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much influence in the countries of Western Europe, and governed Jerusalem or Cyprus. When the crusading spirit ended, a strong feeling arose against them, partly because they lost Jerusalem, and partly because the Western monarchs coveted their vast wealth. Philip IV. of France and Pope Clement V. joined to overthrow them, which they did by bringing many false charges against them, accusing them of the basest crimes. Many of them were burned, and their property was confiscated. Without doubt many of them had become very corrupt, though base motives influenced their enemies.

Molay and three other officers of the order were imprisoned in Paris for many months. Two of them acknowledged that their order was in the wrong, and were pardoned; but Molay and another nobleman, the Grand Preceptor of the order, were burned. In March, 1314, the four were taken from their prisons, loaded with chains, and brought to the place of execution. A confession was read, to which they were asked to assent. When the Grand Master was called upon to make confession, he refused so to do. “I do," he said, "confess my guilt, which consists in having, to my shame and dishonor, suffered myself, through the pain of torture and the fear of death, to give utterance to falsehoods, imputing scandalous sins and iniquities to an illustrious order, which hath nobly served the cause of Christianity. I disdain to seek a wretched and disgraceful existence by engrafting another lie upon the original falsehood." Here he was interrupted, and, with his faithful companion, the Grand Preceptor, who also declared his own innocence, he was hurried back to prison. The same day King Philip ordered their execution, and they were burned to death in a slow and lingering manner upon small fires of

charcoal.

i. 8, plagal cadence, according to the editors of Poet-Lore, "a closing progression of chords in which the sub-dominant or chord on the fourth degree of the scale precedes the tonic or chord on the first degree of the scale. The name arises from the modes used in early church music called Plagal Modes, which were a transposition of the authentic modes beginning on the fourth degree of the authentic modes."

ii. 3, bought of Emperor Aldabrod; Clement condemned John because the riches won by the order during the Crusades had been used in behalf of the Sultan. (5) Pope Clement, fifth of that name, 1305– 1314. (9) clavicithern, cithern with keys like a harpsichord.

iv. 8, Sing "Laudes," called lauds, singing of seven psalms of praise at matins.

vi. 4, Salva reverentia, saving reverence, reverential greeting to the Host in the service of the Mass.

viii. 2, leman, sweetheart of either sex.

316. HOLY-CROSS DAY. The special incidents of this poem are not historical. The extract from the " Diary by the Bishop's Secretary, 1600," is a part of the satire of the piece, and was written by Browning. Holy-cross Day was September 14, and celebrated the finding of the true cross by Saint Helen, its origin dating back to the fifth or sixth century. Although Browning says at the end of the poem that "this bad business of the sermon was abolished by Gregory XVI., 1831-1846, yet George S. Hillard, in his Six Months

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in Italy, written in 1853, says: "By a bull of Gregory XIII., in the year 1584, all Jews above the age of twelve years were compelled to listen every week to a sermon from a Christian priest; usually an exposition of some passage of the Old Testament, and especially those relating to the Messiah, from the Christian point of view. This burden is not yet wholly removed from them; and to this day, several times in the course of a year, a Jewish congregation is gathered together in the church of St. Angelo in Pescheria, and constrained to listen to a homily from a Dominican friar, to whom, unless his zeal have eaten up his good feelings and his good taste, the ceremony must be as painful as to his hearers."

321. THE STATUE AND THE BUST. These questions were once sent to Browning: "1. When, how, and where did it happen? Browning's divine vagueness lets one gather only that the lady's husband was a Riccardi. 2. Who was the lady? who the duke? 3. The magnificent house wherein Florence lodges her préfet is known to all Florentine ball-goers as the Palazzo Riccardi. It was bought by the Riccardi from the Medici in 1659. From none of its windows did the lady gaze at her more than royal lover. From what window, then, if from any? Are the statue and the bust still in their original positions ?"

