in other works, it is stated to have been incorporated by a charter of Queen Elizabeth, which is also confirmed by the Report of the Commissioners on the boundary of the borough. The town is governed by a mayor, chosen annually at the court-leet of the lord of the manor, but the functions of the mayor are merely nominal. The borough of Petersfield returned members to parliament as early as Edward I., and two members continuously from the reign of Edward VI. till the passing of the Reform Act, since which it has been represented by one member. The present parliamentary boundary includes the old borough of Petersfield and the tithing of Sheet; the parishes of Buriton, Lyss, and Froxfield; the tithings of Ramsden, Langrish, and Oxenbourn, in the parish of East Meon, and also the parish of Steep, except the tithings of North and South Ambersham. (Sixteenth Report of the Commissioners on Charities, p. 296; Reform Act and other Parliamentary Papers; Warner's Hist. of Hampshire, &c.) PETERWARDEIN, or PETERVARA, the principal and frontier fortress of Slavonia, the Gibraltar of Hungary, is situated in 45° 15′ N. lat. and 19° 55′ E. long., in the neighbourhood of some mountains and fruitful hills, on the right bank of the Danube, near the angle formed by the sudden change in the course of that river from due south to east. On a rock isolated on three sides stands the upper fortress and the hornwork; on the northern foot of the rock lies the lower fortress, which includes what is properly the town, and is partly on a gentle slope. It commands the Danube, whose waters bathe the walls on the west and south sides. It is a place of extraordinary strength both by nature and art. As a precaution in case of a very close siege, a well has been excavated in the rock to a depth below the surface of the Danube. The lower fortress has very broad and deep moats, which may be filled with water from the Danube, lofty walls, and many bastions and ravelins, by which it is separated on the south side from the two suburbs Ludwigsthal and Rochusthal. One principal street, and two others parallel to it, with a pretty extensive parade, form the whole town, which consists of only fourteen public buildings and forty-eight houses, most of the latter being only one story high. The principal buildings are the arsenal, the residence of the commandant, and the Roman Catholic parish church, formerly belonging to the Jesuits. Besides the two above-mentioned suburbs, some writers reckon the village of Bukowitz, about a league distant, as belonging to Peterwardein. The population of the town, the two suburbs, and Bukowitz, including the garrison, is stated at 6500. The fortress is capable of containing a garrison of 10,000 men. Peterwardein is connected, by a bridge of boats over the Danube (here 700 feet wide, and from 50 to 60 feet deep), with the town of Neusatz, on the opposite bank. (Von Jenny, Handbuch für Reisende in dem Oesterreichischen Kaiserstaate; W. Blumenbach, Neuestes Gemälde der Oesterreichischen Monarchie.) PETIOLE is that part of the leaf commonly called the stalk; it is usually a contracted part of the leaf through which the wood-veins pass from the trunk, but in other cases it is thin, expanded flat, or rolled up in a sheathing manner, when it is scarcely to be distinguished from the blade of the leaf itself. It is the opinion of some botanists that the leaves of endogens, in which the veins are parallel instead of being reticulated, consist exclusively of petiole; but this seems contradicted by grasses which have both a petiole and lamina, with parallel veins. PETIS DE LA CROIX, FRANCOIS, a learned French Orientalist, born at Paris, towards the close of 1653, was the son of the king's interpreter for the Oriental languages, and received an education to qualify him for the same employment. At the early age of sixteen he was sent, by the minister Colbert, to reside in the East. He spent several years at Aleppo, Ispahan, and Constantinople, where he became master of the Arabic, Persian, and Turkish languages. During his stay at the first-named city he translated into elegant Arabic an account of the campaign of Louis XIV. in Holland, which his contemporary Pellisson published in 1671. He returned to Paris in 1680, and two years afterwards was sent to Marocco, as secretary to M. de Saint Amand, who had been appointed ambassador to Muley Ismail, the reigning sultan. He is reported to have pronounced before that sovereign a speech in Arabic which exeited the admiration of the whole court by the facility of the delivery and the elegance and purity of the style. In the two following years he accompanied the French armaments against Algiers, under Duquesne, Tourville, and D'Amfreville [ALGIERS], filling under each of these generals the situation of secretary-interpreter of the marine, in which capacity he was employed to translate into Turkish the treaty of peace, concluded in 1684, between France and the regency of Algiers. In 1685 he performed the same office with respect to the negotiations with Tunis and Tripoli, when he gave decisive proofs of his integrity and patriotism. It is asserted that while the negotiations with the latter power were going on (one of the conditions of the treaty being that