eyes from the depth below, he led him slowly on, until the widening of the road, and the appearance of a few pines diminished the terror of the surrounding objects.'

Upon his arrival in Italy he joins the standard of Uguccione of Fagginola, and becomes an important Condottiero. His skill, his valour, and his towering talents, soon impel him to higher flights, and from this period his life is a succession of conquests and acquisition of power. The court of Milan is described with great effect; the author displays a perfect knowledge of the persons and characters of the great men who adorned Italy at this time; and, if we may venture to praise her for a talent which she, perhaps, would despise, we think her descriptions of the costume then worn by the splendid personages of both sexes are not the least happy part of her labour. They are beautiful in themselves, but they become much more so in her elegant account of them; they are given with truly feminine delicacy. She reminds us of the figures which the pictures of the old masters have made us acquainted with. It is, however, on more serious occasions that she exerts all her powers: the relation of the sacking of Cremona is one of the most striking we remember, next to Defoe's description of the effects of the great plague:

'Most of the German soldiers were busy in destroying the fortifications, or in compelling the peasants and citizens to raze the walls of their town. Other parties were ranging about the streets, entering the palaces, whose rich furniture they destroyed, by feasting, and tearing down from the walls all that had the appearance of gold or silver. The cellars were broken open; and, after inebriating themselves with the choice wines of Italy, the unruly, but armed bands, were in a better mood for oppressing the defenceless people. Some of these poor wretches fled to the open country; others locked themselves up in their houses, and throwing what they possessed from the windows, strove to save their persons from the brutality of their conquerors. Many of the noble females took refuge in the meanest cottages, and disguised themselves in poor clothing, till, frightened by the eager glances, or brutal address of the soldiers, they escaped to the country, and remained exposed to hunger and cold among the woods that surrounded the town. Others, with their hair dishevelled, their dresses in disorder, careless of the eyes which gazed on them, followed their husbands and fathers to their frightful prisons, some in mute despair, many wringing their hands, and crying aloud for mercy. As night came on, the soldiery, tired of rapine, went to rest in the beds from which the proprietors were remorselessly banished: silence prevailed; a dreadful silence, broken sometimes by the shriek of an injured female, or the brutal shouts of some of the men, who passed the night in going from palace to palace, calling up the inhabitants, demanding food and wine, and, on the slightest show of resistance, hurrying their victims to prison, or binding them in their own houses with every aggravation of insult.

Castruccio divided his little band, and sent his men to the protection of several of the palaces, while he and Arrigo rode all night about the town; and having the watchword of the emperor, they succeeded in rescuing some poor wretches from the brutality of the insolent soldiers. Several days followed, bringing with them a repetition of the same scenes; and the hardest heart might have been struck with compassion, to see the misery painted on the faces of many whose former lives had been a

continual dream of pleasure; young mothers weeping over their unfortanate offspring, whose fathers lay rotting or starving in prison; children crying for bread, sitting on the steps of their paterual palaces, within which the military rioted in plenty; childless parents, mourning their murdered babes; orphans, helpless, dying, whose parents could no longer soothe or relieve them.

He finds the lady Euthanasia dei Adimari, with whose family his own had been connected, and who had been the friend and companion of his early days, residing in her feudal Castle of Valperga, near Lucca. He renews the acquaintance; he sues, and is beloved. The character of Euthanasia is elaborately and no less excellently drawn. She is the perfection of womanly beauty, and the personification of all that is great and good in her sex; with a clear judgment, exquisite sensibility, and intense passions; but with reason so powerful, and principles so well established, that all her actions are under the domination of a severe virtue. The following description of the meeting of the lovers, our readers will observe, is in such a style of writing as has not often been seen in productions of a similar name:

'Castruccio and Euthanasia met; after many years of absence, they gazed on each other with curiosity and interest. Euthanasia had awaited his arrival with unwonted anxiety: she could not explain to herself the agitation that she felt at the idea of meeting him; but when she saw him, beautiful as a god, power and love dwelling on every feature of his countenance, and in every motion of his graceful form, the unquiet beatings of her heart ceased, and she became calm and happy. And was she not also beautiful? Her form was light, and every limb was shaped according to those rules by which the exquisite statues of the antients have been modelled. A quantity of golden hair fell round her neck, and, unless it had been confined by a veil that was wreathed round her head, it would almost have touched the ground; her eyes were blue; a blue that seemed to have drunk-in the depths of an Italian sky, and to reflect from their orbs the pure and unfathomable brilliance, which strikes the sight as darkness of a Roman heaven; but these beauteous eyes were fringed by long pointed lashes, which softened their fire, and added to their sweetness: the very soul of open-hearted Charity dwelt on her brow, and her lips expressed the softest sensibility; there was in her countenance, beyond all of kind and good that you could there discover, an expression that seemed to require ages to read and understand; a wisdom exalted by enthusiasm, a wildness tempered by self-command, that filled every look and every motion with eternal change. She was dressed according to the custom of the times, yet her dress was rather plain, being neither ornamented with gold nor jewels: a silk vest of blue reached from her neck to her feet, girded at the waist by a small embroidered band; the wide and hanging sleeves were embroidered at the edge, and fell far over her hands, except when, thrown back, they discovered her rosy-tipt fingers and taper wrist.'

