it was perhaps as true a picture, after its fashion, of a lover's heart.
After all, it must be remembered that there are many kinds of lovers'
hearts, and that those who can understand the "New Life" of Messer
Dante's are very few, and fewer still those that can live that life. But
I here protest very solemnly that it was with no thought of scoff or
mockery that I made my ballad, but just for the sake of saying, in my
way, the things I thought about the pretty women that pleased me and
teased me, and made life so gay and fragrant and variegated in those
far-away, dearly remembered, and no doubt much-to-be-deplored days.

It was the dreaming of this ballad of mine that led me to think of Monna
Vittoria, whom you will remember if you bear in mind the beginning of
this, my history, the lady that Messer Simone of the Bardi was
whimsically pledged to wed if he failed to win a certain wager that I
trust you have not forgotten. And thinking of Monna Vittoria led, in due
time, to a meeting with Monna Vittoria that was not without
consequences.

It is not incurious, when you come to reflect upon it, how potent the
influence of such a woman as Vittoria may be upon the lives of those
that would seem never destined by Heaven to come in her way. My Dante
was never in those days a wooer of such ladies. As to certain things
that are said of him later, in the hours of his despair, when the world
seemed no better than an empty shell, I shall have somewhat to say,
perhaps, by-and-by, for there is a matter that has led to not a little
misunderstanding of the character of my friend. As for Madonna Beatrice,
she that was such a flower in a guarded garden, why, you would have said
it was little less than incredible that the clear course of her simple
life could be crossed by the summer lightning of Madonna Vittoria's
brilliant, fitful existence. Yet, nevertheless, from first to last,
Madonna Vittoria was of the utmost moment in the lives of this golden
lass and lad, and this much must be admitted in all honesty: that she
never did, or at least never sought to do, other than good to either of
them. I should not like to say that she would have troubled at all about
them or their welfare if it had not served her turn to do so. But
whatever the reasons for her deeds, let us be grateful that their
results were not malefic to those whose interests concern us most. If
Messer Simone had never made his brutal boast, Madonna Vittoria would
never ha