the bey of Tripoli should pay to the king of France the sum of 600,000 livres) Petis was offered a considerable bribe if he would put down in the original treaty Tripoli crowns instead of French ones, which would have made a difference of a sixth part, but his fidelity to his sovereign was incorruptible. In 1687 he assisted the Duke de Mortemart in concluding a treaty of peace and commerce with the empire of Marocco. In short, it was through his intervention that all the affairs between France and the Eastern courts were transacted from the year 1680, when he was first employed in diplomacy, to the time of his death. As a reward for his eminent services, Petis was appointed, in 1692, Arabic professor to the Collège Royal de France, and after the death of his father (1695) the office of Oriental interpreter was also conferred upon him. From this period Petis never left his native country, but employed himself in various translations from the Eastern languages, with most of which he was perfectly well acquainted; for, besides the Arabic, Turkish, and Persian, he is said to have been well acquainted with the Mogul, Armenian, and Ethiopian. He died at Paris, December 4, 1713, at the age of sixty, leaving a son, named Alexandre Louis Marie, who succeeded him in his office of secretary-interpreter of the marine, and made likewise several translations from the Persian and the Turkish. His principal publications are, 'Les Mille et un Jours' (the thousand and one days), translated from the Persian, Paris, 1710-12, 5 vols. 12mo.; Contes Turcs,' a translation from Sheikh Zadeh, Paris, 1707, 12mo.; The History of Timur,' translated from the Persian of Sheref-ed-din Ali Yesdi, Paris, 1722, 4 vols. 12mo. Most of his works however still remain in manuscript; these are his 'Travels through Syria and Persia, from 1670 to 1680;' a History of the Conquest of Syria by the Arabs,' translated from the Arabic of Wakedi; The Bibliographical Dictionary of Haji Khalfah,' from the Turkish; a History of the Ottoman Empire,' from the same language; a Dictionary of the Armenian Language; a work on The Antiquities and Monuments-of Egypt; an Account of Ethiopia; a treatise entitled 'Jerusalem, Modern and Antient; and several others, the titles of which are given at full length in the Mémoire sur le Collège Royal,' by Goujet, Paris, 1758. In some biographies of Petis de la Croix, a History of Gengis-Khan,' from the Persian (Paris, 1710), is attributed to him; but this is an error, since the above translation, though edited by Petis, was the work of his father, whose Christian name was also François. (Goujet, Mémoire Historique et Littéraire sur le Collège Royal de France, Paris, 1758, 4to.; Biographie Universelle, vol. xxxiii.) PETIT, JEAN LOUIS, was born at Paris in 1674. Littre, a celebrated professor of anatomy, being a resident in his father's house, inspired the young Petit with such a zeal for the same study, that at twelve years of age he ac quired sufficient dexterity in dissecting to be appointed to prepare the subjects for his preceptor's lectures, and to be placed at the head of his anatomical class. At sixteen he was apprenticed to a surgeon; and so great was his zeal in his studies, that Mareschal, the chief surgeon of the Hos pital La Charité, on going very early in the morning to visit his patients, more than once found Petit asleep by the door, awaiting his arrival, that he might secure a good place during the operations. In 1692 he obtained the post of surgeon in the army, and was in active service till 1700, when he returned to Paris and obtained the degree of Master in Surgery. Here he delivered several courses of lectures to a school of anatomy and surgery which he estab lished, and in which many of those who were afterwards among the first surgeons in Europe were pupils. His reputation rapidly increased, and he was elected a member of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, of the Royal Society of London, and of many learned societies. In 1731, at the Petit was for many years the most renowned surgeon in At the time of his death, Petit had been engaged twelve relate to matters in the ordinary prosecution of a suit, and before a decree. Such petitions are granted upon application of the party petitioning; and they may be presented at any time, whether the courts are sitting or not. They are not answered when presented, in the same manner that other petitions are; but the order to be made on such petition (if presented at the Rolls) is at once drawn up by the secretary of the master of the Rolls, unless they are petitions for rehearing. Such petitions may also be presented to the lord chancellor. Other petitions in a cause, which are not petitions of course, and may be called special petitions, have for their object to carry a decree into execution. Thus a party who has an interest in a fund in court, a legatee for instance who was a minor when the decree was made, may, when he is of age, apply by petition to have his share paid to him, because his right to it has been recognised by a decree or order of the court, or by a master's report which has been confirmed. The nature of the petitions in a cause will of course vary with the subject-matter of the suit. Petitions, not