There once lived in Florence in the days of King Long-Ago or Queen Formerly a signore who went beyond all the men who ever sinned, in making evil out of good and turning light into darkness. For, under cover of being very devout and serving the saints, he well-nigh outdid many a devil in making all about him unhappy. He had six children, three boys and three girls, all as fine young folk as there were in Tuscany. For he was severe in punishing and slow in rewarding, always reviling, never giving a kind word. Once when his eldest son saved him from drowning at the risk of his own life, he abused and struck the youth for tearing his garment in so doing. And in his family there was ever the wolf at the table with such a hunger that one could see it, [21a] while all save himself went so sorrily clad that it was a shame to behold, and if anyone made a jest or so much as smiled there came abuse and blows. And to offend and grieve and insult was so deeply in him that it became a disease.

However, evil weeds must fade as well as flowers; everything dies except Death, and the longer time he takes to sharpen his scythe, the more keenly will it cut. So it came to pass that one day this good man, but very bad parent, came suddenly to his death-bed, while his children stood round with eyes as dry as the Arno in August, which, though it may shine here and there, never runs over. [21b]

Now, by chance there stood by the dying man the great magician Virgilio, who indeed had much love and pity for these young people. And at the same minute, but seen only by him, there came floating in, like a bit of gold-leaf on a light feather, borne on the current of air, a certain folletto, or devil, who had been drifting about in the world for a thousand years, and in all that time had only learned more and more that everything is naught, or nothing of much consequence, and that good or evil stand for one another, according to circumstances. And as the dying man was one who, above all people living, made the meanest trifle a thing of vast importance, so this devil, whose name was BalsÀbo, went beyond all his own kind of diavoli pococuranti in being unlike the great Signore di Tribaldo (as the dead man was called), he being a diavolo a dirittura, a devil in a straight line, or directly forward. And this demon being invisible to all save Virgil, the master said to him secretly:

“Art thou willing to enter this man’s body and act as his soul, and become father of a family?”

“As ready for that as for anything. No doubt I will find fun in it,” answered BalsÀbo.

Then Virgil said:

“Spirito di BelsÀbo,
Io ti scongiurÒ
Che per comando mio
Tu lasci una vita sfrenata
Come ’ai tenuto per il passato
E dentro il corpo di Tribaldo
Tu possa entrare e divenire
Un capo di famiglia
Fino a ordine mio.
E tutti quei
Fanciulli educherai (sic).”

“Spirit of BelsÀbo,
I now conjure thee
That by my command
Thou shalt leave the lewd life
Which thou did’st lead of old,
And enter into this body
Of Di Tribaldo, and become
Head of a family,
And educate his children.”

So into the body he went, as the spirit of Di Tribaldo went out, like the toy which shows the weather in which one puppet pops forth as the other goes in. So there he lay for a minute, all the children around in silent amazement that he had departed without cursing them. When all at once up leaped BalsÀbo, as gay as a lark, crying like a Scaramuccio:

“Whoop, pigs! here we are again!”

Hearing which, the dear children, understanding that he had come to life again, did indeed weep bitterly, so that Di Tribaldo, had he stopped a little longer, might have been amazed. But he had no sooner gone out of his body than a great grim devil, a kind of detective demon, who was on the look-out for souls, whipped him up, gave him a couple of cuffs to keep him quiet, and, putting him into a game-bag, drawing the cords tight, and then rolling them round and tying them, flew off to give the prey up to the proper authorities, and what disposition they made of this precious piece of property I know not, nor truly do I much care. All that can be said is that ’twas a good riddance of bad rubbish, and that we may all rejoice that he comes no more into this story.

But what was the amazement of the well-nigh bereaved children when their solemn parent made a leap half-way to the ceiling, and then, while imitating with his mouth a zufolo, or shepherd’s pipe, to perfection, began to dance with grace a wild coranto, and anon sang:

“Chi ben vive, ben muore,
Io lo credo in mio cuore;
Oggi vivo, in figura,
E doman in sepoltura,
Ho scappato ben il orco,
Morto io, morto il porco!” [23]

“He who lives well may well depart,
As I believe with all my heart.
To-day alive, and all in bloom,
To-morrow buried in the tomb;
But I’ve escaped, and don’t care why!
If I were dead the pig might die!
The pig might die, the world be burned!
And everything to ashes turned!”

