MOST ILLUSTRIOUS AND MOST REVEREND SIR: The more opportunity I have had of observing the actions of his Eminence the Cardinal of England (Pole), the more clear has it seemed to me that he is a true and sincere servant of God. Whenever, therefore, he charitably condescends to give me his opinion on any point, I conceive myself safe from error in following his advice. And he told me that, in his opinion, I ought, in case any letter or other matter should reach me from Fra Bernardino, to send the same to your most Reverend Lordship, and return no answer, unless I should be directed to do so. I send you therefore the inclosed, which I have this day received, together with the little book attached. The whole was in a packet, which came to the post here by a courier from Bologna, without any other writing inside. And I have thought it best not to make use of any other means of sending it, than by a servant of my She adds in a postscript: 66 'It grieves me much that the more he tries to excuse himself the more he accuses himself; and the more he thinks to save others from shipwreck, the more he exposes himself to the flood, being himself out of the ark which saves and secures. Poor Ochino little thought probably that his letter to his former admiring and fervent disciple would be passed on with such a remark to the hands of his enemies! He ought, however, to have been aware that princesses and cardinals, whatever speculations they may have indulged in, do not easily become heretics. She returned once more from Viterbo to Rome toward the end of the year 1544, and took up her residence in the convent of Benedictines of St. Anne. While there she composed the Latin prayer, printed in the note, which has been much admired, and which, though not so Ciceronian in its diction as Bembo might have written, will bear comparison with similar compositions by many more celebrated persons. Several of the latest of her poems were also written at this time. But her health began to fail so rapidly as to give great uneasiness to her friends. Several letters are extant from Tolomei te her physician, anxiously inquiring after her health, urging him to neglect no resources of his art, and bidding him remember that "the lives of many, who continually receive from her their food-some that of the body and others that of the mind-are bound up in hers." The celebrated physician and poet, Fracastoro, was written to in Verona. In his reply, after suggesting medical remedies, he says, "Would that a physician for her mind could be found! Otherwise the fairest light in this world will, from causes by no means clear (a non so che strano modo) be extinguished and taken from our eyes."§ The medical opinion of Fracastoro, writing from a distance, may * Visconti, p. cxxxi. Printed also by Tiraboschi, vol. 7. + Note 6. Visconti, p. cxxxiv. not be of much value. But it is certain that many circumstances combined to render these declining years of Vittoria's life unhappy. The fortunes of her family were under a cloud; and it is probable that she was as much grieved by her brother's conduct as by the consequences of it. The death also of the Marchese del Vasto, in the flower of his age, about this time, was a severe blow to her. Ever since those happy early days in Ischia, when she had been to him, as she said, morally and intellectually a mother, the closest ties of affection had united them; and his loss was to Vittoria like that of a son. Then again, though she had perfectly made up her mind as to the line of conduct it behooved her to take in regard to any difficulties of religious opinion, yet it cannot be doubted that the necessity of separating herself from so many whom she had loved and venerated, deserting them, as it were, in their falling fortunes, must have been acutely painful to her. Possibly also conscience was not wholly at rest with her on this matter. It may be that the still voice of inward conviction would sometimes make obstinate murmur against blindfold submission to a priesthood, who ought not, according to the once expressed opinion of the poetess, to come between the creature and his Creator. As she became gradually worse and weaker, she was removed from the convent of St. Anne to the neighboring house of Giuliano Cesarini, the husband of Guilia Colonna, the only one of her kindred then left in Rome. And there she breathed her last, toward the end of February, 1547, in the 57th year of her age. In her last hours she was visited by her faithful and devotedly attached friend, Michael Angelo, who watched the departure of the spirit from her frame; and who declared,* years afterward, that he had never ceased to regret that in that solemn moment he had not ventured to press his lips, for the first and last time, to the marble forehead of the dead. She had directed that her funeral should be in all respects like that of one of the sisters of the convent in which sbe last resided. And so completely were her behests attended to that no memorial of any kind remains to tell the place of her sepulchre. *Condivi. Vita. NOTES TO THE LIFE OF VITTORIA COLONNA. 1.-Page 15. Guiliano Passeri, the author of the diary quoted in the text, was an honest Weaver, living by his art at Naples, in the time of Ferdinand of Spain and Charles V. His work appears to have been composed wholly for his own satisfaction and amusement. The entire work is written in the form of a diary. But as the first entry records the coming of Alphonso I. to Naples, on "this day, the 26th February, 1443," and the last describes the funeral of the Marchese di Pescara, Vittoria's husband, on the 12th May, 1526, it is difficult to suppose that these could have been the daily jottings of one and the same individual, extending over a As the work period of 83 years, although it is possible that they may have been so. ends quite abruptly, it seems reasonable to suppose that it was carried on till the death of the writer. The probability is, that the memorials of the earlier years are due to another pen. The work is written in Neapolitan dialect, and concerns itself very little with aught that passed out of Naples. It has all the marks of being written by an eye-witness of the circumstances recorded. The accounts especially of all public ceremonies, gala-doings, etc., are given in great detail, and with all the gusto of a regular sight-seer. And the book is interesting as a rare specimen of the writing and ideas of an artisan of the sixteenth century. It was printed in a quarto volume at Naples in 1785, and is rather rare. 2.