in a cause, are of various kinds, and many of them are presented under the authority of particular acts of parliament. These also are called special petitions. Thus a petition may be presented for the appointment of guardians to infants, and for an allowance for their maintenance; for the purpose of procuring an order of court that infant trustees and mortgagees may execute conveyances; and for various other purposes. In matters of lunacy, the form of proceeding in the first instance is by petition to the chancellor, to whom the care of lunatics and idiots is specially delegated by the crown, and the prayer of the petition is for a commission to inquire into the state of mind of the alleged lunatic. [LUNACY.] In subsequent proceedings relating to the property of a person, when found lunatic by a jury, a petition is the regular and usual course of proceeding; and suits are not commenced or defended for the lunatic without the previous approval and direction of the court. All special petitions must be presented to the court to which they are addressed, in order to be answered: until they are answered, the court is not fully possessed of the matter of the petition. The answer, which is written on the copy of the petition and signed by the judge, requires the attendance before him of all parties concerned in the matter of the petition at the hearing thereof. It is the business of the The following list of his works is given by Niceron, in petitioning party to serve all proper parties with notice of the forty-second volume of the 'Mémoires des Hommes this petition, and the answer to the petition becomes an order Illustres:-1, L'Usage du Compas de Proportion,' Paris, of the court, upon every person whom the petitioner chooses 1634, 8vo.; 2, Discours Chronologiques,' Paris, 1636, 4to.; to serve with the petition, to attend at the hearing of it; 3, 'Carte du Gouvernement de la Capelle;' 4, 'Avis sur la and if such person be absent at the hearing, he will be Conjonction proposée des Mers Océane et Méditerranée par bound by the order made on the petition. Service of the les Rivières d'Aude et de Garonne,' 4to.; 5, 'Observations petition consists in delivering a true copy of the petition as touchant le Vide fait pour la première fois en France,' answered to the clerk in court whose attendance the petiParis, 1647, 4to.; 6, Discours touchant les Remèdes qu'on tioner thinks necessary, or to the party himself. In some peut apporter aux Inundations de la Rivière de Seine dans special cases, the petitioner is permitted, on special motion, Paris, 1658, 4to.; 7, Observationes aliquot Eclipsium-supported by an affidavit that he is unable to serve the party Dissertatio de Latitudine Lutetiæ et Magnetis Declina- personally, to leave the copy of the petition at the party's tione-Novi Systematis Confutatio,' published in Duhamel's house with one of his family, and this will be considered 'Astronomy,' Paris, 1659-60-(the object of the second good service. Special petitions frequently require to be of these tracts is to prove that the latitude of Paris supported by affidavits of the petitioner or some other person, was not permanent, an opinion which had been entertained or of both; and such affidavits may be filed at any time with regard to geographical positions generally by the Ita- after the petition is answered. If a petitioner choose to lian astronomer Maria); 8, 'Dissertation sur la Nature des serve a party with a petition, whose presence is considered Comètes,' Paris, 1665, 4to. (written at the desire of Louis by the court to be unnecessary, he must pay such party the XIV., to lessen the alarms of the people occasioned by the cost of attending at the hearing of the petition. appearance of the comet of 1664); 9, Lettre touchant le Jour auquel on doit célébrer la Fête de Pâques, Paris, 1666, 4to.; 10, Dissertations sur la Nature du Chaud et du Froid,' Paris, 1671, 12mo. 4 (Montucla, Histoire des Mathématiques; Niceron.) PETITION. A petition is an application in writing, addressed to the lord chancellor, the master of the rolls, or to the Equity side of the Court of Exchequer, in which the petitioner states certain facts as the ground on which he prays for the order and direction of the court. Petitions are either cause petitions or not. A cause petition is a petition in a matter of which the court has already possession by virtue of there being a suit concerning the matter of the petition; and the petitioner is generally either a party to such suit, or he derives a title to some interest in the subject matter of the suit from a party to it. When there is no suit existing about the matter of the petition, it is called an ex parte petition. Some cause petitions are called petitions of course, and A petition is heard in court by the counsel for the peti tioner stating the substance and prayer of the petition, and by reading or briefly stating the contents of the affidavits filed in support of the petition, if any have been filed. If the prayer of the petition is opposed by any of the parties who have been served with it, they are heard by their counsel, and their affidavits also, if any have been filed, are read or briefly stated to the court. On hearing the matter of the petition and the affidavits on both sides, the court either dismisses the petition or makes such order as it thinks fit. The order when made is drawn up, passed, entered, served, and enforced like any other decree or order of the court. Before any order made on a petition can be passed, the original petition must be filed with the clerk of reports. The order itself in the present practice recites no part of the petition except the prayer. PETITION OF RIGHT. Where the crown or a subject has a cause of action against a subject, the ordinary mode of putting that cause of action into a course of legal VOL. XVIII.