“Since you are lately out of your barbarous Germany, you of course know all about that friar Luther. People here talk of him more and more. ‘To the flames’ say some, but that is not easy. The Elector of Saxony is protecting him, and they say many of his countrymen are mad enough to call him not a heretic, but a saint. Sylvestro Priario, His Holiness’s censor, has written a bitter and biting retort to those much discussed theses. Some men here say it is somewhat too harsh really to serve its end. He asks ‘if Luther has an iron snout and a head of brass which it is impossible to shatter?’ Again he says, ‘It is the nature of dogs to bite. I fear thou hast a dog for thy father.’ Again--seeing that Luther has said there is no warrant for indulgences in the Scripture--‘we have not the authority of the Scripture for them, but we have the authority of the Roman Church and the Popes, which is the greater of the twain.’ All this is, beyond doubt, abrupt, and I fear Priario was ill advised in publishing it. Still this German trouble-monger must be quieted, and perhaps the sharpest way is the best. I understand he is about to be cited to Rome to answer for his heresies. Then if he recants, he is stultified with his countrymen, and his influence is gone. If he refuses, there is assuredly only one end for him. But I plague you enough with such trifles. Let me tell you of the Conte di Rampogli’s Genoese inamorata. She has grown marvellously handsomer since she bleached her hair.” So Rome was acting at last. Of course I had been a true prophet. The Wittenberg friar would learn what it was to curtail the perquisites of the Vatican. But I had not the least interest in the small talk that concluded the gossipy letter. I threw down the offending sheets, and stamped them under foot. “Why in the name of every saint,” I vowed, “cannot Dominati write like a sensible man?” And again, despite all my efforts, I was a very tiresome host that afternoon.