somehow or other I never showed
them to him.

Now, when I had scrolled my rhymes precisely, I had them dispatched to
Monna Vittoria by a sure hand, and, as is my way, having done what I had
to do, thought no more about the matter for the time being. It was ever
a habit of mine not merely to let the dead day bury its dead, but to let
the dead hour, and, if possible, the dead minute and dead second bury
their dead, and to think no more upon any matter than is essential. I
think the sum of all wise living is to be merry as often as one can, and
sad as seldom as one can, and never to fret over what is unavoidable, or
to be pensive over what is past, but to be wise for the time. So I
remember that days not a few drifted by after I had sent my rhymes and
my request to Monna Vittoria, and I was very busy just then paying my
court to three of the prettiest girls I had ever known, and I almost
forgot my poem and Monna Vittoria altogether.

But I recall a grayish morning along Arno and a meeting with Messer
Guido, and his taking me on one side and standing under an archway while
he read me a sonnet that the unknown poet had composed in illustration
of his passion for his nameless lady, and had sent to Messer Guido. It
was a very beautiful sonnet, as I remember, and I recall very keenly
wishing for an instant that I could write such words and, above all,
that I could think such thoughts. I think I have already set it down
that love has always been a very practical business with me. If one girl
is not at hand, another will serve, and the moon-flower, sunflower
manner of worship was never my way. But if one must love like that,
making love rather a candle on God's altar than a torch in Venus her
temple, there is no man ever since the world began, nor will, I think,
ever be till the world shall end, to do so better than Messer Dante.
When I had done reading the sonnet, and had parted from friend Guido, I
found myself in the mood that this then unknown poet's verses always
swung me into, of wonder and trouble, as of one who, having drunk
over-much of a heady and insidious wine, finds himself thinking
unfamiliar thoughts and seeing familiar things unfamiliarly. While I was
thus mazed and arguing with myself as to whether I were right and this
poet wrong or this poet right and I wrong in our view of love and women.
I was accosted in the plain highway by a dapper little brat of a page
that wore a very flamboyant livery, and that carrie