801, was one of the most
brilliant spectacles of the short-lived Italian Republic; and to
consecrate the memory of the ceremony, the once famous fallen
_Intrepidi_ were revived and reformed into the Ariostean academy. The
large public place through which the procession paraded was then for the
first time called Ariosto Square. The author of the _Orlando_ is
jealously claimed as the Homer, not of Italy but Ferrara.[589] The
mother of Ariosto was of Reggio, and the house in which he was born is
carefully distinguished by a tablet with these words: "Qui nacque
Ludovico Ariosto il giorno 8. di Settembre dell' anno 1474." But the
Ferrarese make light of the accident by which their poet was born
abroad, and claim him exclusively for their own. They possess his bones,
they show his arm-chair, and his inkstand, and his autographs.

"......Hic illius anna,
Hic currus fuit......"

The house where he lived, the room where he died, are designated by his
own replaced memorial,[590] and by a recent inscription. The Ferrarese
are more jealous of their claims since the animosity of Denina, arising
from a cause which their apologists mysteriously hint is not unknown to
them, ventured to degrade their soil and climate to a Boeotian in
capacity for all spiritual productions. A quarto volume has been called
forth by the detraction, and this supplement to Barotti's Memoirs of the
illustrious Ferarrese, has been considered a triumphant reply to the
"Quadro Storico Statistico dell' Alta Italia."

12.

For the true laurel-wreath which Glory weaves
Is of the tree no bolt of thunder cleaves.
Stanza xli. lines 4 and 5.

The eagle, the sea calf, the laurel, and the white vine,[591] were
amongst the most approved preservatives against lightning: Jupiter chose
the first, Augustus Caesar the second, and Tiberius never failed to wear
a wreath of the third when the sky threatened a thunder-storm.[592]
These superstitions may be received without a sneer in a country where
the magical properties of the hazel twig have not lost all their credit;
and perhaps the reader may not be much surprised that a commentator on
Suetonius has taken upon himself gravely to disprove the imputed virtues
of the crown of Tiberius, by mentioning that a few years before he wrote
a laurel was actually struck by lightning at Rome.[593]

13.

Kno