The Decameron, Volume II

by Giovanni Boccaccio

Buffalmacco. "Could we so?" returned Buffalmacco. "How?" "Why, as tothat," rejoined Bruno, "I have already marked how it may be done, if hebestow not the pig elsewhere." "So be it, then," said Buffalmacco: "wewill steal it; and then, perchance, our good host, Master Priest, willjoin us in doing honour to such good cheer?" "That right gladly will I,"quoth the priest. Whereupon:--"Some address, though," quoth Bruno, "willbe needful: thou knowest, Buffalmacco, what a niggardly fellow Calandrinois, and how greedily he drinks at other folk's expense. Go we, therefore,and take him to the tavern, and there let the priest make as if, to do ushonour, he would pay the whole score, and suffer Calandrino to pay nevera soldo, and he will grow tipsy, and then we shall speed excellent well,because he is alone in the house."

  As Bruno proposed, so they did: and Calandrino, finding that the priestwould not suffer him to pay, drank amain, and took a great deal moreaboard than he had need of; and the night being far spent when he leftthe tavern, he dispensed with supper, and went home, and thinking to haveshut the door, got him to bed, leaving it open. Buffalmacco and Brunowent to sup with the priest; and after supper, taking with them certainimplements with which to enter Calandrino's house, where Bruno thought itmost feasible, they stealthily approached it; but finding the door open,they entered, and took down the pig, and carried it away to the priest'shouse, and having there bestowed it safely, went to bed. In the morningwhen Calandrino, his head at length quit of the fumes of the wine, gotup, and came downstairs and found that his pig was nowhere to be seen,and that the door was open, he asked this, that, and the other man,whether they wist who had taken the pig away, and getting no answer, hebegan to make a great outcry:--"Alas, alas! luckless man that I am, thatmy pig should have been stolen from me!" Meanwhile Bruno and Buffalmacco,being also risen, made up to him, to hear what he would say touching thepig. Whom he no sooner saw, than well-nigh weeping he called them,saying:--"Alas! my friends! my pig is stolen from me." Bruno stepped upto him and said in a low tone:--"'Tis passing strange if thou art in theright for once." "Alas!" returned Calandrino, "what I say is but tootrue." "Why, then, out with it, man," quoth Bruno, "cry aloud, that allfolk may know that 'tis so." Calandrino then raised his voice andsaid:--"By the body o' God I say of a truth that my pig has been stolenfrom me." "So!" quoth Bruno, "but publish it, man, publish it; lift upthy voice, make thyself well heard, that all may believe thy report.""Thou art enough to make me give my soul to the Enemy," repliedCalandrino. "I say--dost not believe me?--that hang me by the neck if thepig is not stolen from me!" "Nay, but," quoth Bruno, "how can it be? Isaw it here but yesterday. Dost think to make me believe that it hastaken to itself wings and flown away?" "All the same 'tis as I tellthee," returned Calandrino. "Is it possible?" quoth Bruno. "Ay indeed,"replied Calandrino; "'tis even so: and I am undone, and know not how togo home. Never will my wife believe me; or if she do so, I shall know nopeace this year." "Upon my hope of salvation," quoth Bruno, "'tis indeeda bad business, if so it really is. But thou knowest, Calandrino, that'twas but yesterday I counselled thee to make believe that 'twas so. Ishould be sorry to think thou didst befool thy wife and us at the sametime." "Ah!" vociferated Calandrino, "wilt thou drive me to despair andprovoke me to blaspheme God and the saints and all the company of heaven?I tell thee that the pig has been stolen from me in the night."Whereupon:--"If so it be," quoth Buffalmacco, "we must find a way, if wecan, to recover it." "Find a way?" said Calandrino: "how can we compassthat?" "Why," replied Buffalmacco, "'tis certain that no one has comefrom India to steal thy pig: it must have been one of thy neighbours, andif thou couldst bring them together, I warrant thee, I know how to makethe assay with bread and cheese, and we will find out in a trice who hashad the pig." "Ay," struck in Bruno, "make thy assay with bread andcheese in the presence of these gentry hereabout, one of whom I am surehas had the pig! why, the thing would be seen through: and they would notcome." "What shall we do, then?" said Buffalmacco. Whereto Bruno madeanswer:--"It must be done with good pills of ginger and good vernaccia;and they must be bidden come drink with us. They will suspect nothing,and will come; and pills of ginger can be blessed just as well as breadand cheese." "Beyond a doubt, thou art right," quoth Buffalmacco; "andthou Calandrino, what sayst thou? Shall we do as Bruno says?" "Nay, Ientreat you for the love of God," quoth Calandrino, "do even so: for if Iknew but who had had the pig, I should feel myself half consoled for myloss." "Go to, now," quoth Bruno, "I am willing to do thy errand toFlorence for these commodities, if thou givest me the money."

