ourished, and we read of
jurists and astronomers born in those troublous days, as well as of a
distinguished physician, who wrote a ponderous dictionary of simples,
and dedicated it to King Robert of Naples. But by far the greatest
Mantuan of this time was he of whom readers have heard something from
a modern poet. He is the haughty Lombard soul, "in the movement of the
eyes honest and slow," whom Dante, ascending the inexplicable heights
of Purgatory, beheld; and who, summoning all himself, leaped to the
heart of Virgil when he named Mantua: "O Mantuan! I am Sordello, of
thine own land!"

Of Virgil the superstition of the Middle Ages had made a kind of
wizard, and of Sordello the old writers fable all manner of wonders;
he is both knight and poet, and has adventures scarcely less
surprising than those of Amadis of Gaul. It is pretty nearly certain
that he was born in 1189 of the Visconti di Goito, in the Mantuan
country, and that he married Beatrice, a sister of Eccelino, and had
amours with the youngest sister of this tyrant, the pretty Cunizza,
whom Dante places in his "Paradiso." This final disposition of
Cunizza, whom we should hardly think now of assigning a place among
the blest, surprised some people even in that day, it seems; for an
old commentator defends it, saying: "Cunizza was always, it is true,
tender and amorous, and properly called a daughter of Venus; but she
was also compassionate, benign, and merciful toward those unhappy ones
whom her brother cruelly tormented. Therefore the poet is right
in feigning to find her in the sphere of Venus. _For if the gentle
Cyprians deified their Venus, and the Romans their Flora, how much
more honestly may a Christian poet save Cunizza_." The lady, whose
salvation is on these grounds inexpugnably accomplished, was married
to Count Sanbonifazio of Padua, in her twenty-fourth year; and
Sordello was early called to this nobleman's court, having already
given proofs of his poetic genius. He fell in love with Cunizza, whom
her lord, becoming the enemy of the Eccelini, began to ill-treat. A
curious glimpse of the manners and morals of that day is afforded by
the fact, that the brothers of Cunizza conspired to effect her escape
with Sordella from her husband's court, and that, under the protection
of Eccelino da Romano, the lovers were left unmolested to their
amours. Eccelino, indeed, loved this weak sister with extraordinary
tenderness, and we read of a marvelous complai