the insensate obtuseness of the gull
which prevented Ugolino dying of laughter. Ridolfo was annoyed.

"Give me cold iron to play with another time," he growled; "I am sick of
your monkey-tricks." This hurt Ugolino a good deal, for it made him feel
a fool.

Will it be believed that the infatuate Master Cino spent the rest of the
night in a rapture of poetry? It was not voiced poetry, could never have
been written down; rather, it was a torrent of feeling upon which he
floated out to heaven, in which he bathed. It thrilled through every
fibre of his body till he felt the wings of his soul fluttering madly to
be free. This was the very ecstasy of love, to suffer the extreme
torment for the beloved! Ah, he was smitten deep enough at last; if
poetry were to be won through bloody sweat, the pa