of Gieremei, who, in birth, in riches, and in valour, pretended to dispute with him the pre-eminence. Lambertacci did not fail to court the good opinion of his fellow-citizens by increasing, with all the industry of art, the gifts which he already enjoyed of nature and of fortune. He bound to him self, by acts of kindness and courtesy of manners, all whom it fell under his power to oblige, and even when opportunities did not present themselves, he made them, by the marked assiduities of his behaviour, principally towards those who possessed influence over others. He was not avaricious of wealth, but exercised a frequent and discreet liberality, always taking care to accompany it with an air of affectionate benignity, which more than doubled the price of every favour. Complaisance, which is a virtue not less easy to be attained than it is necessary for success in an undertaking, had its native seat in his breast. He well knew that, for want of that quality, Princes themselves are often ruined; and that a mong private individuals, no vice is so hurtful as that dogged obstinacy of character which feels an equal repugnance to return a salute, and to evince a grateful sense of benefits conferred. Antonio was not only gracious in his salutations, but condescending and familiar in his visits of civility or friendship, even to inferior citizens. He employed all the playfulness, but none of the bitterness of satire, detesting, above all things, the dangerous humour of such as would rather lose a friend than sacrifice a jest. Every time that he resorted to the public square, he gained to his party some new citizen; and often found, by experience, how possible it is to buy the hearts of men at the expence of a few simple words. He studied, with care and diligence, the genius of every man with whom he had any dealings; and, until experience had taught him the diversities of each individual cha racter, he availed himself of general rules, recollecting always that avarice is the concomitant of age, and that youth delights itself in play, in the chase, and in love; but his whole industry was employed in making himself the master of important secrets, well knowing of how binding a force they are upon the minds of men whose interests impose the necessity of silence; and, since wine is the parent of freedom, he took the advantage of festive meetings, and revels to worm himself into the confidence of men from whom, with the easy bait of some trifling communication, he often drew out discoveries of the greatest moment. With such acts as these, he continued to insinuate himself into the favour of all men, and principally of the nobles, who were, for the most part, attached to the Ghibellin party On the other hand, Ludovico Gieremei, favoured by such families of the nobility as professed adherence to the Guelphs, courted, with every artifice in his power, the support of the commonalty. Probably his means were as much more base than those of his rival, as were the people whom he strove to win; but there is no action so servile that ambition will not stoop to the commission of it." Meanwhile, the external greatness and prosperity of Bologna increased from day to day, and elevated her to the highest rank among the republics of Italy, and the seeds of discord between the rival families still slumbered for many years after the conclusion of the war of Modena, till they were first awakened into life by a public occurrence. The office of captain of the people, next in dignity to that of the Podestà, had, through the intrigues of the Lambertacci, been procured for a very unworthy adherent to their party, named Bonacossa de Soresino, who was shortly after convicted of gross enormities, and amerced in a very large sum of money. This simple circumstance was aggravated by the Lambertacci into an insult offered to the whole family, and by the Gieremei was studiously represented as involving their rivals in the same guilt with the principal offender. A public fray, attended with the effusion of much blood on either side, was the consequence; but matters were, at that time, prevented from going farther by the intervention of wise and prudent men. The chiefs of each faction were condemned to pay considerable fines into the treasury, and a sort of pacification was made, equally insincere and precarious. This transaction was concluded in 1258; but the ensuing year gave birth the private feuds of the city, those of to yet more serious dissensions. Among the Gallazzi and Carbonesi had long been notorious; but, about this time, an apparent reconciliation emboldened Alberto, a knight belonging to the latter family, to ask in marriage, of Signor Giovan Piero Gallazzi, his daughter, Virginia, with whom he had long been secretly in love. The old gentleman, either retaining in his breast the embers of their ancient enmity, or from some other motive, refused his consent; but the lover, listening only to his passion, did not cease to solicit her as a mistress, whom he could not hope to obtain as his wife; wherefore, in order to see her more often, and more freely to pursue his design upon her affections, he persuaded one of his relations, of the family of Catellani, to build a high tower adjoining to his house, under pretext of adding to the beauty and dignity of his mansion, but really in order to command the neighbouring gardens of the house of Gallazzi. Thither he repaired daily, and there passed hour after hour in the contemplation of her whom he adored. It was not long before he found means to make his passion known, and to inspire a similar sentiment in Virginia's