of childhood, the sweet affections of youth, the first words of love, and the first sad feelings of sorrow, then all the weight of woe and misery she had undergone since her unhappy marriage: she thought what these last few years had been, a constant struggle between a few joys, (and those anything but pure,) and many bitter sorrows and regrets.

“And now, when shaken by so many trials, she had almost desired to follow the voice which seemed to call to her, but had not found strength to do so; now Divine Providence spoke even more loudly, and placed her, as it were, in the path she ought to follow, by so unexpectedly sending tidings of her husband. Every doubt,' she murmured, is now removed, whilst it was uncertain whether he yet lived, there might be some excuse for me, but now can I go on thus ?'

*

"Ginevra possessed a strong and well tempered mind, and consequently could not long remain in this state of indecision; Can I,' she proceeded at last firmly, 'can I live any longer in such constant selfreproach; can I entirely relinquish the hopes, or extinguish the terrors, of a future life?-No. Then let me do as I feel to be right, without regard to any other consideration; and may the sufferings I dread, be accepted as some atonement for my faults; and thou, Mother Divine, thou wilt have pity on me in this world and in the next. Graiano refuse to pardon me, what can he do to me? Kill me? My immortal soul will fly to the presence of GOD, and will have some fruits of penance to offer for mercy and forgiveness.'

Should

"After one last earnest prayer, she rose and ascended the steps into the Church, with a firm and rapid step, as if she hoped, by her haste, to strengthen her resolution, and shutting herself in her chamber, sat down to consider the means of executing her determination."

Fieramosca, weary of the bustle, the excitement, and even of the fascinations of Gonsalvo's daughter, Donna Elvira, (who is much struck with the young Italian,) and touched by the thought, that Ginevra is meanwhile mourning in her monastic retreat, makes an excuse, "valid," as Azeglio remarks, " in the sixteenth as in the nineteenth century," and begging a friend to assure Gonsalvo that he was suffering from violent headache, seeks to retire to his quarters. But on the way he is met by one of the bandits, of whom the reader has already heard. This man having received kindness at the hands of Ginevra, has come to inform him that her retreat has been discovered by Cæsar Borgia, and that she is to be taken thence by violence that very evening. Fieramosca in agony of mind, rushes to the shore, followed by Inigo and Brancaleone. The three, after some delay, succeed in procuring a boat, and in manning it. They strain every nerve, and after reaching the little island, and waiting some minutes, they see a boat approach with three men and a lady in it. They two parties attack each other furiously: Fieramosca mistaking the party for Borgia's men and Ginevra, and

the other crew (in reality led by the young robber who had brought the warning to Ettore,) mistaking in the dusk the leader of their opponents for Borgia himself. On Borgia, this bandit, Pietraccio by name, had long vowed vengeance, for his own mother had been numbered among the victims of the duke.

Fieramosca is left wounded to the care of the lady, who is not Ginevra, but Zoraide, in great fear as to what may have happened to the real object of his search, and in equal dread, lest his condition should render it impossible for him to appear as one of the thirteen champions in the lists of the morrow. At length he hears that Ginevra has fled from the island, and implores his friends to do all in their power to discover some traces of her steps.

We must return to Barletta. At the foot of its fortress was a rocky hiding place, opening by two or three steps upon the sea. Above caroused Gonsalvo and his guests; below in this small chamber lay concealed one, whose presence was known to none of that numerous assembly but the great Captain only. This was Cæsar Borgia after writing much, and reading some letters from the Pope, his father, which threw him into a deep reverie, he paced up and down his little tenement, till the sounds of revelry grew so loud, that he thought that they must be approaching closer. He opened the door, when his eye was caught by the sight of a boat, which in the darkness he at first imagined to be empty, but a moment's delay convinced him that sounds of lamentation were issuing from it.

