my good mother, may God keep and preserve you!’ In a husky voice the old woman made answer to him, ‘And may God keep and preserve you, my son!’ ‘Tell me, my mother,’ Flamminio went on, ‘whether perchance you may be the thing men call Death?’ The old woman replied, ‘No, I am not. On the other hand, I am Life; and know, moreover, that I happen to have with me here in this wallet which I carry behind my back certain liquors and unguents by the working of which I am able with ease to purify and to cure the mortal body of man of all the heavy diseases which afflict him, and in the short space of a single hour to relieve him in like manner from the torture of any pain he may feel.’ Then said Flamminio, ‘Ah, my good mother! can you not let me know where Death is to be found?’ ‘And who may you be,’ asked the old woman, ‘who make this demand of me with so great persistence?’ Flamminio answered, ‘I am a youth who has already spent many days and months and years wandering about in search of Death, and never yet have I been able to find in any land a man who could tell me aught concerning him. Wherefore, if you should happen to possess this knowledge, I beseech you of your courtesy to let me share it, because I am possessed by so keen a desire to look upon him and to know what he is like, in order that I may be certain whether he really is the hideous and the dreadful thing which all men hold him to be.’ The old woman, when she heard the foolish request of the young man, spake thus to him: ‘My son, when would it please you that I let you see Death, and judge how hideous he is, and when would you make trial of his terrors?’ To this Flamminio replied: ‘Ah, my mother! keep me no longer in suspense I beg you, but let me see him now, at this present moment.’ Thereupon the old woman, to satisfy his desire, made him strip himself quite naked, and, while he was taking off his garments, she worked up together certain of her drugs useful in the cure of divers diseases, and when the thing was ready, she said to him: ‘Bend yourself down here, my son.’ And he, in obedience to her direction, bent down. ‘Now bow your head and close your eyes;’ and Flamminio did as she bade him. Scarcely had the old woman finished her speech than she took the sharp blade which she wore by her side and with one blow struck off his head from his shoulders. Then she quickly took up the head, and, having replaced it upon the bust, she smeared it well with the plaster which she had prepared, and thereby the wound was quickly healed. But how the thing which now happened was caused I cannot say, whether it arose through the over-quickness of the old hag in putting back the head upon the shoulders, or whether she herself brought it to pass through her own craft. The head when it was joined once more to the body was put on hind part forward. Wherefore Flamminio, when he looked down upon his shoulders, his loins, and his big buttocks standing out (all of which