Which pious song being ended, he asked them why they were all staring at him like a party of stuck pigs, and bade them scamper and send out for a good supper, with flowers and wine; and on their asking what he would have, he replied, still singing:

“Everything to please the palate,
Venison, woodcocks, larks, and sallet,
Partridges both wild and tame,
And every other kind of game,
Buttered eggs and macaroni,
Salmagundi, rice and honey,
Mince-pies and oyster too,
Lobster patties, veal ragoÛt,
Beef, with mushrooms round the dish,
And everything that heart could wish.”

Whereupon, being told by his eldest daughter, who was of opinion that he had gone mad, that such a supper would cost twenty crowns, he replied that it could not be done for the money, and that he should always expect such a meal every day, and a much better one when guests should come. Wherein he kept his word, and amazed them all by urging them to stuff and cram to their hearts’ desire, but especially by pressing them to drink; and whereas it had been of yore that they had been scolded like beasts if they so much as begged for a second glass of sour, half-watered wine, they were now jeered and jibed as duffers and sticks for not swigging off their bumpers of the best and strongest like men.

And they also noted a great change in this, that while the late Signore Tribaldo had ever been as severe in manner and conversation as any saint, and grim as an old owl, the Signore BalsÀbo during the meal cracked one joke after the other, some of them none too seemly, and roared with laughter at their frightened looks. But as ’tis easy to teach young cats the way to the dairy, they began to slowly put out one paw after the other, and be of the opinion that on the whole their dear papa had been much improved by his death and revival. And some word having been said of games, he suddenly whipped out a pack of cards and proposed play. At which his eldest son replying that it would be but a thin game with them who had hardly a quattrino apiece, BalsÀbo sent for his strong-box, which was indeed well-lined, and gave them each a hundred crowns in gold, swearing it was a shame that such a magnificent family as his should go about like poor beggars, because handsome youth and beautiful girls needed fine clothes, and that in future they were all to spend what they liked—and bless the expense at that!—for as long as there was twopence in the locker, half of it should be theirs.

Then they sat down to play, and Gianni, the eldest son, and Bianca, the eldest daughter, who had aforetime learned to play a little on the sly, thought they would surely win. But BalsÀbo in the end beat them all, and when they marvelled at his luck roared with laughter, and said ’twas no wonder, for he had cheated at every turn; and then, sitting down again, showed them how ’twas done, but bade them keep it all a family secret. “For thus,” said he, “we can among us cheat all the gamesters in Florence, and ever be as rich as so many Cardinals.”

And then he said to them, as in apology: “Ye have no doubt, my dear children, marvelled that I have this evening been somewhat strict and austere with you, which is not to be blamed, considering that I have been dead and am only just now alive again; but I trust that in future I shall be far more kind and indulgent, and lend you a helping hand in all your little games, whatever they be; for the only thing which can grieve me is that there shall be any fun or devilry going on, and I not have a hand in it. And as it is becoming that children should obey their parents, and have no secrets from them, I enjoin it strictly on you that whatever you may be up to, from swindling at pitch-and-toss, up to manslaughter or duels, ye do nothing without first taking counsel with me, because I, being more experienced in the ways of this wicked world, can best guard you against its deceptions. And so, my beloved infants, go in peace, which means go it while you are young, and as peacefully as you can, and merrily if you must!”

Now, the eldest son, Gianni, had longed well nigh to being ill, and even to tears, to wear fine clothes (in which Bianca and the others were well up with him), and have a gallant horse, like the other youths of his rank in Florence. But kind as BalsÀbo had been to him, he hardly dared to broach the subject, when all at once his father introduced it by asking him why he went footing about like a pitiful beggar, instead of riding like a cavalier; and learning that it was because he had no steed, BalsÀbo gave a long whistle and said:

“Well, you are a fool of forty-five degrees! Why the devil, if you thought I would not approve it, did you not buy a horse on post-obit credit, and ride him on the sly? However, ’tis never too late to mend. But such a goose as you would be certainly cheated in the buying. Come with me.”

