p>The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction / Volume 17, No. 481, March 19, 1831
RELICS OF ARIOSTO
INKSTAND.
CHAIR.
We need not bespeak the reader's interest in these "trivial fond" relics—these consecrated memorials—of one of the most celebrated poets of Italy. They are preserved with reverential care at Ferrara, the poet's favourite residence, though not his birthplace. The Ferrarese, however, claim him "exclusively as their own" Lord Byron, in the Notes1 to Childe Harold, canto 4, says, "the author of the Orlando is jealously claimed as the Homer, not of Italy, but Ferrara. The mother of Ariosto was of Reggio, and the house in which he was born is carefully distinguished by a tablet with these words:—'Qui nacque Ludovico Ariosto il giorno 8 di Settembre dell' anno 1474.' But the Ferrarese make light of the accident by which their poet was born abroad, and claim him exclusively for their own. They possess his bones, they show his ARM-CHAIR, and his INKSTAND, and his autographs. The house where he lived, the room where he died, are designated by his own replaced memorial, and by a recent inscription."
Ferrara, we should here mention, is a fortified town, and a day's journey, en voiturier, from Florence to Vienna. The Tomb, as well as the above relics, a bronze Medallion of the great Poet, and an account of his last illness and death—the two latter found in his tomb—are in the public library at Ferrara. This library also contains the original MSS. of Tasso's Gerusalemme Liberata, and Guarini's Pastor Fido; and in the Hospital of St. Anne, at Ferrara, travellers are shown the cell where Tasso was confined.
The INKSTAND is of bronze, and its singular device is said to refer to the Poet's amorous caution. In his Life,2 we are told that "The amours of Ariosto are a difficult theme for both his eulogists and his biographers. He has alluded in his Poems to several ladies with whose charms he was captivated, but, with the exception of Alessandra and Genevra, the names under which they are mentioned are fictitious. His caution in this respect is thought to have been hinted at in the device placed on his favourite inkstand, and which consisted of a little Cupid having his forefinger on his lip in token of secresy." The evidence in proof of Alessandra's being his wife is little short of unanswerable.
Reverting to the early life of the Poet—he studied at Ferrara, but losing his tutor, who was called from thence, and appointed preceptor to the son of Isabella of Naples, Ariosto was left without the present means of gaining instruction in Greek. To this period Mr. Stebbing thus alludes:—
"To the regret he experienced at losing his master, was added that of hearing soon after of his decease; but scarcely had he recovered from the distress he felt at this circumstance, when the death of his father put an end for some time to all his literary thoughts and pursuits. He has pathetically described his situation at this period in his sixth Satire, which contains several allusions both to the present and previous circumstances of his life.
"'My father dies; thenceforth with care oppressed
New thoughts and feelings fill my harass'd breast;
Homer gives way to lawyers and their deeds,
And all a brother's love within me pleads;
Fit suitors found, two sisters soon are wed,
And to the altar without portions led.
With all the wants and wishes of their age
My little brothers next my thoughts engage,
And in their father's place I strive untired
To do whate'er that father's love inspired.
Thus watching how their several wills incline
In courts, in study, or in arms to shine;
No toil I shun their fair pursuits to aid,
Still of the snares that strew their path afraid.
Nor this alone—though press we quick to land,
The bark's not safe till anchor'd on the strand.'"
Passing over the commencement of the Orlando Furioso, which soon followed the above melancholy event—"To be the freer from interruptions, and at the same time render his moderate income equal to his support, he left Ferrara, and took up his residence on an estate belonging to his kinsman Malaguzzo, between Reggio and Rubiera. He has described this retreat, and the pleasant manner in which he spent his time during his short residence there, in his fifth Satire; but it is disputed whether the account alludes to this or an earlier period of his life:
"'Time was when by sweet solitude inclines
The storied page I fill'd with, ready mind;
Those gentle scenes of Reggio's fair domain,
Our own dear nest, where peace and nature reign;
The lovely villa and the neighbouring Rhone,
Whose banks the Naiads haunt serene and lone;
The lucid pool whence small fresh streams distil
That glad the garden round and turn the mill;
Still memory loves upon these scenes to dwell,
Still sees the vines with fruit delicious swell,
Luxurious meadows blooming spread around,
Low winding vales and hills with turrets crown'd.'
"The Duke Alphonso, seeing him left without a patron, and provided with so small an income, invited him to return to Ferrara, which he did, and found no reason, it is said, to regret that he had once more put himself under the protection of the house of Este. Alphonso, knowing his love of retirement and the peculiarity of his habits, promised to leave him at perfect liberty to pursue his studies and live in the way that most suited his wishes. He kept his promise, and there is reason to believe that the presents he bestowed on the poet enabled him to build the cottage in which he resided, with few interruptions, till his death. This favourite house of Ariosto's was situated near the church of S. Benedetto, and stood in the midst of a spacious garden which formed both his pride and delight. Here he continued to compose additional cantos to the 'Orlando Furioso,' and occasionally, to relax his mind with lighter species of poetry, sometimes writing a satire, and at others reverting to the comedies composed in his younger years, and which he subsequently made fit for the stage."
He again quitted Ferrara, on an appointment "by Alphonso, but again soon returned:—
"On his return he established himself, with his two unmarried sisters, in the house he had built near the church of Saint Benedict, and resumed his former occupations. Of his lighter amusements, gardening was that in which he took most pleasure; and it is curious to know that he was as fond of altering the plan of both his house and grounds, as he was of remodelling the stanzas of the Orlando. His son, Virginio proposed writing an account of his illustrious father's life; but unfortunately, he never pursued his design beyond the commencement, and a few memorandums are all that have come down to us. From these, however, we learn the singular fastidiousness of Ariosto in his horticultural amusements, and some other traits of his character, which render him not the less an object of our veneration, by showing us the simplicity as well as power of his mind. 'In gardening,' says Virginio, 'he pursued the same plan as with his verses, never leaving any thing he had planted more than three months in the same place: and, if he set a fruit-tree, or sowed seed of any kind, he would go so often to examine it, and see if it were growing, that he generally ended with spoiling or breaking off the bud.'
"We learn, from the same interesting document, that he had at first no intention of building a house for constant residence in this garden, but that, having raised a mere cottage for
For these Lord B. acknowledges his obligation to his excellent friend J.C. Hobbouse, Esq. M.P.
In "Lives of the Italian Poets." By the Rev. Henry Stebbing, vol. ii.
