each other;-cities were arrayed against cities-and private families engaged in perpetual quarrels with their neighbours. Among the latter class the names of the Lambertazzi and the Gieremei of Bologna, like those of the Montagues and Capulets of Verona, will be long and bitterly remembered. In deep and pervading interest, their stories are by no means dissimilar. In both instances were the fates of young, lovely, and innocent beings connected in their awful and overwhelming catastrophes. The history of Romeo and Juliet has been narrated by an immortal pen; -of that of Imilda de' Lambertazzi and Ippolito Gieremeo, the following pages will be found a slight and imperfect record.

During the thirteenth century, when the Guelfs and Ghibelius were mutually cherishing towards each other the most furious and deadly animosity, and contending for political pre-eminence throughout the states of Italy, the Gieremei and the Lambertazzi, two of the noblest families in Bologna, were the leaders of the rival factions. It was at a masked festival at the palace of her father, that Imilda, the beautiful daughter of Lord Orlando Lambertazzo, leaned for the first time upon the arm of a youthful stranger, who during the evening had poured into her ear all the "tongue's utterance of love." The graceful pair had wandered almost unconsciously into a garden breathing with the freshness of the midnight air, and ren

dered still more enchanting by the odoriferous scents of innumerable flowers. All was silence and deep repose. The moon was climbing the blue depths of the starry heavens, and pouring down upon them a flood of mild and soul-subduing radiance. Every object-above-below, and around them, was calcu lated to awaken the most intense and rapturous enthusiasm. The hearts of the youthful pair yielded to the melting influences of the hour. Presently there came floating on the air the soft breathings of a lute and then followed a full but mellow voice uttering, in song, an avowal of passion couched in the honied tones of a first and soul-absorbing love. The stranger was fain to profit by so sweet, so auspicious an opportunity. He uumasked his face, and, kneeling down, avowed his passion with all the fervour and enthusiasm of which a youthful heart is capable. Heavens! how mournfully delicious were Imilda's sensations when she discovered in her suitor the long-treasured divinity of her bosom-one whose form had haunted her by day, and visited her pillow by night. It was Ippolito Gieremeo, the son of her father's deadliest enemy, who was then suing for pardon and pity at her feet. Manhood had scarcely darkened his cheek, yet had his prowess in the fight been frequently put to the test, and fame had already blazoned forth his name among the noblest of Italian chivalry. His form was finely proportioned, and his full dark eye could one

moment flash forth the lightnings of its wrath, and the next melt with all the tender languishment of love. It had been his fate to behold Imilda at one of those tournaments, or trials of arms, so common during the Middle Ages, among the youthful nobility of warlike states. He had, indeed, frequently beheld her, but never had she appeared to him so surpassingly lovely. That moonlight hour was to him the fatal Rubicon of life; his heart was irretrievably lost. He had often heard of her transcendent beauty, her wit and her gentleness, but had never before felt their united force upon himself. Nor was the blushing and trembling maiden insensible to the virtues and noble bearing of Ippolito. Their passion was reciprocal :-they loved-but their love was like the breezes that blow over the Persian flower, redolent with poison and with death.

Days and weeks fled in rapid succession. In the frequency of their delightful intercourse, the lives of the young lovers glided away in one uninterrupted dream of wild and rapturous bliss; but they were soon fated to be awakened to the sad realities of life.

It happened that the attendant, who had countenanced and promoted the interviews of Imilda and Ippolito, was herself engaged in an intrigue with one of the followers of Lord Orlando Lambertazzo, to whom, in the weakness of her heart, she divulged the secret intrusted to her fidelity. Her paramour, who

was no friend to Ippolito, lost no time in communicating the intelligence he had thus acquired to the father and brother of Imilda, taking care, at the same time, to make his story susceptible of the worst possible construction. The Lambertazzi, already imbued with a rancorous hatred of the Gieremei, who had been represented to them as desirous of supplanting the supremacy of their family in Bologna, listened eagerly to the tale, and vowed to wash out the supposed stain upon the honour of their house with the blood of the offender; nor were they long in redeeming the pledge. Meanwhile, in order the more effectually to conceal their revengeful purpose from the unsuspecting Imilda, they continued to lavish upon her the most endearing and affectionate attentions; even while their spies were on the alert to procure the information necessary to enable them to perpetrate the crime they had it in contemplation to commit. At length, the fatal evening which was to furnish the long-anticipated opportunity arrived. Attended by a single domestic, whose fidelity on occasions of great danger and importance had been often proved, the unwary Ippolito was observed directing his courser's steps towards the palace of his family's hereditary enemies. The intelligence of his approach was quickly conveyed to the Lambertazzi, who, arming themselves in haste, repaired with several of their attendants to the garden, where, having concealed themselves

among its trees, they waited impatiently for the approach of the hapless lover, that they might slake their thirst for revenge in his blood. The servant of the young Knight was on this occasion left without the walls of the enclosure, to guard against interruptiou; meanwhile a private door, opened by the devoted Imilda, admitted her lover to her arms. Never had the scenery around them appeared so transcendently beautiful as at that moment;-never before had they felt so surpassingly dear to each other :every object was clad in a garb of unwonted loveliness. They were as two happy spirits wandering through the groves of the Eastern Innistan, whose cities are radiant with jewels, and whose plains are blooming with everlasting flowers. Alas! that the votive altar, raised to happiness by the fairy wand of the enchantress, Hope, should in one wild moment have been crumbled into dust! Whilst the senses of the lovers were lapt in the Elysium" of deep and passionate love whilst they were even engaged in deprecating the unhappy feuds which separated their families, and vaiuly forming projects for their happy reconciliation, forth from their ambush rushed the murderous and unrelenting Lambertazzi, intending, if possible, to seize Ippolito before he should have time to prepare for resisting their attack. Conceiving that the threatened evil was directed against his beloved, the young Knight, notwithstanding the great inequality

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