And Gianni soon found that his saint of a father was well up to all the tricks of the horse trade, the end being that he had the best steed in Florence for half of what it would have cost him. And from this accomplished parent he also learned to ride and fence, and in the latter he taught his son so many sly passes and subtle tricks, crafty glissades and botte, that he had not his master in all the land.

And now a strange thing came to pass: that as all these young people, though willing enough to be gay and well attired, were good at heart and honest, as they day by day found that their father, though really bad in nothing, had, on the other hand, no more conscience or virtue than an old shoe or a rag scarecrow, so it was they who began to sermonize him, even as the late Signore Tribaldo had lectured them, the tables being quite turned. But what was most marvellous was that Signore BalsÀbo, far from taking any offence, seemed to find in this being scolded for his want of heart, morals, and other crimes, a deep and wondrous joy, a sweet delight, as of one who has discovered a new pleasure or great treasure. This was especially the case when he was brought to book, or hauled over the coals, by his daughter Bianca, who was gifted with the severe eloquence of her other father, which she now poured forth in floods on his successor.

Now, you may well imagine that an old devil-goblin who had been kicked and footed about the world for a thousand years between the back-kitchen of hell unto the inner courts of the Vatican, including all kinds of life, but especially the bad, thus having a family to support and beloved daughters and sons to blow him up, and, in fact, the mere having any decent Christian care enough for him to call him a soulless old blackguard, was like undreamed-of bliss. He had been in his time exorcised by priests in Latin through all that grammar and vocabulary could supply, and cursed in Etruscan, Greek, Lombard, and everything else; but the Italian of his daughter had in it the exquisite and novel charm that there was real love mingled with it and gratitude for his profuse kindness and indulgence, so that ’twas to him like the pecking of an angry and dear canary bird, the which thing acted on him so strangely that he at times was fain to look about him for some stray sin to commit, in order to get a good sound scolding. For he had fallen so much into decent life and ways by living with his dear children that it often happened that he did nothing wrong for as much as three or four days together.

And truly it was a brave sight to see him, when reprimanded, cast down his eyes and sigh: “Yes, yes! ’tis too true: mea culpa! mea maxima culpa! It was indeed wicked!” when all the while he hardly knew where the sin was or wherein he had done wrong or right or anything else. Now, it may seem a strange thing that so old a sinner should ever come to grace; but as ye know that in old tombs raspberry or other seeds, hard and dry, a thousand years old, have been found which, however, grew when planted, so BalsÀbo began to think and change, and try, even for curiosity’s sake, what being good meant.

Meanwhile it was a marvel to see how well—notwithstanding all the expenditure, to which there was no limit, save the consciences of the children—BalsÀbo kept the treasury supplied. And this was to him a joke, as all life was, save, indeed, the children, in whom he began to take interest, or for whom he felt love; for, what with knowing where many an old treasure lay hidden, or the true value of many a cheap estate, and a hundred other devices and tricks, he ever gained so much that in time he gave great dowers to his daughters, and castles and lands, with titles, to his sons.

Now, it came to pass—and it was the greatest marvel of all—that Bianca, by her reproving and reforming BalsÀbo, had her own heart turned to goodness, and gave herself up to good works and study and prayer; and unto her studies BalsÀbo, curiously interested, gave great aid. Then she learned marvellously deep secrets of magic and spirits, but nothing evil; and it came to pass that in her books she found that there were beings born of the elements, creatures appointed to live a thousand years or more, and then pass away into air or fire, and exist no longer. Furthermore, she discovered that such wandering spirits sometimes took up their abode in human bodies, and that, being neither good nor bad, they were always wild and strange, given up of all things to quaint tricks and strange devices, as ready unto one thing as another.

