Читать книгу The Unpublished Legends of Virgil онлайн

53 страница из 60

Now, the eldest son, Gianni, had longed well nigh to being ill, and even to tears, to wear fine clothes (in which Bianca and the others were well up with him), and have a gallant horse, like the other youths of his rank in Florence. But kind as Balsàbo had been to him, he hardly dared to broach the subject, when all at once his father introduced it by asking him why he went footing about like a pitiful beggar, instead of riding like a cavalier; and learning that it was because he had no steed, Balsàbo gave a long whistle and said:

“Well, you are a fool of forty-five degrees! Why the devil, if you thought I would not approve it, did you not buy a horse on post-obit credit, and ride him on the sly? However, ’tis never too late to mend. But such a goose as you would be certainly cheated in the buying. Come with me.”

And Gianni soon found that his saint of a father was well up to all the tricks of the horse trade, the end being that he had the best steed in Florence for half of what it would have cost him. And from this accomplished parent he also learned to ride and fence, and in the latter he taught his son so many sly passes and subtle tricks, crafty glissades and botte, that he had not his master in all the land.