, since it
is your pleasure. But I must forewarn you that the thing is more
uneath to do than you perchance imagine, especially whenas a woman
would recall a man to loving her or a man a woman, for that this
cannot be done save by the very person unto whom it pertaineth; and it
behoveth that whoso doth it be of an assured mind, seeing it must be
done anights and in solitary places without company; which things I
know not how you are disposed to do.' The lady, more enamoured than
discreet, replied, 'Love spurreth me on such wise that there is
nothing I would not do to have again him who hath wrongfully forsaken
me. Algates, an it please you, show me in what I must approve myself
assured of mind.' 'Madam,' replied the scholar, who had a patch of ill
hair to his tail,[385] 'I must make an image of pewter in his name
whom you desire to get again, which whenas I shall send you, it will
behove you seven times bathe yourself therewith, all naked, in a
running stream, at the hour of the first sleep, what time the moon is
far on the wane. Thereafter, naked as you are, you must get you up
into a tree or to the top of some uninhabited house and turning to the
north, with the image in your hand, seven times running say certain
words which I shall give you written; which when you shall have done,
there will come to you two of the fairest damsels you ever beheld, who
will salute you and ask you courteously what you would have done. Do
you well and throughly discover to them your desires and look it
betide you not to name one for another. As soon as you have told them,
they will depart and you may then come down to the place where you
shall have left your clothes and re-clothe yourself and return home;
and for certain, ere it be the middle of the ensuing night, your lover
will come, weeping, to crave you pardon and mercy; and know that from
that time forth he will never again leave you for any other.'

[Footnote 385: A proverbial way of saying that he bore malice and was
vindictive.]

The lady, hearing all this and lending entire faith thereto, was half
comforted, herseeming she already had her lover again in her arms, and
said, 'Never fear; I will very well do these things, and I have
therefor the finest commodity in the world; for I have, towards the
upper end of the Val d'Arno, a farm, which is very near the
river-bank, and it is now July, so that bathing will be pleasant; more
by token that I mind me there is, not far from the s