And it came to her mind, as she noted how BalsÀbo knew all languages, and spoke of things which took place ages before as if he had lived in them, and of men long dead as if he had known them, that he who was her father aforetime was ignorant of all this as he was of gentleness or kindness or good nature, all which BalsÀbo carried to a fault, not caring to take the pains to injure his worst enemy or to do a good turn to his best friend, unless it amused him, in which case he would kill the one with as little sorrow as if he were a fly, and give the other a castle or a thousand crowns, and think no more of it than if he had fed a hawk or a hound. And all such good deeds he played off in some droll fashion, like tricks, as if thinking that sport, and nothing else, was the end and aim of all benevolence. However, as regarded Bianca and her brothers and sisters, he seemed to have other ideas, and to her he appeared to be as another being, in love and awe obeying her as a child and striving to understand her lessons.

So this went on for years, till at last one day Bianca, full of strange suspicions, which had become well nigh certainties, went to Virgilio and said:

“Tell me in truth who is this being whom thou didst send us as my father, for that he is not the Di Tribaldo of earlier days, I am sure. Good and kind he hath been, but too strange to be human; wild hart is he, not to be measured as a man.”

Virgil replied:

“Thou hast guessed the riddle, and yet not all; for he is a spirit of the elements, and his appointed time is drawing near to an end, and, being neither good nor evil, he would have passed away in peace into the nothing which is the end of all his kind. But thou hast awakened in him a knowledge of love and duty, so that he will die in sorrow, for he has learned from thee what he has lost.”

Then Bianca asked:

“Can he not be saved?”

And Virgil replied:

“If anyone would give his or her life, then by virtue of that sacrifice, when the thousand years of his existence shall be at an end, the two lives shall be as one in the world where all are one in love for ever.”

Bianca replied:

“That which I have begun I will finish. Having opened the bud, I will not leave the flower; having the flower, I will bring it to fruit and seed; the egg which I found and saved, I will hatch. She who hath said ‘A’ must also say ‘B,’ till all the letters are learned.

“‘Who such a course hath once begun,
To the very end must run.’

And so will I give my life to give a soul to this poor spirit, even as the Lord gave His to save mankind.”Then Bianca departed, and many days passed. On a time Virgilio saw BalsÀbo, who greeted him with a sad smile.

“My sand is well-nigh run out, oh master,” said the spirit. “Yet another day, and the sun which is to rise no more will go down behind the mountain-range of life. Il sole tramonta.”

“And art thou pleased to have been for a time a man?” asked Virgil.

“It was not an ill thing to be loved by the children,” replied BalsÀbo. “There I had great joy and learned much—yea, far too much for my own happiness, for I found that I was lost. When I was ignorant, and only a poor child of air and earth, fire and water, I knew nothing of good or evil, or of a soul or a better life in eternity; now I have learned all that by love, and also that it is not for me.”

“Wait and see,” replied Virgilio. “He who has learned to love has made the first step to immortality.”

And after a few days, news was brought to Virgilio that BalsÀbo, whom men called Di Tribaldo, was dying, and that Bianca also could not live long; and that night the master, looking from his tower beyond the Arno on the hill, that which is now called the San Gallo, or the Torre di Galileo, saw afar in the night a strange vision, the forms of a man and of a young woman, divinely beautiful, sweetly spiritual, in a golden, rosy light, ever rising higher and higher, while afar there was a sound as of harps and voices singing:

“They walked in the world as in a dream,
For nothing they saw as it now doth seem;
And all they knew of care and woe
Is now but a tale of the long ago;
And they will walk in the land on high
Where flowers are blooming ever and aye,
And every flower in its breath and bloom
Sings in the spirit with song perfume,
And the song which it sings in the land above,
In a thousand forms, is eternal love.”

And as they rose Virgilio saw falling from them, as it were, a rain of rose-leaves and lilies, and every leaf as it fell faded, yet became a spirit which entered some newborn babe, and the spirit was its life.

“Sweetly hast thou sung, oh Spirit of God,” said Virgilio, as the last note was heard and the sight vanished. “The poorest devil may be saved by Love.”

The idea that a soul or spirit, human or other, can enter into a dead body and revive it is to be found in the legends of all lands, from those of ancient Egypt, as appears in that of “Anpu and Bata,” which has been nine times translated into English, down to several of these Italian tales. It is a fancy which need not be traditional or borrowed; it would occur to man as soon as the Shaman pretended to go out of his body while in a trance.

