a personage eminent in learning and revered for his sanctity of life," as he thinks that if the letter is handed to the cardinal, he will hand it to the Congregation, and the cardinals may request to be informed who this personage is. At all events he would like first to consult Castelli, who was not just then at Rome.
The result of the consultation was, however, to deliver the letter to Barberini. Niccolini reported to Galileo on 6th November,[1] that he had received it in a very friendly spirit, and was altogether very kindly disposed towards him. The ambassador does not doubt that a delay will at any rate be granted, that Galileo may make the journey to Rome with less inconvenience.[2] We learn from a document in Gherardi's archives, that Galileo's petitions were discussed at a sitting of the Congregation of the Holy Office held on 11th November, in presence of the Pope, but that he would not grant them, and decreed that Galileo must obey, and ordered that the Inquisitor at Florence should be written to that he might compel Galileo to come to Rome.[3]
Niccolini, meanwhile, was unwearied in trying to get Galileo's proposals accepted. He went to Cardinal Ginetti, who was a member of the Congregation and in high favour with the Pope, and to Mgr. Boccabella, assessor of the Holy Office, and represented to both Galileo's great age, his failing health, and the peril to his life of a journey through quarantine and plague. But as both prelates, on whom as members of the Holy Office strict secrecy was imposed, "only heard what he had to say, and answered nothing," Niccolini went to the Pope himself, to make one more attempt. Having as he thought put the imperious pontiff into the best of humours, by assuring him that the unfortunate savant was ready to render prompt obedience to every command, he laid all the
