Lincolnshire for the purpose of renewing my acquaintance
with Fiammetta. Before, however, I had achieved that object this
thought occurred to me: "You are upon a fool's errand; turn back, or
you will destroy forever one of the sweetest of your boyhood illusions!
You seek Fiammetta in the delusive hope of finding her in the person of
Mrs. Henry Boggs; there is but one Fiammetta, and she is the memory
abiding in your heart. Spare yourself the misery of discovering in the
hearty, fleshy Lincolnshire hussif the decay of the promises of years
ago; be content to do reverence to the ideal Fiammetta who has built
her little shrine in your sympathetic heart!"

Now this was strange counsel, yet it had so great weight with me that I
was persuaded by it, and after lying a night at the Swan-and-Quiver
Tavern I went back to London, and never again had a desire to visit
Lincolnshire.

But Fiammetta is still a pleasing memory--ay, and more than a memory to
me, for whenever I take down that precious book and open it, what a
host of friends do troop forth! Cavaliers, princesses, courtiers,
damoiselles, monks, nuns, equerries, pages, maidens--humanity of every
class and condition, and all instinct with the color of the master
magician, Boccaccio!

And before them all cometh a maiden with dark, glorious eyes, and she
beareth garlands of roses; the moonlight falleth like a benediction
upon the Florentine garden slope, and the night wind seeketh its cradle
in the laurel tree, and fain would sleep to the song of the nightingale.

As for Judge Methuen, he loves his Boccaccio quite as much as I do
mine, and being somewhat of a versifier he has made a little poem on
the subject, a copy of which I have secured surreptitiously and do now
offer for your delectation:

One day upon a topmost shelf
I found a precious prize indeed,
Which father used to read himself,
But did not want us boys to read;
A brown old book of certain age
(As type and binding seemed to show),
While on the spotted title-page
Appeared the name "Boccaccio."

I'd never heard that name before,
But in due season it became
To him who fondly brooded o'er
Those pages a beloved name!
Adown the centuries I walked
Mid pastoral scenes and royal show;
With seigneurs and their dames I talked--
The crony of Boccaccio!

Those courtly knights and sprightly maids,
Who really seemed disposed to shin