BOOKS.

ADOLPHUS TROLLOPE'S ITALIAN WOMEN.* THIS Decade of Dobkin Women is a much better book than some might have expected from its subject, and the " antecedents " of the author. In his " Girlhood. of Catherine do' Medici," Mr. Trollope, though carefully read up in hie, theme, did not display that thorough knowledge of Italian literature which he exhibits in the work before us. The life of tea women packed up in two volumes promised little of interest and unity, especially when the majority of the ladies were obscure, and the lives of the most emi- nent had been frequently written already. Neither is the manner of Mr. Trollope on this occasion of the best. He seems to have taken Carlyle as a. model ; anti if less quaintly exaggerated than his prototype has less of startling or forcible effects. The work, however, is full of novelty and interest, owing either to the author's skill, or a favourable conjuncture of circumstances. Although the lives- of the ten ladies have no biographical con- nexion, and. some of them have little novelty, while others have not much importance, they illustrate the opinions, manners, and social history of Italy, during the interval between 1347 and 1665. A majority of the lives may be taken as a typo of classes of women flourishing during the period: when they happen to be inure exceptional they serve to exhibit the peculiarities, amusements, modes of life, and morals of the time. Saint Catherine of Siena, 1347-1380 is the first life, and she exhibits in a high degree, not so much the gross superstition of the age,—for it may be doubted whether the vulgar in the same regions are not as superstitious now, and whether a woman with the strong wW, the religious enthusi- asm, and the cataleptic fits which distinguished the dyer's daughter five centuries ago, would not attract the same reverence at present if backed by the interests of a religious order, and a divine of some eminence. The wonder in Catherine's- case is the influence she evidently exercised over the more infernied classes and the Pope himself; though probably prompted. in-her hortatives by her Do- miniean confessor., and urging the popular wish for the Pope's re- turn to Rome from Avignon.

The life which follows the Saint is that of Caterina Sforza, a. natural but legitimatised daughter of Duke Galeazzo of' Milan, eventually married to a nephew, or as the scandal of the age as- serted, a son of Pope Sixtus the Fourth, by his own sister. This Pope as every one knows, was bent upon advancing his family, especially his favourite Girolamo. The honour of connexion with the house of Sforza, though in a left-handed way, and the substantial advantage of the small principality of Imola, out of which Galeazzo had tricked its rightful owner on the plea of a marriage with his little Caterina, were the inducements to the Pope ; his Holiness having obtained Forli for Girolamo in an equally unscrupulous way. As the career of the Saint illustrated the Italian notions of religion in the fourteenth century, so that of Caterina &Orem, 1462-1509, and, her husband, exhibits in the fifteenth the struggles of the smaller princes, surrounded by larger powers hankering for their possessions, not popular with their subjects, whom they were compelled, to fleece to keep up their state amid the growing taste for splendour, and with titles to their principalities very often none of the best. Besides this story, which necessarily includes some of the general policy of the time in Italy, the life is made "to exhibit the fashions, arts, and courtly modes, as well as the courtly morals, of the day, and the atrocious tyranny of some of the Italian rulers. The strange not to say insane crimes and cruelties- of Galeazzo Sforza, Caterina's father, are familiar to readers of medheral sketches. The singu- lar state of manners in Rome has more freshness, though intro- duced into the life rather ley the by.

"The picture of life in Rome at this perod, obtainable from the inartistic matter-of-fact narrations of these diarists, the Jacepo just cited, Stefano In- fessura, and one or two others of the same class, is a strange and striking one. Their ever-recurring accounts-of solemnities, celebrations, and festi- vals, are chequered with notices almost equally frequent, and as calmly chronicled of such deeds and occurrences as we are acustomed to hear re- ported from Sacramento or San Francisco, and to consider as the product of a new sad half-organized state of society. A noble patrician is stabbed to death, while sitting at the door of his own palace enjoying the evening air after supper. The name of the murderer and his motive are briefly told, and no further remark is made about the matter, A raid is made by one family against another and many men are killed, but none worth mention jag save one or two nobles. Of such matters nobody dreams of complaining. But wheat onee on Ascension-day a great moss of people had assembled as usual in expectation of receiving the Papa benediction, and Sixtus, for some unassigned reason, did not come forth to kite it, there was great mur- muring, and the multitude heaped bitter curses, we are told, on the Pontiff,_

who had defrauded there of hie bleesine. -

"Many curious indications of the avenge dieorAer and wretched state of Rome during these years may be gleaned frorer..lhe prolix daily notices or these laborious old diarists.

"On the 23d of January 1483 died the poor old Cardinal de Bohan, who was robbed in life and robbed in death. F'or just-before his death Messer- Bernardo de' Elassimi (a scion of a'princely house !) broke into his dwelling through the church of St. Apollinaire, and robbed it of thirty thousand ducats' worth of richly-wrought plate4 with which he got clear off to Venice. And when the body was being carried to his burial the friars of St. Augus- tin fought with the friars of Santa Maria Maggiore for certain gold brocade with which the corpse was covered, and belaboured each other with the torches. And then there was such a row' that swords were drawn, and the rings that the corpse had on its faig,ersj. Mid the mitre on its head were. stolen.'

"Here is another queer little picture, furnished by the same anonymous

• A Decade of Italian, Wooden. By T. Adolphus Trollope, Author of "The Girlhood of Catherine de Medici." In tie volumes. Pubishe 1 by Chapman and Hall. ' Notary of Nantiporto.' One of the great &meth family, the Signor Ma- riano, is a prisoner in St. Angelo. One night, the 25th of July 1483, the Cardinal-governor of the castle the constable, and other authorities are supping in the garden behind the fortress, and after supper sit playing cards till three in the merino-% While they are thus engaged, Signor Mariano connives to escape from the prison. At four a. in., armed men are search- ing all Rome for him, in vain ; for he is safe out of the city. A bad busi- ness for the convives of that pleasant supper and card party ; for that same day-, Pope Sistus, who does not like his prisoners to escape him, goes in per- son and in a great passion to St. Angelo and stayed there almost the whole day, and drove out the governor and the constable and the whole of the rest of the party.'

