“Now, servant-maids, however pretty they may be, are mostly _contadine_ with powerful muscles and mighty arms, and with one accord they rushed on their late master, and soon overpowered him. Then he was securely bound with silken curtain ropes, and the new Signore, taking his place at a great table, bade all the damsels range themselves at the sides in solemn council, for the offender was now to be tried, condemned, and punished too, should he be found guilty. “The trial was indeed one of peculiar interest, and the testimony adduced would have made the fortune of a French novelist, but space (if nothing else) prohibits my giving it. Suffice it to say that the wizard was found guilty of taking unto himself an undue share of pretty hand-maidens, a great sin considering the number of gallant soldiers and other bachelors who were thereby defrauded of their dues. But as he had neither murdered nor stolen, it was decided to let him go and carry on his games in some less Christian town, on condition that he would divide what money he had in the house among the poor girls whom he had so cruelly cajoled. “And as this last sentence was plaintively pronounced, there was a deep and beautiful sigh uttered by all the victims, followed by three cheers. The master’s strong-box was at once hunted up, and its contents shared, and indeed they were so considerable that the maidens one and all soon married nobly and lived happily.” * * * * * The written story, with a pleasing instinct of Italian thrift, adds that the conquering Signore purchased the property, in fact, the whole street, at a very low figure, before the facts became known, and gave the place the name of the _Via delle Serve Smarrite_, as it is still called by the people, despite its new official christening. “Ye may break, ye may ruin the flask if ye will, But the scent of the brandy will hang round it still.” THE BRONZE BOAR OF THE MERCATO NUOVO “Now among the Greeks, as with the Northern races, the boar was the special type of male generation, even as the frog expressed that of the female sex. And therefore images of the boar were set in public places that fertility might be developed among women, for which reason they also wear, as among the Arabs, necklaces of silver frogs.”—_Notes on Symbolism_. In front of the Mercato Nuovo, built by Cosimo I., stands a bronze copy of an ancient boar, now in the Uffizzi Gallery. It was cast by Pietro Tacca, and is now a fountain. The popular legend in relation to it is as follows: “In the market-place of Florence, which is called _Il Porcellino_, because there is in it a fountain with a swine, there was anciently only a spring of water and a pool, in which were many frogs, water-lizards, shell-snails, and slugs. These were round about, but in the spring itself was a frog who was confined there because she had revealed that her lover was a boar.