Allegories; Frame stories; Plague -- Europe -- History -- Fiction; Storytelling -- Fiction
All professed themselves ready enough to eat the pills; and so, having
set them in a row with Calandrino among them, Bruno, beginning at one
end, proceeded to give each a pill, and when he came to Calandrino he
chose one of the pills of dog-ginger and put it in his hand. Calandrino
thrust it forthwith between his teeth and began to chew it; but no sooner
was his tongue acquainted with the aloes, than, finding the bitterness
intolerable, he spat it out. Now, the eyes of all the company being fixed
on one another to see who should spit out his pill, Bruno, who, not
having finished the distribution, feigned to be concerned with nought
else, heard some one in his rear say:--"Ha! Calandrino, what means this?"
and at once turning round, and marking that Calandrino had spit out his
pill:--"Wait a while," quoth he, "perchance 'twas somewhat else that
caused thee to spit: take another;" and thereupon whipping out the other
pill of dog-ginger, he set it between Calandrino's teeth, and finished
the distribution. Bitter as Calandrino had found the former pill, he
found this tenfold more so; but being ashamed to spit it out, he kept it
a while in his mouth and chewed it, and, as he did so, tears stood in his
eyes that shewed as large as filberts, and at length, being unable to
bear it any longer, he spat it out, as he had its predecessor. Which
being observed by Buffalmacco and Bruno, who were then administering the
wine, and by all the company, 'twas averred by common consent that
Calandrino had committed the theft himself; for which cause certain of
them took him severely to task.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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