certain orisons which I will give thee by writ and without which it cannot be done. Then, towards complines, do thou return to the fashion aforesaid, and thus doing, even as I have myself done aforetime, I doubt not but, ere thou come to the end of the penance, thou wilt, (provided thou shalt have performed it with devoutness and compunction), feel somewhat marvellous of eternal beatitude.’ Quoth Fra Puccio, ‘This is no very burdensome matter, nor yet overlong, and may very well be done; wherefore I purpose in God’s name to begin on Sunday.’ Then, taking leave of him and returning home, he related everything in due order to his wife, having the other’s permission therefor. The lady understood very well what the monk meant by bidding him stand fast without stirring till matins; wherefore, the device seeming to her excellent, she replied that she was well pleased therewith and with every other good work that he did for the health of his soul and that, so God might make the penance profitable to him, she would e’en fast with him, but do no more. They being thus of accord and Sunday come, Fra Puccio began his penance and my lord monk, having agreed with the lady, came most evenings to sup with her, bringing with him store of good things to eat and drink, and after lay with her till matinsong, when he arose and took himself off, whilst Fra Puccio returned to bed. Now the place which Fra Puccio had chosen for his penance adjoined the chamber where the lady lay and was parted therefrom but by a very slight wall, wherefore, Master Monk wantoning it one night overfreely with the lady and she with him, it seemed to Fra Puccio that he felt a shaking of the floor of the house. Accordingly, having by this said an hundred of his Paternosters, he made a stop there and without moving, called to his wife to know what she did. The lady, who was of a waggish turn and was then belike astride of San Benedetto his beast or that of San Giovanni Gualberto, answered, ‘I’ faith, husband mine, I toss as most I may.’ ‘How?’ quoth Fra Puccio. ‘Thou tossest? What meaneth this tossing?’ The lady, laughing, for that she was a frolicsome dame and doubtless had cause to laugh, answered merrily; ‘How? You know not what it meaneth? Why, I have heard you say a thousand times, “Who suppeth not by night must toss till morning light.” ’ Fra Puccio doubted not but that the fasting was the cause of her unableness to sleep and it was for this she tossed thus about the bed; wherefore, in the simplicity of his heart, ‘Wife,’ said he, ‘I told thee not to fast; but, since thou wouldst e’en do it, think not of that, but address thyself to rest; thou givest such vaults about the bed that thou makest all in the place shake.’ ‘Have no care for that,’ answered the lady; ‘I know what I am about; do you but well, you, and I will do as well as I may.’ Fra Puccio, accordingly, held his peace and betook himself anew to his Paternosters; and after that night my lord monk and the lady let make a bed in another part of the house, wherein they abode in the utmost joyance what while Fra Puccio’s penance lasted. At one and the same hour the monk took himself off and the lady returned to her own bed, whereto a little after came Fra Puccio from his penance; and on this wise the latter continued to do penance, whilst his wife did her delight with the monk, to whom quoth she merrily, now and again, ‘Thou hast put Fra Puccio upon performing a penance, whereby we have gotten Paradise.’ Indeed, the lady, finding herself in good case, took such a liking to the monk’s fare, having been long kept on low diet by her husband, that, whenas Fra Puccio’s penance was accomplished, she still found means to feed her fill with him elsewhere and using discretion, long took her pleasure thereof. Thus, then, that my last words may not be out of accord with my first, it came to pass that, whereas Fra Puccio, by doing penance, thought to win Paradise for himself, he put therein the monk, who had shown him the speedy way thither, and his wife, who lived with him in great lack of that whereof Dom Felice, like a charitable man as he was, vouchsafed her great plenty.”
The Fifth Story
Ricciardo, surnamed Il Zima, giveth Messer Francesco Vergellesi a palfrey of his and hath therefor his leave to speak with his wife. She keeping silence, he in her person replieth unto himself, and the effect after ensueth in accordance with his answer.
Pamfilo having made an end, not without laughter on the part of the ladies, of the story of Fra Puccio, the queen with a commanding air bade Elisa follow on. She, rather tartly than otherwise, not out of malice, but of old habit, began to speak thus, “Many folk, knowing much, imagine that others know nothing, and so ofttimes, what while they think to overreach others, find, after the event, that they themselves have been outwitted of them; wherefore I hold his folly great who setteth himself without occasion to test the strength of another’s wit. But, for that maybe all are not of my opinion, it pleaseth me, whilst following on the given order of the discourse, to relate to you that which befell a Pistolese gentleman170 by reason thereof.
There was in Pistoia a gentleman of the Vergellesi family, by name Messer Francesco, a man of great wealth and understanding and well advised in all else, but covetous beyond measure. Being made provost of Milan, he had furnished himself with everything necessary for his honourable going thither, except only with a palfrey handsome enough for him, and finding
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