-Page 20. These false ducats gave rise, we are told, to the king's saying, that his wife had brought him three gifts: Faciem pictam, to which the ungallant and brutal royal husband added another, the statement of which ending in "strictam," is so grossly coarse that it cannot be repeated here, even with the partial veil of its Latín clothing. 8.-Page 87. The translations of the sonnets in the text have been given solely with the view of enabling those who do not read Italian to form some idea of the subject-matter and mode of thought of the author, and not with any hope or pretension of presenting anything that might be accepted as a tolerable English sonnet. In many instances the required continuation of the rhyme has not even been attempted. If it be asked, why then were the translations not given in simple prose, which wonl have admitted a yet greater accuracy of literal rendering?-it is answered, that a translation so made would be so intolerably bald, flat, and silly-sounding, that a still more unfavorable conception of the original would remain in the English reader's mind than that which, it is hoped, may be produced by the more or less poetically-cast translations given. The originals, printed in every instance, will do justice (if not more) to our poetess in the eyes of those acquainted with her language, for the specimens chosen may be relied on as being not unfavorable specimens. And many readers, probably, who might not take the trouble to understand the original in a language they imperfectly understand, may yet, by the help of the translation, if they think it worth while, obtain a tolerably accurate notion of Vittoria's poetical style. 4.-Page 65. When Mr. Harford heard these letters read, the exceedingly valuable and interesting museum of papers, pictures, drawings, etc., of Michael Angelo, was the property of his lineal descendant, the late Minister of Public Instruction in Tuscany. When dying, he bequeathed this exceedingly important collection to the "Communità," or corporation of Florence. The Tuscan law requires that the hotary who draws a will should do so in the presence of the testator. Unfortunately, on the sick man complaining of the heat of the room, the notary employed to draw his important instrument, retired, it seems, into the next room, which, as a door was open between the two chambers, he conceived was equivalent to being in presence of the testator, as required by law. It has been decided, however, by the tribunals of Florence, that the will was thus vitiated, and that the property must pass to the heirs at law. An appeal still pending (September, 1858) lies to a higher court; but there is every reason to believe that the original judgment must be confirmed. In the mean time, the papers, etc., are under the inviolable seal of the law. 5.-Page 67. The Ms. of François de Holland, containing the notices of Vittoria Colonna, given in the text, is to be found translated into French, and printed in a volume entitled, "Les Arts en Portugal, par le Comte A. Raczynski. Paris, 1846." My attention was directed to the notices of Vittoria to be found in this volume, by a review of M. Deumier's book on our poetess, by Signor A. Reumont, inserted In the fifth volume of the new series of the "Archivio Storico Italiano, Firenze, 1857," p. 188. 6.-Page 71. The prayer written by Vittoria Colonna is as follows: "Da, precor, Domine, ut ea animi depressione, quae humilitati meæ convenit, eâque mentis elatione, quam tua postulat celsitudo, te semper adorem; ac in timore, quem tua incutit justitia, et in spe, quam tua clementia permittit, vivam continue, meque tibi uti potentissimo subjiciam, tanquam sapientissimo disponam, et ad te ut perfectissimum et optimum convertar. Obsecro, Pater Pientissime, ut me ignis tuus vivacissimus depuret, lux tua clarissima illustret, et amor tuus ille sincerissimus ita proficiat ut ad te nullo mortalium rerum obice dententa, felix redeam et secura." JOSEPHINE. EMPRESS OF THE FRENCH. JOSEPHINE ROSE TASCHER DE LA PAGERIE was born at Martinique on the 24th of June, 1763.. At a very early age she came to Paris, where she married the Viscount Beauharnais, a man of talent and superior personal endowments, but not a courtier, as some writers have asserted, for he was never even presented at court. Beauharnais was a man of limited fortune, and his wife's dower more than doubled his income. In 1787, Madame Beauharnais returned to Martinique to nurse her aged mother, whose health was in a declining state; but the disturbances which soon after took place in that colony, drove her back to France. During her absence, the revolution had broken out, and on her return she found her husband entirely devoted to those principles upon which the regeneration of the French people was to be founded. The well-known opinions of the Viscount Beauharnais gave his wife considerable influence with the rulers of blood, who stretched their reeking sceptre over the whole nation; and she had frequent opportunities, which she never lost, of saving persons doomed by their sanguinary decrees. Among others, Mademoiselle de Bethisy was condemned, by the revolutionary tribunal, to be beheaded; but Madame Beauharnais, by her irresistible intercession, succeeded in obtaining the life and freedom of this interesting lady. The revolution, however, devouring, like Saturn, its own children, spared none of even its warmest supporters, the moment they came in collision with the governing party, then composed of ignorant and blood-thirsty enthusiasts. The slightest hesitation in executiug any of their decrees, however absurd or impracticable, was considered a crime deserving of death. Beauharnais had been appointed general-in-chief of the army of the North. Having failed to attend to some foolish order of the Convention, he was cited to appear at its bar and give an account of his conduct. No one appeared |