how I shall do the other," the big man
continued. "But what of that?" And in a louder voice, and with a gusto
which showed how genuine was his delight in the metre,

"Pauci quos aequus amavit
Jupiter aut ardens evexit ad aethera virtus
Dis geniti potuere,"

he mouthed. "But that," he added, looking scornfully at his confederate,
"is Greek to you!"

Grio's altered aspect, his crestfallen air owned the virtue of the
argument if not of the citation; which he did not understand. He drew a
deep breath. "Per Bacco," he said, "if you succeed in doing it, Messer
Basterga----"

"I shall do it," Basterga retorted, "if you do not spoil all with your
drunken tricks!"

Grio was silent a moment, sunk plainly in reflection. Presently his
bloodshot eyes began to travel respectfully and even timidly over the
objects about him. In truth the room in which he found himself was
worthy of inspection, for it was no common room, either in aspect or
furnishing. It boasted, it is true, none of the weird properties, the
skulls and corpse-lights, dead hands, and waxen masks with which the
necromancer of that day sought to impress the vulgar mind. But in place
of these a multitude of objects, quaint, curious, or valuable, filled
that half of the room which was farther from the fire-hearth. On the
wall, flanked by a lute and some odd-looking rubrical calendars, were
three or four silver discs, engraved with the signs of the Zodiac; these
were hung in such a position as to catch the light which entered through
the heavily leaded casement. On the window-seat below them, a pile of
Plantins and Elzevirs threatened to bury a steel casket. On the table,
several rolls of vellum and papyrus, peeping from metal cylinders, leant
against a row of brass-bound folios. A handsome fur covering masked the
truckle-bed, but this, too, bore its share of books, as did two or three
long trunks covered with stamped and gilded leather which stood against
the wall and were so long that the ladies of the day had the credit of
hiding their gallants in them. On stools lay more books, and yet more
books, with a medley of other things: a silver flagon, and some weapons,
a chess-board, an enamelled triptych and the like.

In a word, this half of the room wore the aspect of a library,
low-roofed, dark and richly furnished. The other half, partly divided
from it by a curtain, struck the eye differently. A stove of peculiar
fashion, equipped with a