Euthanasia loves him, and Castruccio returns her affection with all the love of which his soul is capable. But now the councils of his old general, Scoto, have taken full possession of his mind; his daring and activity lead him to dangerous attempts, and crown him with success. Coldness of heart comes with his honours; his soul is swallowed up with ambition ; and his love for Euthanasia is a minor feeling, and one utterly unworthy

of her. She, on the contrary, loves him with all the fervor of a first passion and a single heart. In the author's own powerful words,

She loved, and was beloved :-her eyes beamed with a quicker fire; and her whole soul, perfectly alive, seemed to feel with a vividness and truth she had never before experienced. Nature was invested for her with new appearances; and there was a beauty, a soul, in the breeze of evening, the starry sky, and uprising sun, which filled her with emotions she had never before so vividly felt. Love seemed to have made her heart its chosen temple; and he linked all its beatings to that universal beauty which is his mother and his nurse.'

Castruccio establishes himself in Lucca, by driving out Uguccione; and the marriage of the lovers is to take place when he shall have returned from a journey he is then about to undertake. Our limits do not allow

us to give any account of a court held by Euthanasia, but which well deserves notice. The author has taken this opportunity of describing the magnificent festivals for which the Italian princes were so famous, and of which the earlier novelists of that country are so loud in their praises. It is not too much to say, that in this part of the book we have been reminded of Boccacio's glorious relations.

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Castruccio undertakes the surprise of Ferrara for the purpose storing the Marquis Obizzi to its sovereignty, and succeeds. He there meets with a young girl who is said to be inspired, and vowed to God. She is the daughter of a woman who was burnt as a heretic, and at this period she is in the house of the bishop, who has brought her up. While she is one day haranguing the people, the inquisitors seize her; she appeals to the Judgment of God, which is the ordeal of walking over heated plough-shares. From the peril of this trial she is saved by a fraud of the monks, to whom the preparations are entrusted. To make the story short, she becomes enamoured of Castruccio, and he, forgetting his high minded Euthanasia, returns her love. The necessity of his departure compels him to explain to the fallen Ancilla Dei that he is betrothed to another, and he quits her. She does not even reproach him. The passionate spirit of the following passage will, we are sure, justify our extracting it :

'Poor Beatrice! She had inherited from her mother the most ardent imagination that ever animated a human soul. Its images were as vivid as reality, and were so overpowering that they appeared to her, when she compared them to the calm sensations of others, as something superhuman; and she followed that as a guide, which she ought to have bound with fetters, and to have curbed and crushed by every effort of reason. Unhappy prophetess! the superstitions of her times had obtained credit for, and indeed given birth to her pretensions, and the compassion and humanity of her fellow creatures had stamped them with the truth-attesting seal of a miracle. There is so much life in love! Beatrice was hardly seventeen, and she loved for the first time; and all the exquisite pleasures of that passion were consecrated to her, by a mysteriousness and delusive sanctity that gave them tenfold zest. It is said, that in love we idolize the object; and, placing him apart and selecting him from his fellows, look on him as superior in nature to all others. We do so; but even as we idolize the object of our affections, do we idolize ourselves: if we separate him from his fellow mortals, so do we separate ourselves, and, glorying in belonging to him alone, feel lifted above all other sensations

all other joys and griefs, to one hallowed circle from which all but his idea is banished; we walk as if a mist or some more potent charm divided us from all but him; a sanctified victim which none but the priest set apart for that office could touch and not pollute, enshrined in a cloud of glory, made glorious through beauties not our own. Thus we all feel during the entrancing dream of love; and Beatrice, the ardent, affectionate Beatrice, felt this with multiplied power: and, believing that none had ever felt so before, she thought that heaven itself had interfered to produce so true a paradise. If her childish dreams had been full of fire, how much more vivid and overpowering was the awakening of her soul when she first loved! It seemed as if some new and wondrous spirit had descended alive, breathing and panting, into her colder heart, and gave it a new impulse, a new existence. Ever the dupe of her undisciplined thoughts, she cherished her reveries, believing that heavenly and intellectual, which was indebted for its force to earthly mixtures; and she resigned herself entire to her visionary joys, until she finally awoke to truth, fallen, and for ever lost,'

Castruccio returns to Lucca with his power increased and established; still his marriage with Euthanasia is postponed. She is anxious to prevent the enslavement of her native city of Florence, and the acquisition of that territory is one point of his ambition.

