He applied himself very early to the study of the Latin, in which he made greater progress than almost any one of his age; and, in the very beginning of his studies, he composed and recited an elegant oration in that language, which gave the highest expectations of him. Tito Strozza, a man of great learning and consummate knowledge, took particular delight to hear him, and to propose difficult questions for his solution; often encouraging a dispute, on literary subjects, between him and Hercules his son, a youth whose age and studies agreed with Ariosto.

But it happened to our Poet, as to Ovid, Petrarch, Tasso, and others, that his father Nicolo, having little taste for literature, and therefore disinclined to encourage his son in pursuing the bent of his genius, was rather desirous, that, as his eldest-born, he should endeavour to establish his fortune in the world, by taking some lucrative profession; and sent him to Padua, to apply himself to the study of the Civil Law, under Angelo Castrinse and Il Maino; in which employment he spent five years, highly disagreeable to one of his disposition: which circumstance he laments in one of his satires addressed to Bembo,

Ahi lasso! quando ebbi al Pegaseo melo
L'età disposta, e che le fresche guancie
Non si vedeano ancor fiorir du'n pelo;

Mio padre mi cacciò con spiedi e lancie,
(Non che con sproni) a volger testi e chiose;
E m'occupò cinque anni in quelle ciancic.

Ere yet my cheeks were fledg'd with rising down,
When, smit with love of verse, I sought renown
On sweet Parnassus' hill; my sire's command
Compell'd me to forsake that happy land,
And chain'd me five long years to hear disputes
Of brawling lawyers and litigious suits.

Satire vi,

So Ovid complains that his father compelled him to study the law: De Tristibus, Lib. iv. Eleg. x.

At mihi jam puero cœlestia sacra placebant,
Inque suum furtim Musa trahebat opus.

Sæpe Pater dixit, Studium quid inutile tentas?
Moonides nullas ipse reliquit opes.

Motus eram dictis: totoque Helicone relicto,
Scribere conabar verba soluta modis.
Sponte sua carmen nnmeros veniebat ad aptos,
Et quod tentabam dicere, versus erat.

While yet a boy, sweet verse my genius fir'd;
The secret Muse her pleasing task inspir'd.
My sire oft cry'd, This useless trade give o'er ;
For Homer left behind no golden store,
Mov'd at his words, I Pindus' hill resign'd,
And strove to write, by metre unconfin'd:
In vain--the Muse spontaneons verse bestow'd,
And all I wrote in tuneful numbers flow'd.

Milton, in like manner, desires his father to let him pursue the Muses:

Tu, tamen, ut simules teneras odisse Camœnas
Non odisse reor; neque enim, pater, ire jubebas
Quà via lata patet, quà pronior area lucri,
Certaque condendi fulget spes aurea nummi :
Nec rapis ad leges, malè custoditaque gentis
Jura, nec insulsis damnas clamoribus aures.

Ad Patrem.

Thou canst not sure the gentle Muses hate,
Or bid me change, O sire! my peaceful state,
To tread the sordid paths, that open lies
To fields of wealth, where golden harvests rise.
Thou wilt not force me to th' ungrateful bar,
Where ill-kept laws supply the constant jar;
Or fix me there, long tedious days, to hear
Those sounds of discord to a poet's ear.

But although Ariosto durst not openly disobey his father, he could not so far conquer his inclinations, but that, during the course of this time, he found leisure to peruse many authors, particularly French and Spanish

Tomances, with which languages he was well acquainted, having translated two or three of these authors himself into his native tongue; of which kind of performances he availed himself in his future works, making use of every beauty that occurred in these wild productions of imagination. Nicolo, at last, perceiving the aversion his son had to the profession of the law, and the little progress he made therein, resolved no longer to combat his desires, but permit him to obey the strong propensity of genius, which evidently pointed to what Nature had designed him. This indulgence of Nicolo is said to have been, in a great degree, owing to the good offices of Pandolfo Ariosto, a youth of excellent endowments, and a near kinsman to Ludovico.

Ludovico, being now left at liberty, applied himself with unwearied assiduity to recover the advantages he had necessarily lost. He had now put himself, at the age of twenty, under the tuition of Gregorio de Spoleti, a person of admirable taste, and well versed in the Latin and Greek tongues, who then resided in the family of Rinaldo of Este, at Ferrara. Gregorio, observing the avidity with which Ariosto applied himself to study, took every possible care to cultivate his genius; and, by his instructions, his pupil soon made himself master of the most excellent Latin authors, particularly the poets, among whom Horace appears to have been his favourite. He explained many difficult and obscure parts in that author, which were never before understood. His intention was, in like manner, to have gone through a course of Greek literature; but as he was first desirous of perfecting himself in the Latin, he suddenly lost the assistance of his preceptor Gregorio, who was constrained

to take a journey into France, at the desire of Isabella, daughter to Alphonso of Naples, as tutor to her son; where he soon after died, to the inexpressible grief of Ariosto.

About the same time died Nicolo Ariosto, the father of Ludovico, leaving behind him a numerous offspring. Ariosto, then only twenty-four years of age, found himself at once involved in the cares of a family, and obliged to take upon himself the management of domestic concerns, to introduce his brothers into the world, provide fortunes for his sisters, and, in every respect, supply to them the place of a father, who had left thena but a very slender patrimony.

Mi more il padre e da Maria il pensiero
Drieto a Marta bisogna ch'io rivolga,
Chi'o muti in squarci e in vacchette Omero;
Trovi marito e modo che si tolga

Di casa una sorella e un' altra appresso,
E che' l'eredita non se ne dolga :

Co' piccioli fratelli a' quai successo
Ero in luoco di padre far l'uffizio
Che debito e pieta m' avea commesso.

My father dead, I took the father's part,
And chang'd for household cares the Muse's art;
For tuneful verse, each thoughtful hour I spent,
To husband well the little heaven had sent:
Each sister claim'd, by turns, my guardian hand,
To watch their youth, and form their nuptial band:
While piety and love my heart engage,

To rear my helpless brethren's tender age.

Satire vi.

He was now so wholly engrossed by a multiplicity of cares, as not only to give over his intended prosecution of the Greek language, but almost to abandon the Latin, which he had but lately recovered, had not Pandolfo Ariosto so far stimulated him, that he still continued,

in some degree, his studies; till death deprived him of so pleasing a companion. Yet all these disappointments did not so much damp the vigour of his genius, but that

he

gave signal proofs of an excellent vein of poetry. He had now attained the age of twenty-nine years, and had acquired an uncommon reputation for his Latin verses, and numerous poems and sonnets full of spirit and imagination. His conversation was coveted by men of the greatest learning and abilities; insomuch that Cardinal Hippolito of Este, whose court was a receptacle for the most admired personages of the age, received him into his service, where he continued fifteen years; during which time, his mind being always intent on the muses, he formed a design of writing a poem of the romance kind; in which no one had yet written with the dignity of which the subject was capable. The happy versatility of his genius was such, that he could equally adapt himself to every species of poetry; and an Italian writer of his life observes, that whatever he wrote, seemed, at the time, to be his particular study.

At about thirty years of age, he began his Orlando ; and Cardinal Bembo, to whom he communicated his design, would have dissuaded him from writing in Italian, advising him to cultivate the Latin; to which Ariosto answered, that he would rather be the first among the Tuscan writers, than scarcely the second among the Latin. At the same time, it fortunately happened, that he had already written some stanzas of his Orlando ; which communicating to several of his friends, he met with such encouragement, that he determined vigorously to prosecute his design. It may be here observed, that Dante, at first, intended to have written his poem in

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