law of Venice and the custom of the Lombards, you can picture yourself,
Fabio Mutinelli, what I shall think of the Christian Merchant and his
security."

Fabio, without a moment's loss of time, bought ships and loaded up with
salt and other sorts of merchandise, which he disposed of in the cities
of the Adriatic shore to great advantage. Then, with a fresh cargo
aboard, he set sail for Constantinople, where he bought carpets,
perfumes, peacock feathers, ivory and ebony. These goods his agents
exchanged along the coasts of Dalmatia for building timber, which the
Venetians had contracted for from him in advance. By these means, in six
months' time, he had multiplied tenfold the amount the Jew had lent him.

But one day that he was taking his diversion with some Greek women,
aboard his vessel, which lay in the Bosphorus, having put out too far to
sea, he was captured by pirates and carried prisoner to Egypt, though,
by rare good fortune, his gold and merchandise were in a safe place all
the while. The pirates sold him to a Saracen lord, who putting him in
fetters, sent him afield to till the wheat, which grows very finely in
that country. Fabio offered his master to pay a heavy ransom, but the
Paynim's daughter, who loved him and was fain to bring him to the end
she desired, over-persuaded her father not to let him go at any price.
Reduced to the necessity of trusting to himself alone for release, he
filed his irons with the tools given him for tilling the ground, made
good his escape to the Nile and threw himself into a boat. Casting
loose, he got to the sea, which was not far off, and when on the point
of death from thirst and hunger, was rescued by a Spanish vessel bound
for Genoa. But, after keeping her course a week, the ship was caught in
a storm which drove her on the coast of Dalmatia. In making the shore,
she was wrecked on a reef. All the crew were drowned except Fabio, who