Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/521

Rh change her hatred into kind love, which at length she fully obtained."—Decameron, 5th Day, Nov. 8. The catastrophe in the text I have added, as affording a better moral. The same story occurs in the 12th chapter of Alphonsus de Clericali Disciplina. It appears in an English garb amongst a collection of Æsop's Fables, published in 1658. Mr. Ellis, or rather Mr. Douce in his Analysis of Alphonsus (see Ancient Metrical Romances) has not noticed this translation.

"Licence was given, upon that day of triumph, to utter tke [sic] most galling reproaches, and the most cutting sarcasms."

Privileges of this kind were permitted to the Roman slaves, on the celebration of their Saturnalia. In the seventh satire of the second book, Horace gives us an example.

Davus spares not his master; and in all probability, many a long treasured grudge would, on these occasions, be vented in the bitterest sarcasms.