bosom; nor could his ardent temper rest satisfied with the attainment of that which at first appeared to him the summit of all earthly happiness, the free indulgence of seeing and conversing with his beautiful mistress by signs and tokens of distant love. He resorted to the powerful engines of corruption, and at last succeeded in winning to the furtherance of his views some of those most intimately attach ed to the family, by whose assistance, in the absence of Giovan Piero, he one day carried off the lady from her father's house, and privately married her, in the presence of two or three members of his own family. Unhappy nuptials, whose auspices were deceit, hatred the wedding torch, and, for the epithalamium, a father's curse! Giovan Piero, from the moment of their consummation, meditated only the deepest plans of revenge; but he was too good a politician not to dissemble most artificially; for, far from creating suspicion by an unnatural appearance of content, he first gave his anger the full sway, then affected a gradual mitigation of his resentment, and, not till after repeated attempts, on the part of his children, to obtain forgiveness, suffered himself at length to be won to the appearance of a reconciliation. Habits of mutual intercourse were now renewed, and the doors of the Carbonesi and Galazzi were mutually opened to the members of both families; when, one night, the inexorable barbarian entered with a party of his friends the house of his son-in-law, and, while they were employed, not without blood-shed, in securing the rest of the household, he himself penetrated into the wedding chamber and murdered the bridegroom as he lay by the side of his daughter. Some human feeling yet subsisting in his savage breast, operated to spare the wretched Virginia, but only for a more miserable fate; for, deprived of reason by the horrible spectacle of the night, she soon after words escaped from the observation of her attendants, and terminated her existence by precipitating herself from a window of her apartment. Galuzzi fled from the city immedi→ ately after the murder; but, owing to his high rank and the intercession of his powerful friends, he received for this enormous crime, no heavier a sentence than that of a two years' banishment. Even this was judged too severe by his adherents, who, still burning with an implacable spirit of resentment against the Carbonesi, in consequence of the indignity offered them by Albert, which they conceived too great to be expiated even by his blood, watched the opportunity of the feast of Easter, to receive him secretly within the walls, and, under his auspices, to extirpate the devoted family of their rivals. The Gieremei suffered themselves to be engaged in this horrid conspiracy, which, however, was not managed so secretly, but that the intended victims were set on their guard in time to prevent or meet its effects; and, in order to do this more effectually, they applied for assistance to the leaders of the Lambertacci, glad of any pretence to inlist themselves in opposition to their ancient antagonists.The tumult which ensued might have been expected to produce the most fatal consequences to one, at least, of the parties engaged, and to the repose and liberty of the State, but once more a sense either of mutual guilt or mutual danger inclined them to submit to the pacifying intercessions of the magistrates. Another reconciliation was made, not more sincere than the preceding; and if it was somewhat more lasting, that must be attributed to the dreadful plague which shortly afterwards broke out and ravaged all the states of Italy for a great length of time, during which, the minds of men were too much engaged in immediate apprehensions for themselves and their families, to renew the feuds and miseries of civil discord. In the meanwhile, the two hostile factions had carried their intrigues beyond the limits of their native city, and divided between them the inhabi tants of most of the vassal states of Romagna. In the year 1263, one Pietro Pagani, a rich citizen of Imola, excited an insurrection in that city, for the purpose of expelling the friends of the Gieremei, and took advantage of the public disorders, by seizing the government, and causing himself to be proclaimed sovereign lord of the place. His short-lived tyranny cost him dear; for the Bolognese, as soon as they received intelligence of the event, equipped an army of sufficient force to reduce the insurgents to immediate obedience. The Lambertacci, at whose instigation he is said to have acted, being taken unprepared, denied all share in the transaction, and left to his fate the wretched tool of their ambition, who ended his days soon after in banishment and poverty. The factions, after this event, again lay dormant for a space of several years, during which, Bologna was engaged with honour in certain foreign wars with the Venetians, and with Hubert Pallavicino, the tyrant of Modena and Bergamo. She also contributed her assistance towards the conquest of Naples by Charles of Anjou, the brother of Saint Lewis, in whose army, it is said, there were no fewer than 4000 croisés from Bologna, under the guidance of Guido Antonio Lambertacci. They were all this time disturbed by no civil commotions of greater consequence than an insurrection of shoemakers, in favour of one of their trade, who had been condemned to prison for the murder of a man with whom he had taken his wife in adultery. In 1273, a peace was concluded with the republic of Venice, which, leaving the state in profound tranquillity as to its external relations, gave birth