his surname was
Bartolomeo, which could not have been borne by a Jew; 3. That the
Florentine historian Poggio speaks of Valori as having been one of the
principal members of the Council of Florence. The Abbe thence justly
concludes, that the ambassador could not have been a Jew; and it is
extraordinary that Daru, after such a conclusive argument, should have
admitted the term _Jew_ into his text. But the truth is, that this
writer (like many others of great reputation) preferred blindly
following the text of Sanuto, as printed by Muratori[2], to the
trouble of consulting any early manuscripts. It happens, however, that
in a manuscript copy of these Orations of Mocenigo, written certainly
earlier than the period of Sanuto, and preserved in the British
Museum, MS. _Add._ 12, 121., the true reading of the passage may be
found thus:--"Fo mandato Bartolomio Valori, _homo richo_, el qual
viveva de cambij." By later transcribers the epithet _richo_, so
properly here bestowed on the Florentine noble, was changed into
_iudio_ (_giudeo_), and having been transferred in that shape into
Sanuto, has formed the groundwork of a serious error, which has now
existed for more than three centuries and a half.

FREDERICK MADDEN.

British Museum, Nov. 7. 1849

[2] In the _Rerum Italicarum Scriptores_, tom. xxii. col. 947.,
the passage stands thus: "Fu mandato Bartolomeo Valori, _hom
giudeo_, el qual vivea di cambi." Two late copies of Sanuto,
formerly in the Guildford collection, and now in the British
Museum, MS. _Add._ 8575, 8576, read, "Bartoli Valori, hom iudio."

* * * * *

LETTERS OF LORD NELSON'S BROTHER IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE BATTLE OF
TRAFALGAR.

[The following letters will be best illustrated by a few words
derived from the valuable life of our great naval hero lately
published by Mr. Pettigrew. Besides his last will, properly so
called, which had been some time executed, Lord Nelson wrote and
signed another paper of testamentary character immediately before
he commenced the battle of Trafalgar. It contained an enumeration
of certain public services performed by Lady Hamilton, and a
request that she might be provided for by the country. "Could I
have rewarded those services," Lord Nelson says, "I would not now
call upon my country; but as that has not been in my power, I
leave Emma Hamilton, therefore, a legacy to my king and co