[006]There was formerly in our city a knight, by name Messer
Tedaldo, of the Lamberti, according to some, or, as others say, of the
Agolanti
family, perhaps for no better reason than that the occupation
of his sons was similar to that which always was and is the
occupation of the Agolanti.
[007]
However, without professing to
determine which of the two houses he belonged to, I say, that he
was in his day a very wealthy knight, and had three sons, the eldest
being by name Lamberto, the second Tedaldo, and the third
Agolante. Fine, spirited young men were they all, though the
eldest was not yet eighteen years old when their father, Messer
Tedaldo, died very rich, leaving to them as his lawful heirs the
whole of his property both movable and immovable.
[008]
Finding
themselves thus possessed of great wealth, both in money and in
lands and chattels, they fell to spending without stint or restraint,
indulging their every desire, maintaining a great establishment, and
a large and well-filled stable, besides dogs and hawks, keeping ever
open house, scattering largesses, jousting, and, not content with these
and the like pastimes proper to their condition, indulging every
appetite natural to their youth.
[009]
They had not long followed this
course of life before the cash left them by their father was exhausted;
and, their rents not sufficing to defray their expenditure, they began
to sell and pledge their property, and disposing of it by degrees, one
item to-day and another to-morrow, they hardly perceived that they
were approaching the verge of ruin, until poverty opened the eyes
which wealth had fast sealed.
[010]
So one day Lamberto called his
brothers to him, reminded them of the position of wealth and
dignity which had been theirs and their father's before them, and
shewed them the poverty to which their extravagance had reduced
them, and adjured them most earnestly that, before their destitution
was yet further manifest, they should all three sell what little
remained to them and depart thence; which accordingly they did.
[011]
Without leave-taking, or any ceremony, they quitted Florence; nor
did they rest until they had arrived in England and established
themselves in a small house in London, where, by living with extreme
parsimony and lending at exorbitant usances, they prospered so well
that in the course of a few years they amassed a fortune;
[012]
and so,
one by one, they returned to Florence, purchased not a few of their
former estates besides many others, and married. The management
of their affairs in England where they continued their business of
usurers, they left to a young nephew, Alessandro by name, while,
heedless
alike of the teaching of experience and of marital and
parental duty, they all three launched out at Florence into more
extravagant expenditure than before, and contracted debts on all
hands and to large amounts.
[013]
This expenditure they were enabled
for some years to support by the remittances made by Alessandro,
who, to his great profit, had lent money to the barons on the
security of their castles and rents.
