I wish my epistle to consist of unqualified good humour, that I may impart to you a portion of the pleasure I derived from the baths of Baden.” Soon after Poggio’s return from Baden to Constance the Council proceeded to the trial of Jerome of Prague, an intimate friend and associate of John Huss. When Jerome was apprized of the arrest and imprisonment of his brother reformer, he deemed himself bound in honour to repair to Constance, to administer to him comfort and assistance. He accordingly arrived in that city on the 24th of April, 1415.[73] But alarmed by the violence of spirit which seemed to rage against reputed heretics, he soon fled from Constance, and went to Uberlingen, whence he sent to the council to demand a safe conduct. Instead of this instrument of protection, the members of that assembly addressed to him a citation to appear before them, and answer to a charge of heresy.[74] Justly dreading the consequences of encountering the prejudices of the ecclesiastical dignitaries, whose morals and principles he had so often branded with infamy, he refused to obey this citation, and set off on his return to Bohemia. He proceeded without molestation as far as Hirsaw; but there he was arrested by the officers of the duke of Sultzbach, who sent him in chains to Constance.[75] Immediately after his arrival in that city, he underwent an examination, after which he was committed to prison. The severity which he there experienced, the importunity of some of his prosecutors, and his solitary meditations on the dreadful catastrophe of Huss, at length shook his constancy, and on the 15th of September, 1415, he read in open Council, a recantation of his errors.[76] At this price he purchased a relaxation of the rigour of his confinement: but, notwithstanding the remonstrances of Zabarella, and of three other cardinals, who contended, that by his renunciation of error, he had satisfied public justice, he was detained in custody. In the course of a few months after his recantation, new articles of impeachment were exhibited against him. To these he pleaded in a solemn assembly of the council, held for that purpose, on the 26th May, 1416.[77] Poggio, who was present at this second trial of Jerome, gave the following interesting account of it to his friend Leonardo Aretino.[78]