-F investigation is by the king's writ, requiring the party to appear in court to answer the complaint. Where the claim is against the crown itself, as this course cannot be pursued, the mode of proceeding provided by common law is to present a petition to the crown, praying for an inquiry and for the remedy to which the party conceives himself to be entitled. As by Magna Charta the king is not to delay right, he is bound, if the petition presents that which has the semblance of a legal or equitable claim, to indorse the petition with the words 'let right be done;' which indorsement operates, in the case of a claim of a legal nature, as a warrant and command to the lord chancellor to issue a commission to inquire into the truth of the matters alleged in the petition. A commission accordingly issues to six or eight persons, who summon a jury, of whom not less than twelve or more than twenty-three are impannelled, and who, under the superintendence of the commissioners, hear the evidence which the petitioner, or, as he is called, the suppliant, has to adduce in support of his statement. If the jury negative the allegations contained in the petition, the commission is at an end; but the suppliant is at liberty to sue out a new commission or commissions till a jury return an inquisition in which the allegations are found to be true. The crown may, upon this return, insist that the facts alleged by the suppliant, and found by the inquisition, do not in point of law entitle the suppliant to the remedy which he claims. The question of law thus raised by demurrer to the inquisition is argued before the lord chancellor. The crown however, notwithstanding the finding of the jury, may deny the truth of the facts, or, admitting them to be true, may allege other facts which show that the suppliant is not entitled to what he claims. To such facts the suppliant must reply. Any issue of fact joined between the suppliant and the crown is tried in the court of King's Bench, the lord chancellor not having the power to summon a jury. Final judgment is given for or against the suppliant according to the result of the argument upon the demurrer or of the trial of the issue. If the suppliant in his petition pray that the investigation may take place in a particular court, and the royal indorsement on the petition directs that course to be pursued, the proceedings take place in the court indicated by the indorsement, instead of the Court of Chancery. Before the abolition of the feudal tenures by the Commonwealth (confirmed after the Restoration, by 12 Car. II., c. 24), the rights of the crown and of the subject being often brought into collision, occasions for proceeding by petition of right were very frequent, and as this mode of proceeding was dilatory and expensive, two acts, passed in the reign of Edward III., enabled parties aggrieved in certain cases by legal proceedings of the crown, to enter their claim upon those proceedings, without being put to their petition of right, with its expensive commission to inquire. This new course was called a 'traverse of office,' where the subject denies the matters contained in the office' or ex parte record constituting the king's title, and a 'monstraunce de droit,' where the facts upon which the king's title rests are admitted but their effect is avoided by the allegation of other facts showing a better title in the claimant. In modern practice the petition of right is not resorted to, except in cases to which neither a. traverse of office nor a monstraunce de droit applies, or after those remedies have failed. The petition of right is supposed by Lord Coke and others to be so called because the investigation prayed for is demandable as of right, and not granted as a matter of grace or favour; but the Latin term 'petitio justitia' shows that the words are used in the sense of a 'petition for right.' PETITION OF RIGHT. In the first parliament of Charles I., which met in 1626, the Commons refused to grant supplies until certain rights and privileges of the subject, which they alleged had been violated, should have been solemnly recognised by a legislative enactment. With this view they framed a petition to the king, in which, after reciting various statutes by which their rights and privileges were recognised, they pray the king that no man be compelled to make or yield any gift, loan, benevolence, tax, or such-like charge, without common consent by act of parliament, that none be called upon to make answer for refusal so to do, that freemen be imprisoned or detained only by the law of the land, or by due process of law, and not by the king's special command, without any