Coming nearer he beholds a female figure. She was weeping bitterly, her hands clasped in the attitude of prayer. Borgia having lifted her from the boat, bears her to his chamber, and great is his astonishment on discovering in the almost lifeless form before him, the long sought-for Ginevra-Ginevra, who in her attempt to seek out her husband had actually, in her ignorance, brought herself to the door of her great persecutor.

The story hastens to its melancholy close. Ginevra's dishonour is sealed, and Borgia being rejoined by his follower, Michele, leaves Barletta before dawn to pursue his schemes of aggrandisement at Rome.

Ginevra herself is discovered on the following morning, extended insensible at the bottom of the boat, that had carried her so fatally the night before. At Gonsalvo's request the noble Vittoria Colonna tends her with a sister's care, and a priest, Fra Mariano, is brought to calm her troubled spirit. This priest is represented (as indeed are most of his brethren, to whom the author attributes any extraordinary share of earnestness and self-devotion) as being a follower of Savonarola.

His attachment to that enthusiast had brought Mariano into trouble. He was said to have broken an engagement to a noble Florentine lady, being won to the priesthood by the eloquence of Savonarola.

"These were the reports concerning him. But the keenest enmity could not discover a blot on his character. The severe teaching of Savonarola had found in his heart a soil prepared for the seed, and assisted by his natural disposition, a readiness to sacrifice everything for truth, had indeed borne ample fruit of charity and earnest zeal.

"The stake where his master had suffered had, as it were, consumed with him his whole party; and dread of papal vengeance had silenced all those who still detested the abuses of the Court of Rome. Fra Mariano lived tranquilly in his retreat, content, since GOD had not thought him worthy to suffer for the truth, that he was not compelled to witness evils which he had not the power to remedy."

His attendance on Ginevra is but short. In a few hours she is no more, but her death is concealed from Fieramosca, who finding himself sufficiently recovered to enter the lists, returns in the morning to Barletta, where he and his comrades prove triumphant. But in the evening he comes to Vittoria to inquire for Ginevra, and is informed (for the lady desired to defer the fatal intelligence) that Ginevra is again at S. Ursula. And so in truth she was, having been conveyed thither at her own request to be buried in that little chapel, where she had knelt in such earnest prayer for Divine guidance and protection. Fieramosca arrives in time to see the last rites over the object of his first and latest love. After a few moments of stupefaction he remounts his charger, though a storm is raging round, and spurring him madly along the rocky summit of the island, was never seen again by mortal eye. Relics of spurs, gauntlets, and other knightly accoutrements being found by the poor fishermen of the place, it was charitably presumed that in his bewilderment he had got entangled among the rocks, and urging his horse had fallen into the waves below.

Such is the outline of Azeglio's tale. Its leading features must strike English readers as somewhat painful and even repulsive, nor can we wish such sentiments on their part to be eschewed. But whatever the plot may appear in the disadvantageous form of an epitome, it is impossible to deny to it, as it stands in the original volume, the merit of skilful construction and the power of keeping up the reader's interest and excitement to its latest page. The characters are felicitously drawn; even Cæsar Borgia is never suffered to degenerate into the common-place villain. Who indeed that had ever gazed on his picture by Raphael, as it meets the eye, and almost speaks, in the Borghese Palace at Rome, could ever think of him as such? For better uses was given that commanding spirit, which even on the canvass looks through the outer form; and Azeglio, though dwelling much on the perturbed restlessness of the Duke's eye and gesture, yet not unreasonably imagines for him some seasons of awe and momentary compunctious meditation.