Browning made answer under date of January 8, 1887: "I have seldom met with such a strange inability to understand what seems the plainest matter possible: ball-goers' are probably not historyreaders, but any guide-book would confirm what is sufficiently stated in the poem. I will append a note or two, however. 1. This story the townsmen tell;' when, how, and where,' constitutes the subject of the poem. 2. The lady was the wife of Riccardi ; and the duke, Ferdinand, just as the poem says. As it was built by, and inhabited by, the Medici till sold, long after, to the Riccardi, it was not from the duke's palace, but a window in that of the Riccardi, that the lady gazed at her lover riding by. The statue is still in its place, looking at the window under which 'now is the empty shrine.' Can anything be clearer? My vagueness' leaves what to be " 'gathered' when all these things are put down in black and white? Oh, 'ballgoers'!" (1) There's a palace in Florence, old Riccardi Palace, now the Palazzo Antinori, in square of Annunziati, in which stands the statue.

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322:6, Great-Duke Ferdinand, Grand Duke of Florence in 1587, a cardinal, but a capable ruler. (12) Riccardi, one of the leading families of Florence. (16) encolure, French, neck and shoulders of a horse. (19) emprise, enterprise. (30) because of a crime, that of Cosimo dei Medici and his grandson, Lorenzo, who lived in the Riccardi Palace, then Medici Palace, in destroying the liberties of Flor

ence.

324:16, Arno bowers, cool places by the river. (17) Petraja, a suburb of the city.

326: 16, Robbia's craft, the glazed ceramic work known as Della Robbia was largely made in Florence, and had its origin with the Robbia family in the sixteenth century.

327:16, John of Douay, sculptor, 1424-1608, who executed the statue in 1608, and it was his last though not his best work.

328: 15, stamp of the very Guelph, English coins with head of Victoria, a Guelph. (31) De te, fabula! The fable is told concerning thee.

330. "CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME." Browning distinctly said that this poem was written to exemplify constancy to an ideal, without definite allegorical purpose. Edgar's song in Shakespeare's Lear, iii. 4, was the basis of the poem, and gave the poet his title. Other elements were a piece of tapestry in the poet's room, which contained the picture of a lean horse: a tower he once saw in the Carrara Mountains, a painting of which he once caught a glimpse in Paris, wrought together in the poet's fervid imagination to produce the poem. In an article describing a visit to the poet, Rev. John W. Chadwick speaks of this tapestry and Mr. Browning's comments on the poem: "Upon the lengthwise wall of the room, above the Italian furniture, sombre and richly carved, was a long, wide band of tapestry, on which I thought I recognized the miserable horse of Childe Roland's pilgrimage:

"One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare,

Stood stupefied, however he came there :
Thrust out past service from the devil's stud!'

I asked Mr. Browning if the beast of the tapestry was the beast of the poem; and he said yes, and descanted somewhat on his lean monstrosity. But only a Browning could have evolved the stanzas of the poem from the woven image. I further asked him if he had said that he only wrote Childe Roland for its realistic imagery, without any moral purpose, -a notion to which Mrs. Sutherland Orr has given currency; and he protested that he never had. When I asked him if constancy to an ideal 'He that endureth to the end shall be saved'. was not a sufficient understanding of the central purpose of the poem, he said, 'Yes, just about that.' "Childe" is a title of honor, about tantamount to "lord," says Brewer.

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337. A SOUL'S TRAGEDY. (2) the ave-bell, rung half an hour after sunset as a signal to people to repeat the Ave-Maria, or Hail, Mary. 338: 41, holy-water drop, consecrated water at door of Catholic churches, into which each worshipper dips his finger and crosses himself as he enters.

339: 10, gauntlet-gatherer, champion who takes up gauntlet or glove when thrown down by enemy as challenge to battle. (32) Faenza, small town in Italy, twenty miles from Ravenna, with ceramic manufacturing, hence faience.

341: 8, by fascination, as if fascination or enchantment made him act in spite of himself.

342: 40, Lugo path, road to Lugo, ten miles from Faenza. 344: 8, scudi, old Roman coins, of about one dollar in value.

345: 23, trip-hook, thumbscrews and the gadge, instruments of torture. (31) Argenta, small town north from Lugo, on road to Ferrara and Venice.

348:11, San Cassiano, village near Solferino, south of Lake Garda. (22) dico vobis, I tell you. (30) St. Neponucene, St. John Nepomuck, from birthplace in Bohemia, of which country he is the patron saint.

349:11, Pontificial Legate, envoy of pope to other rulers. (12)

Cur fremuere gentes, Why do the people rage? Psalm ii. 1, in Vulgate or Catholic version.

355: 3, advocators, intercessors, or those who act for others. (25) young David, 1 Samuel xvii. 17.

