DANTE ALIGHIERI.

1255-1321.

BEATRICE.

ALL that is known of Beatrice may be summed up in a few words. She was the daughter of Folco Portinari, a wealthy citizen of Florence, in which city she was born in 1266. Dante saw her for the first time in 1274, at a banquet in her father's house. It was a May-day festival, and she appeared in a blood-red dress. They were mere children, both being in their ninth year, still they were old enough to love: at least Dante was, for at the sight of Beatrice he was seized with a sudden passion for her. At the end of nine years they met again. She was walking in the street at the time, between two ladies, and was clothed in white. Dante trembled at her approach, and would have shrank away, but she saw him, and he was rooted to the ground. She saluted him graciously, and he was in the seventh heaven of love. The next time that he saw her was at church. She sat at a distance from him, on a line with another lady, who intercepted his loving looks. He was accused of loving this lady, and for the sake of Beatrice, whose rank seems to have been superior to his own, he favored the mistake, and pretended to be enamoured of her. He wrote a poem on sixty of the loveliest women in the city, and do what he would to the contrary, the name of Beatrice always came the ninth in the list. She made a journey to a distant part of the country, and during her absence he feigned to be in love with another, which offended her so when she heard of it, that she would not salute him on her return. The next thing we learn is that she is married. The date of her marriage is not given, but it must have been before the 15th of January, 1287, for on that day her father drew up a will, in which she and her husband, Simone dei Bardi, were mentioned. The death of her father two years later, and her excessive grief on that occasion, closed the book of her life. She died on the 9th of June, 1290.

This is a meagre account certainly, but it is all that Dante's commentators, for five hundred years, have been able to wring from the Past, and much of this would, doubtless, have escaped them but for Dante himself, so stormy were the times in which he lived. A few years after her death he collected the poems that he had written upon her, and published them with a biographical and critical commentary. This work, which he

called "THE NEW LIFE" (Vita Nuova), was followed by another called "THE BANQUET " (Convito), and at length by the celebrated "Divina Commedia," in both of which she is introduced, or rather her name is, for the Beatrice of the "Divina Commedia” and "THE BANQUET" is an embodiment of Philosophy and Religion, and not the Beatrice Portinari, whom Dante loved in his youth, and remembered with fondness in his age. The following extracts are from "THE NEW LIFE." The version used is that of Lyell. (London, 1845.)

To every captive soul and gentle heart,

Into whose sight the present song shall come,
Praying their thoughts on what it may portend,
Health in the name of Love, their sovereign lord.
A third part of the hours had almost past
Which show in brightest lustre every star,
When suddenly before me Love appeared,
Whose essence to remember gives me horror.
Joyful Love seemed, holding within his hand
My heart, and in his arms enfolded lay
Madonna sleeping, in a mantle wrapt.
Then waking her, he with this burning heart
Courteously fed her, and in fear she ate.
That done, I saw him go his way in tears.

Young, tender, noble maiden, since you see

That Love, with your consent, has made me yours,
And that for you I burn, and waste, and pine,

O let me not expire without reward.

O Love! dear lord, haply thou disbelievest
How hard she is, and cruel is my pain;
For in thy generous heart there must exist
The will to succor my fidelity.

And, lady, every pain would be removed

If hope were realized, and I were blest
With joy which Love solicits you to grant.
O help me, then, Madonna, ere I die;
I live for that alone, and if denied,

A corse you soon will see me at your feet.

O Love! since while I gazed, you struck this heart
A blow so dire, that every nerve is pained,

In pity, lord, afford it some relief,

So that the sorrowing spirit may revive.
For see you not these mournful eyes consume
In weeping, through extremity of woe,
Which brings me to the verge of death so near,
That my escape is barred on every side.
See, lady, what a load of grief I bear;

And hearken to my voice, how weak it is
With calling still for pity, and your love:

Yet if it be your pleasure, gentle lady,

That by this grief my heart should waste away,
Behold your servant humble and resigned.

Tell me, kind ladies, have you seen, of late,
That gentle creature who my life consumes?
To you I own, that if she do but smile,
My thoughts dissolve as snow before the sun.
Hence on my heart such cruel blows arrive

That they would seem to threaten me with death:
Kind ladies, then, wherever ye may see her,
If you by chance should meet her on your way,
O rest with her awhile for pity's sake,

And with humility make known to her

That my life bears for her the weight of death:

And if in mercy she will comfort me,

And ease the mind deep laden with my griefs,
O send to me, far distant, the glad news.

All thoughts that meet within my mind expire,
Fair jewel, when I come to gaze on you;
And when I am near you, I hear Love exclaim,
O flee, if thy destruction thou wouldst shun !
The countenance the heart's complexion wears,
Which panting seeks support where'er it can;

And through the intoxication of great fear,
The very stones, methinks, cry out, Die, die!
He sins who can behold me, then, unmoved,
Nor comfort gives to the affrighted soul,
At least in showing that he pities me
For the distress occasioned by your scorn,
Which is apparent in the deadly hue

Of these sad eyes, that fain would close in death.

Many the times that to my memory comes
The cheerless state imposed on me by Love;
And o'er me comes such sadness, then, that oft
I say, Alas, was ever fate like mine!
For Love assaulteth me so suddenly,

That life itself almost abandons me;
One spirit alone escapes alive, and that
Is left, fair lady, for it speaks of you.
At length I make an effort for relief,

And so, all pale and destitute of power,
I come to gaze on you, in hope of cure:
And if I raise the eyes that I may look,

A trembling at my heart begins, so dread,
It makes the soul take flight from every vein.

So noble and so modest doth appear

My lady when she any one salutes,

That every tongue becomes in trembling mute,
And none dare raise the eyes to look on her.

Robed in humility she hears her praise,

And passes on with calm benignity;
Appearing not a thing of earth, but come
From heaven, to show mankind a miracle.

So pleasing is the sight of her, that he

Who gazes feels a sweetness reach the heart That must be proved or cannot be conceived. And from her countenance there seems to flow