And how should Aeneas Sylvius not be the first to beckon’ When on die opening page of that bulky folio (Bale 1551) there is a formula so close to us: that one should be grown up at twenty, prudent at thirty, rich at forty? Measure that formula against Dante, or even Petrarch (whom it might fit, yet who could not have uttered it), and you will see why Aeneas Sylvius claims kinship forward, more than back. The quality of his mind was also therefore sceptical, as witness that little anecdote on Scotland. ‘I had heard once there was a tree in Scotland which growing on the river bank produced fruits in the shape of duckings; and these when they reach maturity fall of their own accord, some on the land, some in the water; and those that fall on the ground rot, but those falling in the water soon come to life and straight away fly up into the air with wings and feathers.