ver it might be, and carry it
off, to see what he should say to the people of the matter.

Fra Cipolla had a servant, whom some called Guccio[313] Balena,[314]
others Guccio Imbratta[315] and yet others Guccia Porco[316] and who
was such a scurvy knave that Lipo Topo[317] never wrought his like,
inasmuch as his master used oftentimes to jest of him with his cronies
and say, 'My servant hath in him nine defaults, such that, were one of
them in Solomon or Aristotle or Seneca, it would suffice to mar all
their worth, all their wit and all their sanctity. Consider, then,
what a man he must be, who hath all nine of them and in whom there is
neither worth nor wit nor sanctity.' Being questioned whiles what were
these nine defaults and having put them into doggerel rhyme, he would
answer, 'I will tell you. He's a liar, a sloven, a slugabed;
disobedient, neglectful, ill bred; o'erweening, foul-spoken, a
dunderhead; beside which he hath divers other peccadilloes, whereof it
booteth not to speak. But what is most laughable of all his fashions
is that, wherever he goeth, he is still for taking a wife and hiring a
house; for, having a big black greasy beard, him-seemeth he is so
exceeding handsome and agreeable that he conceiteth himself all the
women who see him fall in love with him, and if you let him alone, he
would run after them all till he lost his girdle.[318] Sooth to say,
he is of great assistance to me, for that none can ever seek to speak
with me so secretly but he must needs hear his share; and if it chance
that I be questioned of aught, he is so fearful lest I should not know
how to answer, that he straightway answereth for me both Ay and No, as
he judgeth sortable.'

[Footnote 313: Diminutive of contempt of Arrigo, contracted from
Arriguccio, _i.e._ mean little Arrigo.]

[Footnote 314: _i.e._ Whale.]

[Footnote 315: _i.e._ Dirt.]

[Footnote 316: _i.e._ Hog.]

[Footnote 317: A painter of Boccaccio's time, of whom little or
nothing seems to be known.]

[Footnote 318: _Perpendo lo coreggia._ The exact meaning of this
passage is not clear. The commentators make sundry random shots at it,
but, as usual, only succeed in making confusion worse confounded. It
may perhaps be rendered, "till his wind failed him."]

Now Fra Cipolla, in leaving him at the inn, had bidden him look well
that none touched his gear, and more particularly his saddle-bags, for
that therein were the sacred things. But Guccio, who was fonder o