itself, and which might be greatly improved by cultivation, but would
lose all its natural beauty if too much meddled with:--this is the case,
he would continue, with stanzas, which come into the mind, we know not
how, and which may be improved by the correction of a little original
roughness, but are deprived of all their grace and freshness by too nice
a handling."--(_Stebbing's Life._)

The life-time of Ariosto was shortened by the intensity with which he
applied himself to the production of his works. One of his last labours
was a corrected and enlarged edition of his splendid Orlando Furioso.
The printing was, however, so badly executed, as to cause him to say
"he had been assassinated by his printer." Mr. Stebbing observes, "it
is probable that this circumstance, combined with the fatigue attending
his close application while preparing the edition for the press, had a
serious effect on his health, which now began to exhibit signs of rapid
decline."[3] In the spring of 1533 he was seriously attacked with
indigestion. The constant application of medicine to remove this
complaint brought on a consumption, and on the night of June 6, in the
same year, he breathed his last, "his death, it is worthy of mention,
having been preceded only a few hours by the total destruction of
Alphonso's splendid theatre by fire;" which theatre, it should be
added, the poet had designed for his noble patron a few years before:
"so superb and convenient was the structure, when finished, that it was
the admiration of all Italy."

"Ferrara, all Italy, and even Europe, lamented Ariosto as the first
poet of the age, and as worthy of being enrolled in the same chart of
fame with the greatest that had ever lived. His funeral was rendered
remarkable by the attendance of a large body of monks, who to honour
his memory, followed him, contrary to the rules of their order, to the
grave. His son, Virginio, shortly after built a small chapel in his
garden, and formed a mausoleum to which he intended to remove his
remains, but the same monks prohibited it, and the body was left in
the humble tomb in which it was originally deposited, till the new
church of S. Benedetto was built, when Agostino Mosti, a gentleman of
Ferrara, raised above it a monument more worthy of the poet. In 1612 his
great grandson, Ludovico, erected a still nobler one, and removed the
ashes of his ancestor from the tomb of Agostino, as the latter had done
from the one in which the