...you another couple of lines; and this is to say that for twelve years now I've been traipsing around Italy, borne all kinds of disgrace, suffered every calamity, lacerated my body with cruel toil, put my own life in danger a thousand times, only to help my family; and now that I've started to raise...

...linked to a tormented personality, a dramatic, eventful life, as he himself described it to his brother: "I have been traipsing around all Italy, borne all...every calamity, lacerated my body with cruel toil". And again, he writes to Martelli: "I see that you have imagined that I am what God wished me to be....