The hope of seeing his beloved Italy an united, great, and powerful country pervades the entire story. As an obstacle in the way of the realization of this vision, and one chief cause why it has

not ere now become a living fact, instead of a poet's dream, the author looks with suspicion upon the temporal power and past political influence of the Popedom. It is indeed only just and right, that in days when we hear much that is very true concerning the beneficial influence of that power, when (as even Mr. R. C. Trench has been compelled to admit) it is so generally confessed "that Papal Rome of the middle ages had a work of GOD to accomplish for the taming of a violent and brutal world, in the midst of which she often lifted up the only voice which was anywhere heard in behalf of righteousness and truth;" it is only right, we say, to listen to reasonable representations which would urge us to reflect upon the weighty and important exceptions to the beneficial character of that temporal might and sway. The abstract question is not however of necessity deeply touched by such considerations. The circumstance that Anselm was a saint, and William Rufus a man of almost fiendish passions, does not of itself prove the justice of all the claims made by the Archbishop, and by the Papal See through him. Neither on the other hand do our author's pictures of the evil use made of that power by Popes Alexander VI. and Clement VII. of necessity convince us that the Continental Church could have (humanly speaking) survived so many shocks without the union of a sceptre with its crosier. But it is not, as we have already implied, our purpose to enter upon this large subject. Whatever be the objections to the reasonings and to portions of the plot of this tale, and that of Niccolo de' Lapi, we cannot but feel for their author much sincere admiration and respect. Living in the great world, he is not ashamed to be religious; and a genuine modesty adorns his genius with an ornament than which none can be more graceful. While the most popular fictions of France are the compositions-often loathsomely horrible, often flagrantly immoral-of such men as Dumas, and the Socialist, Eugene Sue, it is refreshing to be able to refer the student of Italian to tales so admirable as those of Manzoni and his son-in-law, Massimo d' Azeglio.

REVIEWS AND NOTICES.

Stories of Holy Men and Women. By the Author of "Hymns and Scenes of Childhood." London: Masters.

THE author of this little work is well known as particularly happy in her mode of writing for children. It is a task of infinite difficulty, but one in which this last attempt proves her to be really successful. There cannot be more useful reading for young persons than that

* Trench's Sacred Latin Poetry, p. 163.

which gives them in language at once pleasing and suited to their comprehension the history of those who have so truly wrought for the Faith in this world that now, when resting from their labours, their works do follow them; especially the author has skill not only to win admiration for their holy examples, but to excite also the desire of imitation. We heartily wish all success to this little book; and we would merely add a caution to the author to be very careful in her choice of subjects when she writes for the young: a mere detail of facts will sometimes convey a bad impression, however good a lesson may be drawn from them. In a work exclusively intended for the innocent minds of little childen, we should have preferred to see the histories of Afra and Theodata omitted.

Mr. JACKSON, of S. James', Westminster, has published a Confirma. tion Address, entitled The Spirit of the World, and the Spirit which is of GOD (Skeffington and Southwell.) Viewed dogmatically it is wanting in exactness, and scarcely fit to be put forth as a model; but if intended merely for private circulation among his flock, it will command that respect which is always given to earnest and affectionate pastoral exhortation.

A Plea for Parochial Boarding-Schools, by Mr. J. C. Cox, of S. Nicolas, Guildford, (Rivingtons,) touches a very important truth, viz., that our ordinary parish-schools are quite inadequate for forming character; and that if we desire to elevate the moral and social condition of the people, it must be done by bringing at least a few under a better system of early discipline than what they are likely to meet with at home. The main objection (beyond the mere fiscal one) to his plan of receiving a limited number of boarders into our parochial schools, is the incompetency of the ordinary run of masters to effect the object desired. We should have more hope from the establishment of a distinct order of schools on the collegiate model, just outside our large towns, where boys could be educated for about £1 or 15s. per month.

MR. IRONS' volume comparing the two judgments of the Arches Court and the Privy Council (Masters) reached us as we were going to press. We have seen enough, however, to pronounce it a very valuable publication; and if any one desires a conspectus of the whole case, he cannot do better than procure a copy of this work. Mr. Irons here

quite recovers the ground which he appeared before to abandon, as well (we must be allowed to say) as his own temper. He admits that no previous cases of State oppression at all parallel our present position; that "our prospects are dark, and that our dangers must be arrested now or never.'

The BISHOP OF RIPON'S Pastoral Letter to his clergy is also a very important gain on the same side.

LONDON: JOSEPH MASTERS, PRINTER, ALDERSGATE STREET.