pleted his work at Assisi and Rome and would soon
give to the world the Florentine Campanile. Fra Sisto and Fra Ristoro
had built the church Santa Maria Novella at Florence and Arnolfo di
Cambio, while Dante was writing sonnets, had begun the duomo or
cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. The stout walls and lofty tower of
the Bargello had sprung into beauteous being. Santa Croce destined to
be the burial place of illustrious Italians, had been built and remains
today one of Florence's greatest churches. St. John's Baptistry, _il
mio bel Giovanni_, had received its external facing of marble, and in
ten years after Dante's death would get its massive bronze doors which
are unparalleled in the world.

The century closed with the opening of the great Jubilee at Rome. March
twenty-fifth of the following year, 1300, Dante places as the time for
his journey through the realms of the unseen--the story of which is told
in the Divina Commedia. If sympathy with Dante and his work is not
aroused already, perhaps these two quotations may quicken your interest.

Charles Elliot Norton writes: "There are few other works of man, perhaps
there is no other, which affords such evidence as the Divine Comedy, of
uninterrupted consistency of purpose, of sustained vigor of imagination,
and of steady force of character controlling alike the vagaries of the
poetic temperament, the wavering of human purpose, the fluctuation of
human powers, the untowardness of circumstances. From the beginning to
the end of his work of many years there is no flagging of energy, no
indication of weakness. The shoulders burdened by a task almost too
great for mortal strength, never tremble under their load."

And Dr. Frank Crane, a foremost writer of the syndicate press, says "I
have put a good deal of hard labor digging into Dante and while I cannot
say that I ever got from him any direct usable material, yet I no more
regret my hours spent with him than I regret the beautiful landscapes I
have seen, the great music I have heard, the wise and noble souls I have
met, the wondrous dreams I have had. These are all a part of one's
education, of one's equipment for life and perhaps the best part."

DANTE THE MAN

DANTE THE MAN

Fifty-five years ago when called on for a poem to celebrate the sixth
hundredth anniversary of Dante's birth, Tennyson, feeling his own
littleness before "this central man of all the world," wrote:

"King, that has reigned