y attention upon
literature; and Tasso had lost whatever energy he once possessed to
assert his claims to recognition among the multitude of sycophants at
the Vatican.

Sick at heart, he left the imperial city, and directed his steps to
Naples, in the hope that on the spot he might succeed in recovering
his father's possession and his mother's dowry. But here, too, the
same ill-fortune that had hitherto dogged his steps attended him. The
lawsuit which he instituted, though it promised well at first, proved
a will-o'-the-wisp, which lured him into the bog of absolute penury.
His sister was dead; his mother's relatives, formerly hostile, were
now, because of the lawsuit, doubly embittered against him. In his
distress he sought refuge in the Benedictine monastery of Monte
Oliveto, which is now occupied by the offices of the Municipality of
Naples, and the monastery garden converted into a market-place. Here,
in one of the finest situations in Naples, commanding one of the
loveliest views in the world, and in the congenial society of the
monks, his shattered health was recruited, and his mind tranquillised
by the beauties of Nature and the exercises of religion. He repaid the
kindness of his hosts by writing a poem on the origin of their Order,
and by addressing to them one of his best sonnets. Among the visitors
who sought him out in this retreat was John Battista Manso, Marquis of
Villa, who afterwards became his biographer. This accomplished
nobleman, "whose name the friendship and Latin hexameters of Milton
have rendered at once familiar and musical to English ears," was by
far the kindest and most consistent patron that Tasso ever met with.
He loaded him with presents, and showed him the most delicate and
thoughtful attentions during Tasso's visit at his beautiful villa on
the seashore near Naples. He took him with him to his tower of
Bisaccio, where he remained all October and November, spending his
days, with great advantage to his health, in hunting, and his nights
in music and dancing, taking special delight in the marvellous
performances of the improvisatori. Milton's acquaintance with Manso
may be regarded as one of the most fortunate incidents of his foreign
travels, inasmuch as his conversations about Tasso are supposed to
have suggested to him the design of writing an epic work like the
_Gerusalemme_; and indeed Milton is supposed to have borrowed some of
his ideas for _Paradise Lost_ from the _Sette Giornate