Page:Peregrinaggio di tre giovani figliuoli del re di Serendippo.djvu/91

 All who saw admired it so much that they could barely be persuaded that it had been produced by human hand. Because he wanted to recognize the great merit of the goldsmith throughout the land, he assigned to him an annual income of more than one thousand scudi. Now, such generosity from the Lord caused great envy among many goldsmiths in the city and they visited the Lion often to see whether there were any obvious defects in craftmanship that they could criticize, and in so doing gain the Lord's favor.

And among these there was one who was shrewd and very prudent and who said that, not knowing of any defects in the work, the Lion could not contain ten thousand gold pieces, based on its size and quality. And he judged this to be a good opportunity to deprive the goldsmith of his income and to get into the good graces of the Lord, and he focused all his thoughts on this. But since he could not believe that in order to ascertain that the goldsmith had robbed him, the Lord had to have the statue of the animal, which was so perfect, cut entirely into pieces. He did not know exactly how to figure out how else to weigh that much gold. When one day he discussed this with his wife, he told her that whoever knew a method for weighing the Lion, and prove to the Lord that the goldsmith had robbed him, he would without a doubt acquire the favor of the Lord and obtain the annual income assigned to the goldsmith.