charge,-that persons be not compelled to receive soldiers and mariners into their houses against the laws and customs of the realm,-that commissions for proceeding by martial law be revoked: all which they pray as their rights and liberties according to the laws and statutes of the realm.' To this petition the king at first sent an evasive answer: "The king willeth that right be done according to the laws and customs of the realm, and that the statutes be put in due execution, that his subjects may have no cause to complain of any wrongs or oppressions contrary to their just rights and liberties, to the preservation whereof he holds himself in conscience obliged as of his own prerogative.' This answer being rejected as unsatisfactory, the king at last pronounced the formal words of unqualified assent, Let right be done as it is desired.' (1 Car. I., c. 1.) Notwithstanding this however the ministers of the crown caused the petition to be printed and circulated with the first insufficient answer. PETITOT, JOHN, an eminent painter in enamel, the son of a sculptor and architect, was born at Geneva, in 1607. Being designed for the trade of a jeweller, he was placed under the direction of Bordier, and in this occupation was engaged in the preparation of enamels for the jewellery business. He was so successful in the production of colours, that he was advised by Bordier to attempt portraits. They conjointly made several trials, and though they still wanted many colours which they knew not how to prepare for the fire, their attempts had great success. After some time they went to Italy, where they consulted the most eminent chemists, and made considerable progress in their art, but it was in England, whither they removed after a few years, that they perfected it. In London they became acquainted with Sir Theodore Mayern, first physician to Charles I., and an intelligent chemist, who had by his experiments discovered the principal colours proper to be used in enamel, and the means of vitrifying them, so that they surpassed the boasted enamelling of Venice and Limoges. Petitot was introduced by Mayern to the king, who retained him in his service and gave him apartments in Whitehall. He painted the portraits of Charles and the royal family several times, and copied many pictures, after Vandyck, which are considered his finest works. That painter greatly assisted him by his advice, and the king frequently went to see him paint. On the death of Charles, Petitot retired to France with the exiled family. He was greatly noticed by Charles II., who introduced him to Louis XIV. Louis appointed him his painter in enamel, and granted him a pension and apartments in the Louvre. He painted the French king many times, and, amongst a vast number of portraits, those of the queens Anne of Austria and Maria Theresa. He also occupied himself in making copies from the most celebrated pictures of Mignard and Lebrun. Petitot, who was a zealous Protestant, dreading the effects of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, solicited leave, but for a long while in vain, to return to Geneva. The king employed Bossuet to endeavour to convert him to Romanism, in which however that eloquent prelate was wholly unsuccessful. At length Louis permitted him to depart, and leaving his wife and children in Paris, he proceeded to his native place, where he was soon after joined by his family. Arrived now at eighty years of age, he was sought by such numbers of friends and admirers, that he was forced to remove from Geneva and retire to Vevay, a small town in the canton of Berne, where he continued to labour until 1691, in which year, whilst painting a portrait of his wife, he was suddenly attacked by apoplexy, of which he died. Bordier, in conjunction with whom he worked for fifty years, and who painted the hair, backgrounds, and draperies of his pictures, married his wife's sister. In the museum of the Louvre there is a collection of fifty-six portraits by Petitot; but his principal work is a magnificent wholelength portrait of Rachel de Rouvigny, countess of Southampton, in the collection of the duke of Devonshire, painted from the original in oil by Vandyck, in the possession of the earl of Hardwicke. This enamel is nine inches and threequarters high, by five inches and three-quarters wide, a prodigious size for a work of this description, and by far the largest that had been then, and for a century and a half afterwards, executed. It is dated 1642. This work was some years ago entrusted to the late Mr. Bone, the enamel painter and royal academician, to repair, it having been seriously damaged by a fall, by which a large portion of the enamel had been displaced. Different from the practice In the earlier part of his career Petitot received twenty guineas for a portrait, which price he afterwards raised to forty. He generally used plates of gold, but seldom copper, and sometimes, it is said, silver, though this seems improbable, for that metal generally has the effect of tinging the enamel with yellow. Amongst a vast number of his works painted in England, we have never met with one the plate of which was composed of silver. His custom was to have a painter to draw the likeness of his sitter in oil, from