dently disagreeable to him, in
spite of the company of his friends, Barrilli and Barbato. His
friendship with the latter was for a moment overcast by an act of
indiscretion on the part of Barbato, who, by dint of importunity,
obtained from Petrarch thirty-four lines of his poem of Africa, under a
promise that he would show them to nobody. On entering the library of
another friend, the first thing that struck our poet's eyes was a copy
of the same verses, transcribed with a good many blunders. Petrarch's
vanity on this occasion, however, was touched more than his anger--he
forgave his friend's treachery, believing it to have arisen from
excessive admiration. Barbato, as some atonement, gave him a little MS.
of Cicero, which Petrarch found to contain two books of the orator's
Treatise on the Academics, "a work," as he observes, "more subtle than
useful."

Queen Giovanna was fond of literature. She had several conversations
with Petrarch, which increased her admiration of him. After the example
of her grandfather, she made him her chaplain and household clerk, both
of which offices must be supposed to have been sinecures. Her letters
appointing him to them are dated the 25th of November, 1343, the very
day before that nocturnal storm of which I shall speedily quote the
poet's description.

Voltaire has asserted that the young Queen of Naples was the pupil of
Petrarch; "but of this," as De Sade remarks, "there is no proof." It
only appears that the two greatest geniuses of Italy, Boccaccio and
Petrarch, were both attached to Giovanna, and had a more charitable
opinion of her than most of their contemporaries.

Soon after his return from the tour to Baiae, Petrarch was witness to a
violent tempest at Naples, which most historians have mentioned, as it
was memorable for having threatened the entire destruction of the city.

The night of the 25th of November, 1343, set in with uncommonly still
weather; but suddenly a tempest rose violently in the direction of the
sea, which made the buildings of the city shake to their very
foundations. "At the first onset of the tempest," Petrarch writes to the
Cardinal Colonna, "the windows of the house were burst open. The lamp of
my chamber"--he was lodged at a monastery--"was blown out--I was shaken
from my bed with violence, and I apprehended immediate death. The friars
and prior of the convent, who had risen to pay their customary
devotions, rushed into my room with crucifixes and r