backed by the Ubaldini, a very ancient and powerful house in Tuscany, who had several impreguable fortresses in the Apennine, near the city of Mugella, of which they were lords. These were the gentlemen, unworthy of being called so, spoken of by Petrarch's cook. They gave an asylum to these banditti in their castles, favoured their conduct, and divided with them the spoil. Villani, the historian of this age, from whom this account is taken, adds, that these thieves, having learned that Mainard of Florence was returning from Avignon with two thousand florins of gold, they lay in wait for him, killed and rifled him in the country of Florence.' Petrarch thought it his duty to write to those who governed the city of Florence, to engage them to pursue the villains into their entrenchments, and insure the safety of the highways. After a compliment to the republic, he says:

I have just received news which is grief to my soul. Mainard Accuise, one of your best citizens, and my dear friend, returning from the court of Avignon, and going to Florence, was assassinated near the gates of the city, in the bosom of his country, and, so to speak, in the face of his friends. This unfortunate man, after having traversed the earth, and suffered much in his youth, was coming to pass in tranquillity the remains of a laborious and agitated life: and

he flattered himself with a quiet death and burial in that land where he received his birth. Barbarous men, or rather savage beasts, have envied him this consolation. O times! O manners! Who could have believed that this gentle and good man, after having travelled without accident through the midst of those cruel nations who inhabit the borders of the Rhone, traversed the deserts of Provence, the most desolate and depraved country in the world, after passing the night among the Alps, where are whole armies of banditti, should be sacrificed in open day at the very gates of Florence? Gold in ancient times, but blood now, is the object of these wretches. What else could induce them to plunge their swords into the breast of an innocent man, stripped and disarmed, who could never have revenged their robbery? For what have they to fear in those impregnable fortresses, which serve them for caverns and asylums, from whence they brave Florence and heaven itself?

'Justice is the basis of all grandeur and prosperity. Assassins threaten you to the face, who dared not conceive mischief in the time of your fathers. If you leave such actions unpunished, there is an end of your glory, and of your republic. Its foundation overthrown, it must sink. But I feel that your justice will not tarry; it will overtake them. You are distressed, it is true, by these

banditti: but true virtue comes as pure out of adversity, as gold out of the crucible; and your courage will increase in proportion to your difficulties. But what will relieve my grief? The most eloquent words I can use, even the lyre of Orpheus itself, cannot restore to me the friend I have lost. I do not propose it to you to raise him from the dead, but to preserve his honour from burial; and, which is a most important object, to free the Apennine from banditti, which is the general road to Rome. These mountains have been always steep and rugged, but formerly they were traversed with the greatest security. But if those that should be the guardians become the robbers, and instead of faithful dogs, watching from their castles to protect, become wolves to destroy, terror will spread over the mind, the Apennine will become desert, and more uninhabitable than Atlas or Caucasus. Illustrious citizens! prevent this disgrace. Those that would pull up a tree begin at the roots; in like manner, those who would exterminate thieves, must seek them in their secret retreats. Have the goodness also, to seek out the other friend of whose fate I am uncertain. But I dread the worst. God maintain the happiness of your republic.'

This letter had the success it deserved. The

Florentines sent an army against the Ubaldini, and took, in less than two months, a great many of their castles, and made great havoc in their estates. The body of Mainard was found, and buried with honour; a poor consolation for Petrarch! He sought news of Luke from every one he met with, and trembled at each noise around him. He had lost all hope, when a Milanese merchant of his acquaintance called on him, saying, I was told you were here, and would not pass without paying my respects to you.' 'You are very polite, sir. May I inquire the road you came?' From Florence,' replied the merchant. 'I set out from thence four days ago. Good heaven!' said Petrarch, which, then, was your route? Not the high road,' replied the merchant; I was warned against that. I took a bypath through the woods. You know, without doubt, the accident that has happened to a citizen of Florence; the whole city is in arms to revenge his death. The army is already encamped on the Apennine.' I know it,' said Petrarch: but is it true that the persons who accompanied this Florentine have perished with him?' I only heard speak of one person who suffered,' replied the merchant: had there been several, it would have been mentioned: but I can affirm nothing, as I know only the public report.' This revived the hopes of Petrarch. In this uncertain and

afflicted state of mind, and continually hearing of and beholding the devastations made by the plague, he wrote the following letter to his dear Socrates:

'Has any annals, since the destruction of Troy, shown such terror and desolation as we now behold? Lands abandoned, cities depopulated, fields covered with dead bodies; the whole earth almost become one vast desert! Ask the historians; they say nothing. Consult the physicians; they are astonished and confounded. Address the philosophers; they shrug up their shoulders, knit their brows, and put their finger on their lips. Our streets, heaped up with dead bodies, resemble a charnel house rather than a city; and we are amazed, when we reenter our houses, to find any thing remaining that is dear to us. Happy, thrice happy, the future age, which will, perhaps, look upon our calamities as a series of fables! In the most bloody war there is some resource; and an honourable death is a great consolation. But here we have none. And is it then true, as some philosophers have advanced, that God has no concern for what passes on the earth? Let us cast far from us so senseless an opinion. If he has not, how could the world subsist? Some philosophers have given this care to nature. Seneca justly views such as ungrateful men, who would hide, under a borrowed name,