which he commenced his enamel, and then finished it from life. He copied those of Louis XIV. from the best portraits of him, but generally obtained one or two sittings for the completion. now adopted, the plate on which this was painted is formed | entirely cut out of the rock, the minutest embellishments upon a very thick piece of gold, the back having cross-bars of which, wherever the hand of man has not purposely attached of the same metal, filled up with enamel, the effaced them, are so perfect that it may be doubted whether metal alone weighing more than three ounces. any work of the antients, excepting perhaps some on the banks of the Nile, have come down to our time so little injured by the lapse of age. There is in fact scarcely a building of forty years' standing in England so well preserved in the greater part of its architectural decorations.' After passing this temple, the valley conducts to the theatre, 'and here the ruins of the city burst on the view in their full grandeur, shut in on their opposite sides by barren craggy precipices, from which numerous ravines and valleys, like those we had passed, branch out in all directions. The sides of the mountains, covered with an endless variety of excavated tombs and private dwellings, presented altogether the most singular scene we have ever beheld, and we must despair of giving the reader an idea of the sinThe pictures which Petitot painted in England are exe-gular effect of rocks tinted with the most extraordinary cuted in a more free style, and have a greater depth and hues, whose summits present to us nature in her most richness of tint than those executed in France, whilst the savage and romantic form, while their bases are worked ou latter are remarkable for the extreme delicacy of touch and in all the symmetry and regularity of art, with colonnade the exquisitely elaborate finish. He may be called the and pediments, and ranges of corridors adhering to the pet inventor of enamel painting, for though subjects of fruit pendicular surface.' and flowers were long before painted on this material for the purposes of jewellery, he was the first who made the attempt to execute pictures, and it was he who at once brought the art to perfection. The principal objection to the tone of colour of his works, a defect observable in the pictures of all other practitioners in enamel till the present century, is a prevalence of purple in the flesh tints. He had a son, John, who followed this art in England, Petra is described by Strabo (xvi., p. 779) and Pliny (Hist. Nat., vi. 32) as situated on level ground about two miles in size,* and surrounded by precipitous mountains. The town itself was well watered, but the surrounding country, and especially the part towards Judæa, was a complete desert. It was 600 Roman miles from Gaza, and three or four days' journey from Jericho. In the time of Augustus, Petra was a large and important town, and its greatness appears to have been principally owing to its situation, which caused it to be a great halting-place for caravans. A friend of Strabo's, of the name of Athenodorus, who had resided at Petra for many years, informed the geographer that many Romans lived there, as well as other foreigners. (Strabo, xvi., p. 779.) It maintained its independence against the attempts of the Greek kings of Syria (Diod. Sic., xix. 9597), and was governed by a native prince in the time of Strabo. It was taken by Trajan (Dion Cass., Ixviii. 14); and it appears from coins (Eckhel, Doctr. Num., ii. 503) that Hadrian called it after his own name ('Adpiávn). The ruins of Petra still exist in the Wady Musa, two days' journey from the Dead Sea, and the same distance northeast of Akaba. They were visited by Burckhardt in the year 1812, by Captains Irby and Mangles in 1818, and more recently by Laborde. Burckhardt's visit was brief and hasty, but a minute description of the ruins has been given by Captains Irby and Mangles, from whose account we extract the following remarks. The principal entrance to the town appears to have been through a narrow valley formed by the passage of a small rivulet through the rocks, which in some places approach so near to one another as only to leave sufficient room for the passage of two horsemen abreast. This narrow valley extends for nearly two miles; and on each side of it there are numerous tombs cut out of the rocks, which, as you approach nearer the city, become more frequent on both sides, till at length nothing is seen but a continued street of tombs. Nearly at the termination of this valley there are the ruins of a magnificent temple, Pliny probably means circumferetice; he merely says amplitudinis.' ་ The best description of the ruins of Petra is given in Laborde's 'Voyage de l'Arabie Petrée,' Par., 1830, of which an English translation was published in 1836. PETRARCA, FRANCESCO, born at Arezzo, in July, 1304, was the son of Pietro, or Petracco (an idiomatic form of Pietro), a notary of Florence, who was banished in 1302, at the same time as Dante and others of the Bianchi faction. [DANTE.] The true name of Petrarca was Francesco di Petracco, or Francis the son of Petracco,' which he afterwards changed into the more euphonic name of Francesco Petrarca. After losing all