le with secret infidelity, provided she does not expose herself
to ridicule and censure by letting her amour be known. Here again,
therefore, the proper translation of the word seems to be credit.
Finally, we may allude to the invective against honor which Tasso puts
into the mouths of his shepherds in _Aminta_[2] Though at this period
the influence of France and Spain had communicated to aristocratic
society in Italy an exotic sense of honor, yet a court poet dared to
condemn it as unworthy of the _Bell' eta dell' oro_, because it
interfered with pleasure and introduced disagreeable duties into life.
Such a tirade would not have been endured in the London of Elizabeth or
in the Paris of Louis XIV. Tasso himself, it may be said in passing, was
almost feverishly punctilious in matters that touched his reputation.

[1] _La Raffaella, ovvero Delia bella Creanza delle Donne_
(Milano, Daelli). Compare the statement of the author in his
preface, p. 4, where he speaks in his own person, with the
definition of _Onore_ given by Raffaella, pp. 50 and 51 of the
Dialogue: 'l'onore non e riposto in altro, se non nella
stimazione appresso agli uomini ... l'onor della donna non
consiste, come t'ho detto, nel fare o non fare, che questo
importa poco, ma nel credersi o non credersi.'

[2] This invective might be paralleled from one ot Masuccio's
Novelle (ed. Napoli, pp. 389, 390), in which he almost
cynically exposes the inconvenience of self-respect and
delicacy. The situation of two friends, who agree that honor is
a nuisance and share their wives in common, is a favorite of
the Novelists.

An important consideration, affecting the whole question of Italian
immorality, is this. Whereas the northern races had hitherto remained in
a state of comparative poverty and barbarism, distributed through
villages and country districts, the people of Italy had enjoyed
centuries of wealth and civilization in great cities. Their towns were
the centers of luxurious life. The superfluous income of the rich was
spent in pleasure, nor had modern decorum taught them to conceal the
vices of advanced culture beneath the cloak of propriety. They were at
the same time both indifferent to opinion and self-conscious in a high
degree. The very worst of them was seen at a glance and recorded with
minute particularity. The depravity of less cultivated races remained
unnoticed because no one took the trou