第520页 / 共1118页

"My good fellow, if you are not disposed to submit to be called

simpleton, till it becomes familiar to your taste, you must not

expect to live in Bergamo. You would always be obliged to carry

your knife in hand; and when you had killed three or four, you

might be killed yourself, and have to appear before the bar of

God with three or four murders to answer for?"

"And a Milanese who understands his trade?"

"It is all the same; he would still be a simpleton. Do you know

how my master expresses himself when he talks of me to his

friends? _Heaven has sent me this simpleton to carry on my

business. If it were not for this simpleton I should never get

on._ It is the custom."

"It is a silly custom, to say the least of it; and especially as

it is we who have brought the art hither, and who carry it on. Is

it possible that there is no remedy?"

"None. Time may accomplish it. The next generation may be

different, but at present we must submit. And after all, what is

it?"