mpest from the sky;
The air at once grew calm and all serene;
And where rude thorns had clothed the mountain high,
Was spread a plain, all flowers and vernal green.
Repentance ceased her scourge. Still standing nigh,
With placid looks, in her but rarely seen,
She said: 'Beware how yet the prize you lose;
The key of fortune few can wisely use.'

In the last stanza of the preceding translation, the seventh
line is the essence of the stanza immediately following; the
eighth is from a passage several stanzas forward, after
Orlando has obtained the key, which was the object of his
search:

Che mal se trova alcun sotto la Luna,
Ch' adopri ben la chiave di Fortuna.

The first two books of Bojardo's poem were published in
1486. The first complete edition was published in 1495.

The Venetian edition of 1544, from which I have cited this
passage, and the preceding one in chapter xx., is the
fifteenth and last complete Italian edition. The original
work was superseded by the _Rifacciamenti_ of Berni and
Domenichi. Mr. Panizzi has rendered a great service to
literature in reprinting the original. He collated all
accessible editions. _Verum opere in longo fas est obrepere
somnum_. He took for his standard,... as I think
unfortunately, the Milanese edition of 1539. With all the
care he bestowed on his task, he overlooked one fearful
perversion in the concluding stanza, which in all editions
but the Milanese reads thus: Mentre ch' io canto, ahime Dio
redentore...

He was recalled to himself by sinking up to his shoulders of a hollow.

'She must have anticipated my coming,' said the young gentleman to
himself. 'She had opened the book at this passage, and has left it to
say to me for her--Choose between love and repentance. Four times seven
days! That is to ensure calm for the Christmas holidays. The term will
pass over Twelfth Night. The lovers of old romance were subjected to a
probation of seven years:--

Seven long years I served thee, fair one,
Seven long years my fee was scorn.

'But here, perhaps, the case is reversed. She may have feared a
probation of seven years for herself; and not without reason. And what
have I to expect if I let the four times seven days pass by? Why, then,
I can read in her looks--an