[Footnote 1: "You heap up in your folly ample riches for yourself, and
refuse a crumb of bread to the poor man; lo! the day is at hand when
burning in cruel flames, you shall beg for a drop of water."--_Ship of
Fools._]


In those days Nicolas Nerli was a banker in the noble city of Florence.
Tierce was no sooner sounded than he was at his desk, and at nones he
was seated there still, poring all day long over the figures he wrote in
his table-books. He lent money to the Emperor and to the Pope. And if he
did not lend to the Devil, it was only because he was afraid of bad
debts with him they call the Wily One, and who is full of cunning and
trickery. Nicolas Nerli was bold and unscrupulous; he had won great
riches and robbed many folks of their own. Wherefore he was highly
honoured in the city of Florence. He dwelt in a Palace where the light
of God's day entered only by narrow windows; and this was a wise
precaution, for the rich man's house must be a castle, and they who
possess much wealth do well to defend by force what they have gotten by
cunning.

Accordingly the windows were guarded with bars and the doors with
chains. Outside, the walls were painted in fresco by clever craftsmen,
who had depicted thereon the Virtues under the likeness of women, the
Patriarchs, the Prophets and the Kings of Israel. Tapestries hung in the
rooms within, displaying the histories of Alexander and Tristram, as
they are told us in legends. Nicolas Nerli set all the city talking of
his wealth by the pious foundations he established. He had raised an
Hospital beyond the walls, the frieze of which, carved and painted,
represented the most honourable actions of his own life; in gratitude
for the sums of money he had given towards the completion of Santa Maria