aradiso_, xvii. 70.

The Scaligers are well known, not only as having held the lordship of
Verona for some generations, but also as having been among the friends of
Dante in his exile, no mean reputation in itself; and, at a later period,
as taking very high rank among the first scholars of their day. To which of
them the passage above properly belongs--whether to Can Grande, or his
brother Bartolommeo, or even his father Alberto, commentators are by no
means agreed. The question is argued more largely than conclusively, both
in the notes to Lombardi's edition, and also in Ugo Foscolo's _Discorso nel
testo di Dante_.

Perhaps the following may be a contribution to the evidence in favour of
Can Grande. After {134} saying, in a letter, in which he professes to give
the history and origin of his family,--

"Prisca omnium familiarum Scaligerae stirpis insignia sunt, aut _Scala
singularis_, aut Canes utrinque scalae innitentes."

Joseph Scaliger adds--

"Denique principium Veronensium progenitores eadem habuerunt insignia:
_donec_ in eam familiam Alboinus et _Canis Magnus_ Aquilam imperii cum
Scala primum ab Henrico VII^o, deinde a Ludovico Bavaro acceptam nobis
reliquerunt."

Alboinus, however, who received this grant upon being made a Lieutenant of
the Empire, and having the Signory of Verona made hereditary in his family,
only bore the eagle "_in quadrante scuti_."

"Sed Canis Magnus, cum eidem a Caesare Ludovico Bavaro idem privilegium
confirmatum esset, totum scutum Aquila occupavit, _subjecta Alitis
pedibus Scala_."

Can Grande, then, was surely the first who carried the "santo uccello" _in
su_ la Scala; and his epithet of Grande would also agree best with Dante's
words, as neither his father nor brothers seem to have had the same claim
to it.

I would offer a farther remark about this same title or epithet Can Grande,
and the origin of the scala or ladder as a charge upon the shield or coat
of this family. Cane would at first sight appear to be a designation
borrowed from the animal of that name. There would be parallels enough in
Italy and elsewhere, as the Ursini, Lewis the Lion (VIII. of France), our
own Coeur de Lion, and Harold Harefoot. Dante, too, refers to him under the
name "Il Veltro," _Inferno_, canto 1. l. 101. But Joseph Scaliger, in the
letter to which I referred before, gives the following account of it:--

"Nomen illi fuerat _Franscisco_, a sacro lavac