DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.32874#0502
420 LIFE OF BENVENUTO CELLINI [BK. 11
go to the closet, so much so that when daylight came,
feeling that my genital organs were on fire, I wanted to
see what could be the matter. I found the sheet covered
with blood. At once I imagined that I had eaten some-
thing poisonous, and over and over again I turned over
in my own mind what the thing could have been. And
there returned to my memory those plates and bowls
and saucers differing from the others allotted to me by
the said wife of Sbietta, and (the reason) why that evil
priest, the brother of the said Sbietta, who had been
labouring so hard to do me such honour, did not then
want to remain at supper with us himself. And there
returned to my memory besides that the said priest had
said that his (brother) Sbietta had done such a fine
stroke (of business) in having sold a farm to an old man
for life, who would never survive the year. For such
words had been repeated to me by that honest man
Giovanni Sardella. So that I concluded that they had
given me in a bowl of sauce, which had been very well
made and was very pleasant to the palate, a dose of
sublimate because sublimate causes all those
symptoms that I observed that I had. But since I am
accustomed to eat few sauces or condiments with meat,
other than salt, I consequently chanced to eat but two
small mouthfuls of that sauce, because itwas so good to the
taste. And I went on to remember how many times the
said wife of Sbietta kept urging me in divers fashions, tell-
ing me that I must eat that sauce: so that I knew for very
certain that with that said sauce they had administered
me that small dose of sublimate. Though I was suffering
' A misspelling for "bichloride of mercury," a cor-
rosive substance of considerable strength.
go to the closet, so much so that when daylight came,
feeling that my genital organs were on fire, I wanted to
see what could be the matter. I found the sheet covered
with blood. At once I imagined that I had eaten some-
thing poisonous, and over and over again I turned over
in my own mind what the thing could have been. And
there returned to my memory those plates and bowls
and saucers differing from the others allotted to me by
the said wife of Sbietta, and (the reason) why that evil
priest, the brother of the said Sbietta, who had been
labouring so hard to do me such honour, did not then
want to remain at supper with us himself. And there
returned to my memory besides that the said priest had
said that his (brother) Sbietta had done such a fine
stroke (of business) in having sold a farm to an old man
for life, who would never survive the year. For such
words had been repeated to me by that honest man
Giovanni Sardella. So that I concluded that they had
given me in a bowl of sauce, which had been very well
made and was very pleasant to the palate, a dose of
sublimate because sublimate causes all those
symptoms that I observed that I had. But since I am
accustomed to eat few sauces or condiments with meat,
other than salt, I consequently chanced to eat but two
small mouthfuls of that sauce, because itwas so good to the
taste. And I went on to remember how many times the
said wife of Sbietta kept urging me in divers fashions, tell-
ing me that I must eat that sauce: so that I knew for very
certain that with that said sauce they had administered
me that small dose of sublimate. Though I was suffering
' A misspelling for "bichloride of mercury," a cor-
rosive substance of considerable strength.