Fencing Bear at Prayer

We call it bating when the falcon, held by the jesses on the hand or perch, attempts to fly off .  This occurs most frequently in unseeled falcons held on the hand and indoors during the period of their wildness....  As some forms of bating are more serious than others, let us see which is the least harmful; for although we cannot altogether prevent the falcon from flying off the hand, we can train her to choose the least injurious acts....  In all cases of bating the falconer must use every effort to replace the falcon as quickly as possible in her normal position, for the longer she is pendant [on her jesses] the greater is the risk of serious injury.... Inasmuch as a falcon that is securely held on the fist or tied to a perch will not remain quiet under all conditions, especially while still in the wild state, it is good policy to accustom her to that form of bating that will do her least harm, viz., that which takes an upward direction toward the falconer's face....

"[ Mombaer's book ] is divided into titles, or articles.  The first one is called 'Eruditiorium Exercitiorum', or 'Of the more learned (advanced) exercises,' and covers six folios in the Zwolle edition of 1494 .  It is divided into several sub-divisions, which deal with a great multitude of subjects, having little connection with each other.  It seems like a vast jungle of nouns and verbs , suggestive of purity, fervor, moderation, advice, congruity; dignity, doing, commanding, giving, promising, enemies, judgment, example, writing, evil, sin, pride, order, place, time, etc.  Probably this first title or article is intended as a sort of introduction, or survey." --Albert Hyma, The Christian Renaissance: A History of the “Devotio Moderna” (New York and London: The Century Co., 1925), p. 258.

I just discovered that Google eBooks just released* an iPad (and iPhone and iPod touch) app that allows you to read eBooks on your device. Just like Kindle books. Just like pdfs. Which means... I can now sit at home reading Jon Mombaer's Rosetum exercitiorum spiritualium et sacrarum meditationum (Milan: H. Bordonum et P.M. Locarum, 1603) without having to go to the Newberry Library to read their (admittedly older) copy (Lyon: Scabalerius, 1510). From which I was only able to request 30 pages in photocopy the week before last.** And now I have the whole thing, all 784 pages (in the 1603 edition), right here on my iPad. I am in shock. On the edge of a whole new world of scholarship. Suddenly, all of those early modern printed editions (provided the libraries of the world are willing to scan them) are available to me. I wonder if this is how the first subscribers to Migne's Patrologia latina felt when his presses started churning out their editions of the works of the Fat...