The poor Beatrice, forlorn and broken-hearted, and in the disguise of a pilgrim, visits the Castle of Valperga for the purpose of beholding her rival, and quits it almost in delirium. Castruccio relates her story to Euthanasia, who has now so far conquered her passion that she has resolved never to wed him. The deeds by which he has ascended to power are so incompatible with virtue and honour, that her soul which is capable of any sacrifice, shudders at a union with him. At length so little weight has his love against his ambition, that he summons the Castle of Valperga, which has hitherto been independent. Euthanasia refuses to yield it; it is attacked, and taken by the troops of Castruccio, who himself basely points out the secret path of entrance by which he has been admitted for far different purposes. Euthanasia is led a prisoner to Lucca, where Castruccio again offers her his hand he is refused; but the refusal does not excite even his anger; so cool has his heart grown in his worldly career.

An episode is then introduced of a witch who is consulted by Euthanasia's dwarf Bindo; this old woman is actuated only by a love of mischief, and pretends to enter into his plans for the destruction of Castruccio. If we might say so of what we do not profess clearly to understand, this is the weakest and worst part of the novel. We leave it, to return to the poor Beatrice, whom the charitable disposition of Euthanasia leads her to find in one of the prisons of the city, about to be put to death as a Paterin heretic. She procures from Castruccio her liberation, takes her home, learns her story, which is one of madness and suffering; solaces her woes, restores her health, and in some measure her tranquillity. The mischievous witch, who has also learnt her history, and has by Bindo's assistance seen her, promises to assist her in conjuring up the form of Castruccio. They meet by night, at a time when the adroit bag knows he must pass. A mummery ensues; she administers a draught to Beatrice for the purpose of aiding the delusion; she then invokes Castruccio, who passes the road; the distracted Beatrice rushes towards

him, and the shock, together with the potency of the draught, uproots her reason-she is carried home and expires.

The manner of her funeral, which Euthanasia wished to be private, but which Castruccio insisted should be attended with every circumstance of pomp used in those days, is thus described :

'The room was hung with black cloth, and made as dark as night, to give brightness to the many torches by which it was illuminated. Beatrice was laid on a bier, arrayed in costly apparel, and canopied with a pall of black velvet embroidered with gold: flowers, whose beauty and freshness mocked the livid hues of the corpse, were strewn over her, and scattered about the room; and two boys walked about, swinging censers of incense. The chamber was filled with mourning women; one, the chief, dressed in black, with dishevelled hair, knelt near the head of the bier, and began the funeral song; she sang a strain in a monotonous, but not unmelodious voice: the verses were extempore, and described the virtues and fortunes of the deceased; they ended with the words:

Oime! ora giace morta sulla bara!*

And the other women, taking up the burthen, cried in shrill tones: Oime! ora giace morta sulla bara !

Again they were silent: and the Cantatrice, renewing her song, repeated another verse in praise of poor Beatrice. Castruccio had told her in part what ought to be the subject of her song. The first verse described her as beautiful, beloved, and prosperous among her friends and fellow citizens: "Then," cried the singer, "the spoiler came; she lost all that was dear to her; and she wandered forth a wretch upon the earth. Who can tell what she suffered? Evil persons were abroad; they seized on her; and she became the victim of unspoken crimes: worse ills followed, madness and heresy, which threatened to destroy her soul."

'The woman wept, wept unfeigned tears as she sang; and the hired mourners sympathized in her grief; each verse ended with the words, Oime! ora giace morta sulla bara!

which were echoed by them all, and accompanied by cries and tears. 'She ended; and, night being come, the hour for interment arrived. The censers were replenished with incense; and the priests sprinkled holy water about the room. Four lay-brothers raised the bier, and followed a troop of priests and monks, who went first with the crucifix, chaunting a De profundis. The streets through which they passed were rendered as light as day by the glare of torches; after the priests, came the bier on which the body lay exposed, covered with flowers; many of the young girls and women of the city followed, each carrying a wax taper; a troop of horse closed the procession. It was midnight when they entered the church; the moon threw the shadow of the high window on the pavement: but all shadows were effaced by the torches which filled the church. Beatrice was laid in her peaceful grave; and, mass being said for the repose of her soul, the ceremony closed.'

Castruccio's increasing crimes widen the gulf which separates him from Euthanasia. The murder of her kinsmen, the enslavement of her country, and the persuasions of her friends, induce at length the magnanimous lady of Valperga to join in a plot for his removal. It is dis

* Alas! she now lies dead upon the bier!