o the best Florentine society:
society where there was much more plate than the circle of enamelled
silver in the centre of the brass dishes, and where it was not forbidden
by the Signory to wear the richest brocade. For where could a handsome
young scholar not be welcome when he could touch the lute and troll a
gay song? That bright face, that easy smile, that liquid voice, seemed
to give life a holiday aspect; just as a strain of gay music and the
hoisting of colours make the work-worn and the sad rather ashamed of
showing themselves. Here was a professor likely to render the Greek
classics amiable to the sons of great houses.

And that was not the whole of Tito's good fortune; for he had sold all
his jewels, except the ring he did not choose to part with, and he was
master of full five hundred gold florins.

Yet the moment when he first had this sum in his possession was the
crisis of the first serious struggle his facile, good-humoured nature
had known. An importunate thought, of which he had till now refused to
see more than the shadow as it dogged his footsteps, at last rushed upon
him and grasped him: he was obliged to pause and decide whether he would
surrender and obey, or whether he would give the refusal that must carry
irrevocable consequences. It was in the room above Nello's shop, which
Tito had now hired as a lodging, that the elder Cennini handed him the
last quota of the sum on behalf of Bernardo Rucellai, the purchaser of
the two most valuable gems.

"_Ecco, giovane mio_!" said the respectable printer and goldsmith, "you
have now a pretty little fortune; and if you will take my advice, you
will let me place your florins in a safe quarter, where they may
increase and multiply, instead of slipping through your fingers for
banquets and other follies which are rife among our Florentine youth.
And it has been too much the fashion of scholars, especially when, like
our Pietro Crinito, they think their scholarship needs to be scented and
broidered, to squander with one hand till they have been fain to beg
with the other. I have brought you the money, and you are free to make
a wise choice or an unwise: I shall see on which side the balance dips.
We Florentines hold no man a member of an Art till he has shown his
skill and been matriculated; and no man is matriculated to the art of
life till he has been well tempted. If you make up your mind to put
your florins out to usury, you can let me know to-mor