hope of being restored to his native town, Petracco removed with his family to Avignon, where Pope Clement V. had fixed the residence of the Papal court, and whither strangers from every country resorted. His son Francesco, after studying grammar and rhetoric, was sent by his father to Montpellier, and afterwards to Bologna to study law, which was considered the most profitable profession. Young Petrarca however had little taste for the law, especially as it was taught in that age, and he devoted much of his time to reading and copying MSS. of the classic writers. His father and mother having died at Avignon nearly about the same time, Petrarca left Bologna, and on his arrival at Avignon he found that his paternal inheritance was but little. He assumed the clerical dress, without however having taken priestly orders, that habit being then, as it still is, the customary dress of good company at the Papal residence. The Papal court of Avignon was very gay and even licentious; and Petrarca, who was then only two and twenty years of age, and of a handsome person, was one of the gayest in the fashionable circles. But his love of pleasure was tempered by the love of study. He contracted a friendship with the jurist Soranzo, with the canon John of Florence, who was apostolic secretary, and with James Colonna, bishop of Lombes in Gascony, and other distinguished men, who were fond of learning, and whe supplied him with books, a scarce and expensive commodity in those times. Petrarca accompanied the bishop of Lomber to his diocese at the foot of the Pyrenees, where they spent much of their time in literary discussions and excursions in the mountains, with two other friends of similar tastes, whom Petrarca has recorded under the classical names of Socrates and Laelius (Trionfo d'Amore, ch. 4). On his return to Avignon, the Cardinal John Colonna, brother of James, gave Petrarca apartments in his own palace, and became his patron; and when his father, Stephen Colonna, a sturdy warlike old baron, but not illiterate, and well known for his quarrels with Boniface VIII., came from Rome to Avignon on a visit to his sons, Petrarca was introduced to him, and soon won his favour. Petrarca, who was an admirer of the heroes of antient Rome, fancied that he saw in Stephen Colonna their worthy descendant, and in several of his verses, addressed to him, he calls him the hope of the Latin name' (Sonetto 10). Azzo da Correggio, lord of Parma, having come to Avignon to defend, before Pope Benedict XII., his title to that sovereignty against the claims of Marsiglio Rossi, became acquainted with Petrarca, and prevailed on him to act as his advocate at the Papal chancery. Petrarca undertook the cause and won it. Azzo had brought with him Guglielmo Pastrengo, a learned man of Verona, the author of a work De Originibus Rerum,' a kind of hisF2 'Piaga per allentar d'arco non sana. torical dictionary in alphabetical order, which is considered | to those who wondered how he could still admire her, he the first specimen of that kind of work. Petrarca formed answered: an intimacy with Pastrengo as well as with the Calabrian monk Barlaam, who came to Avignon on a mission from the emperor Andronicus the younger, and from whom he learned the rudiments of Greek. But before this time an incident had occurred which exercised a powerful influence over Petrarca's life. On the 6th of April, 1327, while he was attending service in the church of St. Clair, at Avignon, he was struck with the beauty of a young lady who happened to be near him, and he conceived a violent passion for her. The lady's name was Laura. According to the received opinion, supported by documents, for Petrarca himself never mentions her family name, she was the daughter of Audibert of Noves, a small place in the territory of Avignon; she had a considerable fortune, and had been married about two years to Hugh de Sade, a gentleman of Avignon: when Petrarca first saw her, she was nineteen years of age. The attractions of Laura's person have been so fully described and probably exaggerated by Petrarca, that it is needless to say anything on the subject. But the qualities of her mind, which he also praises, seem to have been truly remarkable in a provincial lady of those times and of no very exalted rank. In her conduct for a long course of years towards her handsome, accomplished, and impetuous admirer, whom she could not help meeting wherever she went, at parties of pleasure, in walking, or at church, she exhibited a rare mix ture of firmness and courtesy, of respect for her own character with a considerate regard for her enthusiastic lover. She has been called a coquette, but we ought not to judge the conduct of a French woman of the fourteenth century by the standard of manners in England or even France in the nineteenth century. To those acquainted with the manners of Italy and Spain even at the present day, the passion of Petrarca for Laura de Sade is nothing uncommon. Such attachments are frequent, and though often of a platonic nature, are certainly not always so. That the attachment of Petrarca continued to be platonic, was owing to Laura's sense of duty, or to her indifference, or to both, but ("The bow can no longer wound, but its mortal blow has been already inflicted. If I had loved her person only, I had changed long since.) In the year 1343, sixteen years after his first sight of Laura, he was writing in the soberness of self-examination: 'My love is vehement, excessive, but exclusive and virtuous.