to the renewal of those interior dissentions, the phrenzy of which had so long remained suspended. The leaders of the two factions were more than ever solicitous to gain adherents to their respective parties, and to give their partizans the habits and appearance of a military force, so that, within no long compass of time, the whole city seemed to be organized in two divisions, and not a day passed without the immediate expectation of a public rupture. The occasion was soon after given by a grand entertainment, held at the palace of Ludovico Gieremei.A young man of the house of Lambertacci, moved by curiosity, attended, and while he was too earnestly observing some part of the spectacle, stood in the way of the domestics who were serving up the banquet; whereupon a friend of the Gieremei, pretending not to know who he was, indulged his spite against the rival family, by beating him out of doors. The young man went home, and made his complaint, and Antonio, as soon as he heard the news, rose up in a transport of fury, and declared his resolution to wash out, in the blood of his enemies, the insult offered to his race. Immediately the whole party was in arms, and Ludovico himself, with those about him, sallied forth in a tumultuous manner towards the house of the Gieremei. A servant of Ludovico, having discovered their preparations, gave intelligence to his master, just in time to allow his mustering a strong body of his friends, and going out to meet the tempest in the public square. He there gave orders to his adherents, who soon collected in sufficient number to keep his enemies in awe, to disperse themselves abroad in all parts of the city, and set on fire the houses of the Lambertacci. The tumult became universal, and during the whole ensuing day and night, every street in Bologna was the scene of some desperate and bloody skirmish. No great advantage, however, appears to have been gained by either party over the other, and to this circumstance it was perhaps chiefly owing, that the effects of the magistrates to restore peace and order became once more successful.Ludovico and Antonio both repaired to the great council, there to plead their respective causes; when the former, after making excuses for the ignorance of his guest, and shewing the necessity he was under of taking up arms in his defence, concluded by pronouncing a severe censure upon the rash violence of which his opponents were guilty in seizing the sword of justice, and punishing with their own hands, injuries which the law only ought to chastise. Antonio, enraged at this imputation, rose with a violence in his air and gestures which threatened to put a stop to all hopes of reconciliation, when the magistrates interposing their authority, at length enforced silence, and Matthew Prendiparte, an ancient citizen of great worth and respectability, exerted his good offices so effectually with the angry antagonists, as to prevail with them to come, at least, to an apparent concord, and pledge themselves to a forgetfulness of their former animosity, by partaking of a magnificient entertain ment at his house, "as is the custom among the Germans.” In this apparent reconciliation, it is manifest that the seeds of discontent and hatred must still have lurked; and it appears to have been no little aggravation of former injuries in the mind of Antonio, that the partial senate had allowed his adversary to plead his cause uninterrupted, and when he himself rose to speak, had refused him that justice, which the lowest citizen might claim, of being heard in his own defence. But these and other causes of ill will and animosity, slumbered for a little farther space of time, until new outrages awoke them into action. (To be continued.) MEMOIR OF THE LATE REV. RICHARD HOLE. [The following account of this gentleman (author of the humorous production, entitled the Exmoor Courtship, in our twenty-third number, the continuation of which will be given very soon) is extracted from an unpublished memoir, entitled, "A Slight Sketch of the Life of the late Rev. Richard Hole, L. L. B. Rector of Farringdon and Inwardleigh," printed at the request of a literary society at Exeter, to which he belonged, and which is known to the public by a volume of essays on topics of general literature.] THE subject of this memoir was born in Exeter, in the year 1746, and his classical education was completed in the grammar-school of this city, under the care of Mr Hodgkinson, a master whose abilities as a classical scholar were of a superior degree, and who left several excellent specimens of his talents as a tutor, in this county (of Devon.) The early youth of Mr Hole was particularly distinguished; he maintained his situation in school with considerable credit, and even at that time his peculiar vein of dry comic humour was conspicuous. I remember the boys of that period acting in the school the Beaux Stratagem, and High Life below Stairs, in which our friend represented Scrub, and Lovell disguised as the country boy, who spoke in the Devonshire dialect; Shapleigh was the Archer and Philip; Hocken, the late rector of Oakhampton, the Aimwell and Duke's Servant. If I can trace with accuracy the recollections of that period, the performance was far from despicable. Mr Hole removed to Oxford in the year 1764, and took his degree of Bachelor of Laws in 1771;-he was ordained in the same or the following year. At college his acquaintance with General Simcoe commenced, which, ripened into the warmest, the most sincere friendship, terminated only with our friend's life. There also he became acquainted with our