of dining daily with the prince at his own private
table. He accompanied the princesses to their country retreats at
Urbino, Belriguarda, or Consandoli, where in healthy country pursuits
he forgot for a time his troubles. At Urbino he wrote the unfinished
canzone to the river Metauro, one of the most touching of his
compositions, in which he laments the wounds which fortune had
inflicted upon him through the whole of his hapless life.

But the tenure of princely favour at Italian courts, amid so many
ambitious patrons and anxious suitors, was very precarious. It was
uncommonly so at Ferrara. After a while a sudden change passed over
the mind of the duke towards Tasso. Whether tired of the poet's
incessant complaints, irritated at his incautious conduct--going the
length on two occasions of drawing his sword, when provoked, upon
members of the ducal household,--or whether his suspicions were
aroused regarding the relations between him and his sister Leonora, is
not known, but from this time he began to treat Tasso as if he were a
madman. He was placed under the charge of the ducal physicians and
servants, who reported to their employer every careless word. Removed
from Belriguarda, he was ordered to be confined in the Ferrarese
convent of San Francisco; and two friars were appointed to watch over
him continually. Such a life was unendurable to the proud poet, who
disliked the nauseous medicines of the convent as much as its
restraint; and taking advantage of a _festa_, when his keepers were
unusually negligent, he made his escape by a window. In the disguise
of a shepherd he travelled on foot over the mountains of the Abruzzi,
getting a morsel of bread and a lodging from the peasants by the way,
to his sister's house at Sorrento, now the Vigna Sersale. There he
remained during the whole summer, soothed by his sister's affectionate
kindness. The monotony of the life, however, began to pall upon him,
and he longed to get back to his old scenes of excitement. Undeterred
by an evasive reply which the duke sent to an urgent letter of his, he
set out for Ferrara; and on his arrival, meeting with a cold
reception, he was obliged again to leave the place where he had once
been so happy. For a year and a half he wandered over almost the whole
of Northern Italy, visiting in turn Venice, Urbino, Mantua, Padua,
Rome, and Turin. At the last place he arrived without a passport, and
in such a miserable condition that the guards at the