-No, this very disquietude, these suspicions, this watchfulness, this delirium, this weariness of every thing, are not the signs of a virtuous love.' (De Secreto Conflictu.) In the year 1348, while Petrarca was staying in Italy, the plague spread into France and reached Avignon. Laura was attacked by the disease, and she died after three days' illness, on the 6th of April, in the fortieth year of her age. Her death, from the account of witnesses, appears to have been placid and resigned as her life had been. Petrarca has beautifully described her passing away like a lamp which becomes gradually extinct for want of nourishment: A guisa d'un soave e chiaro lume (Trionfo della Morte, ch. i.) When the news reached Petrarca in Italy, he felt the blow as if he had lost the only object that attached him to earth. He wrote on a copy of Virgil, his favourite author, the following memorandum: 'It was in the early days of my youth, on the 6th of April, in the morning, and in the year 1327, that Laura, distinguished by her virtues, and celebrated in my verses, first blessed my eyes in the church of St. Clara, at Avignon; and it was in the same city, on the 6th of the very same month of April, at the same hour in the morning, in the year 1348, that this bright luminary was withdrawn from our sight, whilst I was at Verona, and beautiful body were deposited in the church of the alas! ignorant of my calamity. The remains of her chaste Cordeliers, on the evening of the same day. To preserve the painful remembrance, I have taken a bitter pleasure that it did not drive her lover to madness and ruin was in recording it particularly in this book, which is most owing to her consummate address, of which we have abundant frequently before my eyes, in order that nothing in this evidence in Petrarca's own confessions. When he ventured world may have any further attraction for me, and that this on a declaration, she sternly rebuked him, and avoided his great bond of attachment to life being now dissolved, I may presence; but when she heard that he was ill, she assumed by frequent reflection, and a proper estimation of our transitowards him the manners of a friend interested in his welfare;tory existence, be admonished that it is high time for me to she succeeded in purifying his passion, and in making him think of quitting this earthly Babylon, which I trust will satisfied with her conversation, and with giving vent to his not be difficult for me, with a strong and manly courage, to feelings in poetry. (Petrarca's Latin Epistle to James Co-accomplish.' Petrarca's 'Virgil,' with this affecting memolonna, bishop of Lombes.) She was probably flattered by randum, is now in the Ambrosian library at Milan. (Valéry, his praise, which brought no imputation on her character, Voyages Littéraires.) and made her the most celebrated woman of her day. Pe- it the second part of his love poetry. Hitherto he had written Here begins a new period of the life of Petrarca, and with trarca's sonnets and canzoni in praise of Laura circulated throughout Europe. When Charles of Luxemburg, after-death. He fancied himself in frequent communion with verses in praise of Laura; he now wrote verses' on Laura's wards the emperor Charles IV., came on a visit to Avignon, one of his first inquiries was after the Laura celebrated by Petrarca, and being introduced to her in the midst of a large assembly, he respectfully begged to be allowed to kiss her on the forehead as a mark of his esteem. (Petrarca, Sonnet 201.) It was not however without a violent struggle that Petrarca allowed himself to be led by her better judgment. For ten years after he had first seen Laura, his life was one continued strife between his passion and his reason. He left Avignon repeatedly, travelled about, returned, but was still the same. Wishing, if possible, to forget Laura, he formed a connection with another woman, and had by her a son, and afterwards a daughter. But still his mind recurred perpetually to the object of his first attachment. He took care of his illegitimate children, but broke off the connection. For several years he fixed his residence at Vaucluse, a solitary romantic valley near Avignon, on the banks of the Sorga, of which he has given some beautiful descriptions. In a letter addressed to James Colonna, and dated June, 1338, he assigns as a reason for his retirement, that he was disgusted with the vice and dissoluteness of the Papal court of Avignon, in leaving which, he says, he sang to himself the psalm In exitu Israel de Ægypto.' He also says, that he was tired of waiting for the fulfilment of the promises of honour and emolument made to him by the pope. Meantime, year after year rolled on, and the beauty of Laura faded away. She became the mother of a large family. But Petrarca continued to see her with the eyes of youth, and her spirit; he describes her appearing to him in the middle his heart. 'Benedetta colei che à miglior riva Volse il mio corso, e l'empia voglia ardente |