356: 28, profane vulgar, profanum vulgus of Horace, Odes, iii. 1. 1. 358:44, Let whoso thinketh, etc., 1 Corinthians x. 12.

362. LURIA. (2) Signory, at Florence the governing Council of Ten. (7) Lucchese, soldiers of Lucca, which city was on side of Pisa in an effort at this time to gain independency of Florence. (11) Luria holds Pisa's fortunes, not historical as descriptive of struggle in 1406 between Florence and Pisa, in which the latter was subdued. Not one of the leaders of the Florentine forces was a Moor, though mercenaries were employed by the Italian cities at this time. The play is based on certain historical details, however, for in Sapio Amminato's Florentine History it is related: “And when all was ready, the expedition marched to the gates of Pisa, under the command of Conte Bartoldo Orsini, a Ventusian captain, in the Florentine service, accompanied by Filippo di Megalotti, Rinaldo di Gian Figliazzi, and Maso degli Albizzi, in the character of commissaries of the commonwealth. For although we have every confidence in the honor and fidelity of our general, you see it is always well to be on the safe side. And in the matter of receiving possession of a city

these nobles with the old feudal names! We know the ways of them! An Orsini might be as bad in Pisa as a Visconti, so we might as well send some of our own people to be on the spot. The three commissaries, therefore, accompanied the Florentine general to Pisa." (23) Commissary, commissioner or minister of state.

363: 14, Lapo, familiar name for Jacopo.

364: 33, Did he draw that? Browning appears to have been struck, in studying the Duomo, with the idea that a Moorish front would best complete it. Mr. Ernest Bradford discovered, in exploring a small museum in Florence, that one design offered had actually thus planned the completion of the building. His letter about this discovery Dr. Furnivall sent to Browning, who answered that he " heard nor dreamed there had been any such notion at any time of a Moorish Front for the Duomo, it was altogether a fancy of my own, illustrative of the feelings natural to Luria and Braccio, each after his kind." (35) unfinished Duomo, church of Santa Maria del Fiore, begun in 1294, but not completed until 1887.

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366:4, her whole House's fall, probably the fate of the Traversari, Porzio and Berto, father and brothers of Domizia, was suggested by that of the Albizzi, rivals of the Medici. After more than a half century of defence of Florence, the Albizzi were accused of treason and banished.

370: 38, the Mage Negro king to Christ the babe perhaps refers to pictures of the adoration of the magi, some of the legends representing one of the three as a descendant of Ham.

377:16, broke the bread and given the salt, Arab custom that those are friends with whom one eats salt.

389:20, our city authorizes. . . Luria's removal; the historic facts referred to are described by Napier, in his Florentine History, as follows: "The acquisition of Pisa was a serious affair at Florence, and

great efforts were made to secure it. . . . Her army was first commanded by Jacopo Salviati, a Florentine citizen, who after some useful and active service was superseded by Bertoldo degli Orsini; but this general, showing more rapacity than soldiership, displeased the Florentines, and was ordered to resign his command to Obizzo da Monte Carelli. Active military operations had continued through the autumn of 1405, and when the camp was pitched before Pisa, almost all its territory had been subdued. . . . After this the grow ing rivalry of Sforza and Tartaglia began to trouble the camp so much that they were placed by order of the Seigniory in distinct and distant commands, with their separate forces, for in those days armies were like a piece of patchwork, composed of many small independent bands, with but little subordination amongst any who were strong enough to be troublesome, unless awed by high rank or the acknowledged fame of some able chieftain. . . . As famine was still eating on its silent way Gamba corta [one of the Pisan leaders] secretly renewed the negotiations with Gino Capponi, and finally consented to a capitulation. . . . After this resolute conduct Gino repaired to Florence and explained all to the Seigniory. . . . Gino Capponi and Bartolommeo Corbinelli were appointed public syndics to complete the transaction. . . . Gino then took possession of the public palace and commenced Florentine rule."

393: 22, him who first ordained that Florence... should be, Dante, whose ideal of the supremacy of Florence in Italy helped to bring about that result, and who, in 1293, helped to remodel her constitution. (25) him a star, too, guided; Luria would be guided in his spiritual aspirations by Domizia, as Dante had been by Beatrice.

397: 6, Pesa... Lupo, the places on heights about Florence where towers and fortifications were erected in 1300.

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