former associate, Drewe, of whose life he presented to this society a short and elegant sketch; and from these friends, whose military ardour was VOL. V. early conspicuous, he caught a portion of the same spirit, and anxiously wished, at one period of his life, to embrace the profession to which they were destined, and in which the former attained so conspicuous a rank with the highest military reputation; but "his lot forbade," and his affection for his mother prevailed, for he knew, that to hint his wishes would have been destructive of her peace. His poetical genius expanded, I believe, very early, and I have seen some humorous poems written while he was at college. As his theatrical inclinations were then warm, several prologues and epilogues were the productions of his pen. To these I cannot at present have access, but shall copy from recollection a lively jeu d'esprit of about the year 1765. When Bishop Keppel came to reside here for the first time, Lady Waldegrave, Mrs Keppel's sister, accompanied him. Her beauty excited universal admiration; and among the rest Mr Hole's uncle, the Rev. Mr Wight, and the chanter, Mr Snow, kindled into poetry in her praise. Mr Hole sent the following letter as from an Exmoor shepherd (his father's living, Bishop Nymmett, being in that neighbourhood), with the following lines annexed. "Madam,-Though I cannot pretend to chant your ladyship's praises, like these two gentlemen, I am, with equal respect, your ladyship's most faithful and devoted." "Happy the fair whose matchless charms Lo! the white frost her beauty warms, Lady W. was so well pleased with the compliment, that the Exmoor shep herd was her frequent toast. In 1772, Mr Hole published his translation of Fingal. It was written when the admiration of Ossian's poetry was general, warm, and sometimes enthusiastic. The accounts of Macpherson and its early era were equally credited; nor was it surprising that a youthful poet (for the translation was begun not long after the original publication in 1761,) should catch with ardour the glowing imagery, the wild scenery, the animated description of this antico-modern bard, as the subject of his lays. In the year 1772, however, the public ardour had cooled. The same images almost constantly recurring with artful but slight variations, fatigued the reader; the suspicion of imposture, though it had then scarcely assumed a questionable shape, disgusted him. The version, elegant and flowing, with scarcely a weak line, or a faulty rhyme, did not, probably on this account, obtain much regard; and while the Ode to Imagination, especially when enforced by the masterly melody of Jackson's music, was warmly applauded, the work circulated with languor, and the sale at no time repaid the author's expectations of his merits. To select a specimen from a work so well known, and so long since published, can scarcely be expected; but on again examining it with a view to the present attempt, I was particularly struck by the energy and spirit of the following description. On comparing it with Mr Macpherson's translation, we shall at once see the additional force and animation which it receives from Mr Hole's numbers. "His daring words enflame the martial throng The gloom of battle slowly rolls along : And wrapits splendour in surrounding shade. Precedes the darkening cloud, and from his hand Pours the wild storms that desolate the land, Howl o'er the waste, and shake the sounding groves, The fiery chief in pomp terrific moves." The Ode to Imagination again recurs in the Devonshire and Cornish poems, but it will best enable us to trace the progress of our friend's talents to notice it in this place. We need not repeat the commendations which it has so generally received. The plan is that of Dryden's celebrated St Cecilia's Ode, and the imagery is equally spirited and correct, the lines flowing and mellifluous. From this also a specimen may be per mitted. "Yon mossy stones that rise above the heath, Beside the blasted oak that towers on high, Mark to the hunter's view the cave of death, Where chiefs renowned in former ages lie: There rests brave Morar! thy untimely doom, Thy aged sire and mournful friends de plore. How vain their sorrow! in the silent tomb Like him, ye warriors, you must pass away, The mighty Morar sleeps, to rise no more! Like him you shine the glory of the plain: In time your strength will fail, your tombs decay, And no memorial of your fame remain." In the year 1776, he was united to Miss Wilhelmina Katencamp, daughter of Mr Katencamp, a very respectable and opulent merchant of this city. It was completely a union of hearts, and continued with unexampled harmony and affection to the time of his death, a period of twenty-six years. Soon after this event, Mr Hole fixed at Sowton, as curate to Mr Archdeacon Moore; his living at Buckerel, to which he was presented in 1777, having no suitable habitation. Mr Hole's occasional residence in the neighbourhood of Southmolton, led him to an acquaintance with Mr Badcock. From Mr Badcock he first received the Hymn to Ceres, and by his advice, and with some of his assistance, Mr Hole engaged in the translation. This gentleman, who had reviewed the original in the Monthly Review, at that time contributed very largely to the same journal. I mention this circumstance chiefly to remark, that our friend often liberally assisted him, and that particularly the articles which related to the Poems of Rowley, and the subsequent controversy, were much enriched by his communications. Mr Hole's poetical taste, and discriminating judgment, were on that occasion highly |