Before he was thirteen he had his first taste of wounds and his first narrow escape. When returning to Venice from the country he was robbed by a shabbily dressed individual who imposed on him in order to be allowed to make the trip in his boat. The robber left him for dead, but he revived, and reached Mestre, where his hurts were dressed; and it was characteristic of the future man that although a mere boy he succeeded in tracking his aggressor with blood-hounds and handed him over to the justice of Padua, where the man was executed. After a considerable time he regained his strength, and returned to his studies at the University, but his taste for excitement and adventure led him into bad company; he gambled away his ready money, and even sold his books in order to play, until at last, being quite penniless and ashamed to go home, he disappeared from Padua, not yet a grown man, and joined one of those many fighting bands of mercenaries which were employed by the Italian princes of the time. During the following five years he was not heard of in Venice, his relatives gave him up for dead, and when he suddenly appeared at last he was greeted with no small delight by his brothers and sisters. He stayed a while with his family and then went to Greece, thinking that it was high time to take possession of his canonry of Patras. The governor received him with open arms, having no doubt heard that Zeno was fond of fighting, for the Turks were just then very troublesome; and the young man at once rendered good service, and would no doubt have done much more, had he not been severely wounded--‘mortally,’ says the good bishop of Feltre. During the night he fell into a syncope which those who attended him took for death; they accordingly proceeded to prepare him for interment, and only waited for the morning in order to bury him; but he revived, a little before daybreak, and escaped being buried alive. He was in such a condition of weakness that he had to be taken to Venice to recover. While he was there, Peter, King of Cyprus, came to the city and soon took a strong fancy to Zeno, who seems to have made himself useful to this new patron in various ways; but soon the Emperor Charles IV., who was Carlo’s godfather, appeared in Italy, and finding his godson to his liking carried him off and kept him with him for some time, employed him on business which gave him a chance of seeing France, Germany and England, and at last allowed him to return to Patras and to his somewhat neglected ecclesiastical career.