  Calandrino had some forty soldi upon him, which he gave to Bruno, whothereupon hied him to Florence to a friend of his that was an apothecary,and bought a pound of good pills of ginger, two of which, being ofdog-ginger, he caused to be compounded with fresh hepatic aloes, and thento be coated with sugar like the others; and lest they should be lost, orany of the others mistaken for them, he had a slight mark set upon themby which he might readily recognize them. He also bought a flask of goodvernaccia, and, thus laden, returned to the farm, and said toCalandrino:--"To-morrow morning thou wilt bid those whom thou suspectestcome hither to drink with thee: as 'twill be a saint's day, they will allcome readily enough; and to-night I and Buffalmacco will say theincantation over the pills, which in the morning I will bring to theehere, and for our friendship's sake will administer them myself, and doand say all that needs to be said and done." So Calandrino did as Brunoadvised, and on the morrow a goodly company, as well of young men fromFlorence, that happened to be in the village, as of husbandmen, beingassembled in front of the church around the elm, Bruno and Buffalmaccocame, bearing a box containing the ginger, and the flask of wine, andranged the folk in a circle. Whereupon: "Gentlemen," said Bruno, "'tismeet I tell you the reason why you are gathered here, that if aughtunpleasant to you should befall, you may have no ground for complaintagainst me. Calandrino here was the night before last robbed of a finepig, and cannot discover who has had it; and, for that it must have beenstolen by some one of us here, he would have each of you take and eat oneof these pills and drink of this vernaccia. Wherefore I forthwith do youto wit, that whoso has had the pig will not be able to swallow the pill,but will find it more bitter than poison, and will spit it out; and so,rather, than he should suffer this shame in presence of so many, 'twereperhaps best that he that has had the pig should confess the fact to thepriest, and I will wash my hands of the affair."

  All professed themselves ready enough to eat the pills; and so, havingset them in a row with Calandrino among them, Bruno, beginning at oneend, proceeded to give each a pill, and when he came to Calandrino hechose one of the pills of dog-ginger and put it in his hand. Calandrinothrust it forthwith between his teeth and began to chew it; but no soonerwas his tongue acquainted with the aloes, than, finding the bitternessintolerable, he spat it out. Now, the eyes of all the company being fixedon one another to see who should spit out his pill, Bruno, who, nothaving finished the distribution, feigned to be concerned with noughtelse, heard some one in his rear say:--"Ha! Calandrino, what means this?"and at once turning round, and marking that Calandrino had spit out hispill:--"Wait a while," quoth he, "perchance 'twas somewhat else thatcaused thee to spit: take another;" and thereupon whipping out the otherpill of dog-ginger, he set it between Calandrino's teeth, and finishedthe distribution. Bitter as Calandrino had found the former pill, hefound this tenfold more so; but being ashamed to spit it out, he kept ita while in his mouth and chewed it, and, as he did so, tears stood in hiseyes that shewed as large as filberts, and at length, being unable tobear it any longer, he spat it out, as he had its predecessor. Whichbeing observed by Buffalmacco and Bruno, who were then administering thewine, and by all the company, 'twas averred by common consent thatCalandrino had committed the theft himself; for which cause certain ofthem took him severely to task.

  However, the company being dispersed, and Bruno and Buffalmacco leftalone with Calandrino, Buffalmacco began on this wise:--"I never doubtedbut that thou hadst had it thyself, and wast minded to make us believethat it had been stolen from t
hee, that we might not have of thee so muchas a single drink out of the price which thou gottest for it."Calandrino, with the bitterness of the aloes still on his tongue, fell aswearing that he had not had it. Whereupon:--"Nay, but, comrade," quothBuffalmacco, "upon thy honour, what did it fetch? Six florins?" Whereto,Calandrino being now on the verge of