that they took refuge in the palace of the Papal Nuncio, whence they escaped that same evening to the Lido en route for the States of the Church.  An old Venetian nobleman of the highest birth, Alessandro Malipiero, who bore a singular affection for the champion of his country’s liberty, was walking a short way in front of Sarpi beyond the bridge upon which the assault was perpetrated.  He rushed to his friend’s aid, dragged out the dagger from his face, and bore him to the convent.  There Sarpi lay for many weeks in danger, suffering as much, it seems, from his physicians as from the wounds.  Not satisfied with the attendance of his own surgeon, Alvise Ragoza, the Venetians insisted on sending all the eminent doctors of the city and of Padua to his bedside.  The illustrious Acquapendente formed one of this miscellaneous cortege; and when the cure was completed, he received a rich gold chain and knighthood for his service.  Every medical man suggested some fresh application.  Some of them, suspecting poison, treated the wounds with theriac and antidotes.  Others cut into the flesh and probed.  Meanwhile the loss of blood had so exhausted Sarpi’s meager frame that for more than twenty days he had no strength to move or lift his hands.  Not a word of impatience escaped his lips; and when Acquapendente began to medicate the worst wound in his face, he moved the dozen doctors to laughter by wittily observing, ’And yet the world maintains that it was given Stilo Romanae Curiae.’[145] His old friend Malipiero would fain have kept the dagger as a relic.  But Sarpi suspended it at the foot of a crucifix in the church of the Servi, with this appropriate inscription, Dei Filio Liberatori.  When he had recovered from his long suffering, the Republic assigned their Counselor an increase of pension in order that he might maintain a body of armed guards, and voted him a house in S. Marco for the greater security of his person.  But Sarpi begged to be allowed to remain among the friars, with whom he had spent his life, and where his vocation bound him.  In the future he took a few obvious precautions, passing in a gondola to the Rialto and thence on foot through the crowded Merceria to the Ducal Palace, and furthermore securing the good offices of his attendants in the convent by liberal gifts of money.  Otherwise, he refused to alter the customary tenor of his way.

[Footnote 144:  Dispatch to Fr. Contarini under date September 25, 1607, quoted in Campbell’s Life of Sarpi, p. 145.]

[Footnote 145:  Fulgenzio’s Life, p. 61.  A.G.  Campbell asserts that this celebrated mot of Sarpi’s is not to be found in Fulgenzio’s MS. It occurs, however, quite naturally in the published work.  The first edition of the Life appeared in 1646, eight years before Fulgenzio’s death.  The discrepancies between it and the MS. may therefore have been intended by the author.]