Page:Galileo Galilei and the Roman Curia (IA cu31924012301754).pdf/187



By the beginning of January, 1632, the printing of the "Dialogues" was so far advanced, that on the 3rd Galileo had the satisfaction of telling his friend, Cesare Marsili, at Bologna, that the work would be completed in ten or twelve days. It did not, however, appear till February. On the twenty-second of that month Galileo presented his book to the Grand Duke, to whom it was dedicated, and to the other members of the house of Medici. On the twenty-third he sent at first thirty-two copies to Cesare Marsili. He had a large number of copies handsomely bound for his powerful friends and patrons at Rome, but they could not be despatched immediately, since, owing to the continued prevalence of the plague, they would have had to be purified in the quarantine houses, which might have injured them. It was not till May that two unbound copies reached the papal residence in a roundabout way. One of these came into the hands of Cardinal Francesco Barberini, who lent it to Father Castelli. In a letter to Galileo of 26th September, 1631, he had vowed that, after the appearance of the