Explore "The Humbugs of the World" by P.T. Barnum on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Monsignore Cristoforo Rischio; or, Il Creso, the nostrum-vender of Florence -- A model for our quack doctors.
Every visitor to Florence during the last twenty years must have noticed on the grand piazza before the Ducal Palace, the strange genius known as Monsignore Créso, or, in plain English, Mr. Croesus. He is so called because of his reputed great wealth; but his real name is Christoforo Rischio, which I may again translate, as Christopher Risk. Mrs. Browning refers to him in one of her poems -- the "Casa Guidi Windows," I think -- and he has also been the staple of a tale by one of the Trollope brothers.