"Shortly afterwards, we have the following anecdote preserved for us by Stefano In:tessera. A certain yeuth, one Messer Gianantonio di Parma, a deformed hunchback and monster of a man,' grossly ignorant besides and of infamous character, had paid down two hundred and fifty ducats to Count Girolamo, and promised a thousand to the Pope for a place. So Sixtus sends this promising youth to the Auditors of the Rota, the highest, most learned, and most respected legal body in Rome, with orders to admit him at once as one of their number ! The members of that court demurred; humbly pointing out that it was contrary to all law and custom to appoint as-Auditor of the Rota one not qualified by the usual preparatory degrees and examinations. The Pope, in reply, ordered a body of guards to march dawn to the court, and take all the members prisoners. But that grave and learned body, having received notice of what was coming, quickly broke up their sitting, and stole off secretly, every man to his own house, not by the direct way, but by Trastevere, for fear of being caught and taken to priaotr.' Hereupon Messer Gianantonio, baulked of his place, demanded his two hundred and fifty ducats back again from the Count. But it by no means suited that niagnannuous prince to refund ; so he angrily answered thaA the money had been an unconditional gift."

The biography of Vittoria Colonna 1490-1547 is of less inte- rest than the two previous lives, for it has less of practical or of strongly marked characteristics ; and it has been often writ- ten already. It serves however, to mark if not the learned female age of Italy, yet the age when some Italian ladies read the classics, wrote poetry, or at least verses, and gathered round them a circle of literary men and artists. Mr. Trollope's notice too con- tains a critical estimate of Vittoria's writings, with specimens ori- ginal and translated, as well as a discussion on the extent to whioh her Reforming views in religion reached. The two other principal women of the decade are more exceptional in their character ; and the lives of both have been written as often and as fully as the biography of Vittoria Colonna. The great classical scholar and Cieeroman Latinist Olympia Morata, 1526-1555, can only very slightly illustrate her own age, her abilities and acquire.. meats being so rare ; but Mr. Trollope rather violently imports the house of Ferrara into her career, and more naturally the soholars and religious contests of her. age. The story of Bianca Cappello, 1548-1587, the Venetian young lady who eloped with ahanker's clerk, to become the mistress, and subsequently the wife of Franceseo the Grand Duke of Florence, is not only known from its inherent singularity, or "romance" as some people call it; but !remits connexion with Florentine and Venetian hi

Strange and exceptional it doubtless is, still it does serve to lustrate the ideas and moral sense of the period. It is true we must not, as Mr. Trollope continually remarks attempt to judge those centuries by the opinions of our own, arid even in our own we have seen some strange submission of greatness to fortune and interest. Still as Voltaire puts it, the pride of rank survives, where the pride of virtue has been long extinct ; and it has been customary beyond the Alps, save perhaps in Germany, to throw a kind of secrecy or veil over female profligacy when brought in con- nexion with rulers and states. Mr. Trollope, however, has given a full account of the strange life of this abandoned woman, the re- sult of very extensive research. He has also told it in a terse and pithy way ; his sardonic style being well adapted to the theme.

The ladies forming the remaining half of the decade are less known, and less important ; but some of them exhibit Italian manners well enough. Tullia D'Aragona was born about 1510, and died about 1570. Her father was a Cardinal, who had educated her very carefully, but allowed her to follow, or could not prevent her from following the profession of a courtesan, in which she was very successful at the Court of Rome. Olympia Parafili 1594-1656, was the open and avowed mistress of Innocent the Tenth. The other three ladies were of humbler rank and more respectable character. Isabella Andreini, 1562-1604, was an actress of great fame, and strange to say of the profession in that country and time of unblemished reputation. Elisabetta Simni of Bologna 148-1665, was one of a family of painters, and distinguished for her extraordinary copiousness of ideas and facility of execution. Her celebrity, however, rests as much upon the suspicion of poisoning which attended her death, as upon her artistic powers ; though in reality that suspicion was ill-founded, Mr. Trollope showing that she died of an ulcer in the stomach. The last of the decade is the irnprovisatrice La Corilla, 1T40- 1800, who was so fashionable in her day, that in 1776 the old burlesque of crowning her was gone through in all seriousness at Rome-

" Not with more glee, by hands Pontific crowned, With scarlet hats wide-waving circled round; Rome in her capitol saw Querno sit, Throned on seven hills, the Antichrist of wit."

—Duneied, Book 2.

Neither of these two last lives so broadly exhibits the cha- racteristics of the times as those of the previous persons. That of Elisabetta is merely a medium for describing a domestic household of the Italian middle class during the seventeenth century ; the story of La .Corilla only indicates the effete condition to which what was called letters had arrived in Italy during the genera- tion preceding the French Revolution. This, however, is to be

said for them. They both display a far more respectable state of things than in the palmy days of Italy. Considered simply as biographies, these volumes cannot take very high rank. The lives of the most important are of no great account for the world; the biography is too often lost sight of in its concomitants or accessories ; and the manner of the biogra- pher is often too artificial. But, as already intimated, the "Italian Women" of Mr. Trollope is a very remarkable book. It gives very distinct gleams of Italian life for several centuries, it con- veys an idea of the corruption of' the Papacy and the history of the smaller princes in medireval times, in the only mode in which such history can well be done, namely by particular biography, and the whole is pervaded by a thorough knowledge, the result of research, reflection, and original observation of the country and people.