in mortal combat, but there it was, it was the will of heaven
and could not be altered. It seemed rather an invitation to the
shortener of the story, but the same people do not come to the theatre
every night and those who had missed the death of Bradamante would be
pleased to see Malagigi die.

The nearest peaceful shore with a suitable grotto known to Nacalone
happened to be in Asia; he put his master on his back and flew off with
him apologising for carrying him so far, but there was not really much
trouble about it, because his wings were strong and the journey was
accomplished in safety.

Malagigi sat repenting in his Asian grotto, like S. Gerolamo in the
pictures. He found a stone with a hole in it into which he stuck a cross
made of two pieces of wood tied together with dried grass, and to this
cross he prayed. In the intervals of prayer and repentance he gathered
the herb malva, dried it, powdered it, mixed it with water into paste,
formed it into cakes, baked them in the sun and ate them. When his time
came, he died, and gradually his corpse became a skeleton, but his spirit
still dwelt within because it was so ordained. His dying did not
surprise me--to be born is to enter upon the path which even magicians
must tread and which leads to the inevitable door--nor was I alarmed
about his spirit remaining inside his skeleton--it gave him a touch of
originality after all and differentiated his death from that of
Bradamante whose soul I had seen extracted by an angel; but I could not
help being seriously uneasy about his burning all his books. Each book
had a devil chained inside it, and when Malagigi opened a book its devil
used to appear for instructions. As long as he was repenting, they might
perhaps be trusted to behave themselves; but after his death, in spite of
its being somewhat equivocal, I was afraid that all these devils, and
Merlin had an extensive library, would escape and be free to do as they
chose. The buffo assured me, however, that no harm would come of it, and
as he knew what was ordained by the will of heaven I was ready to take
his word; besides, there was still the one unburnt book and this was the
home of Nacalone, who might be powerful enough to avert disasters. So
Malagigi's body remained in the grotto, dead and yet not dead.

Then a time came when his son Argantino happened to be travelling in Asia
with his second cousin Guido Santo. Accompanied by Costanzo, a Turk,
whom Argant