After the foregoing was written out, including the allusion to seeds found in tombs a thousand years old which grew again, and which were, of course, Roman or Etruscan, as the only kind known in Italy—I never having read of any such thing save as regards corn found in Egypt—I met with the following passage in “The Sagacity and Morality of Plants,” by Dr. J. E. Taylor:

“Seeds have been found in Celtic tumuli . . . which, after an interval of perhaps two thousand years, have germinated into plants, and similar successful experiments have been made with seeds found in ancient Roman tombs.”

As regards the original of this story, it was so imperfect, brief, and trifling that I have, as it were, well-nigh reconstructed it, and might as well claim to be its author as not, as I should have done were I an earlier Italian novelist, who without scruple appropriated popular stories with as little conscience as Robert Burns did old ballads. Bishop Percy amended them, and owned it, and all that he got thereby was much abuse and ridicule. But it is of little consequence when the legend is not offered as a mere tradition, and this is only a scrap of tradition rÉchauffÉ.

The character of BalsÀbo belongs closely to the class which includes Falstaff, Panurge, Punch, Belphegor, and many other types who are “without conscience or cognition” of right or wrong, neither adapted to be banned or blessed, genially selfish, extravagantly generous, good fellows and bad Christians, yet who have ever been pre-eminently popular. But I am not aware that it ever entered into a mortal head to dream of their being reformed, any more than their cousins Manfred and Don Giovanni, for which reason I consider this tale of BalsÀbo as decidedly original. Sinners we have had repentant by thousands, but this is really the only history of the conversion of Nothingarian.

Paracelsus was the first writer, following the Neo-Platonists and popular traditions, to make a mythology of elementary spirits and define their nature.

“There dwell,” he says, “under the earth semi-homines, or half-human beings, who have all temporal things which can be enjoyed and desired. They are called ‘gnomes,’ though properly the name should be sylphs or pygmies. They are not spirits, yet may be compared to them . . . between them and the devil is a great difference, because he does not die and they do, albeit they are very long-lived. And they are not spirits, because a spirit is immortal.”

This gave birth in later days to the “Entertainments” of the Comte de Gabalis, and the exquisite “Undine” of La Motte FouquÉ. Of late years exact science, by its investigations into zoology and botany, has approached Paracelsus by discovering incredible developments in instinctive intelligence, as distinguished from self-conscious reason, in all that exists.

Since the foregoing tale, with the comment on it, was written, even to the last word, I met with and read a novel entitled “Entombed in the Flesh,” by Michael Henry Dziewicki, [32] which, both as regards plot and many details, bears such an extraordinary, and yet absolutely accidental, resemblance to the story of “BalsÀbo” that, unless I enter a protest to the contrary, I can hardly escape the accusation of having borrowed largely from it. In it a demon, neither angel nor devil, enters into the body of a man just dead, and has many marvellous and amusing adventures, being, of course, involved in the fate of a girl whom Lucifer wishes to destroy. The end is, however, very different, because in the novel Phantasto, the spirit, is set free, and the maiden rescued by the latter going into a Salvation Army meeting and being moved by hearing the name and teaching of Jesus. In “BalsÀbo” the demon has immortality conferred on him by Bianca’s giving her own life to effect it. This is, I think, more ingenious than any other sacrifice could be, because in the tale, though it be rudely expressed, there is the exquisite conception that an immortal existence can take in, include with it, and identify a minor intelligence or raise it to a higher sphere.

That I have somewhat enlarged the original tale or written it up will be evident to everyone, but I have omitted very little which is in the text, save an incantation at the end which Virgil addresses to the unborn souls who are to enter into the bodies of the children born of the rose-leaves. But I have inadvertently missed one point, to the effect that, after having been kicked out of hell, BalsÀbo got down so low in morality as to be finally expelled from the Vatican. The literal translation of the passage is as follows:

“But poor BalsÀbo, who had been kicked out of the kitchen of hell, . . . and even from the Vatican (felt honoured) . . . when Bianca scolded him like a child, and said: ‘Vergogna!’—‘For shame!’”