Seeing this history, Count Orlando said
In his own heart, "O God who in the sky
Know'st all things! how was Milo hither led?
Who caused the Giant in this place to die?"
And certain letters, weeping, then he read,
So that he could not keep his visage dry,—
As I will tell in the ensuing story:
From evil keep you the high King of Glory!
[Note to Stanza v. Lines 1, 2.—In an Edition of the Morgante Maggiore issued at Florence by G. Pulci, in 1900, line 2 of stanza v. runs thus—
"Com' egli ebbe un Ormanno e 'l suo Turpino."
The allusion to "Ormanno," who has been identified with a mythical chronicler, "Urmano from Paris" (see Rajna's Ricerche sui Reali di Francia, 1872, p. 51), and the appeal to the authority of Leonardo Aretino, must not be taken au pied de la lettre. At the same time, the opinion attributed to Leonardo is in accordance with contemporary sentiment and phraseology. Compare "Horum res gestas si qui auctores digni celebrassent, quam magnæ, quam admirabiles, quam veteribus illis similes viderentur."—B. Accolti Aretini (ob. 1466) Dialogus de Præstantiâ Virorum sui Ævi. P. Villani, Liber de Florentiæ Famosis Civibus, 1847, p. 112. From information kindly supplied by Professor V. Rossi, of the University of Pavia.]
FOOTNOTES:
[ [332] {283}[Matteo Maria Bojardo (1434-1494) published his Orlando Innamorato in 1486; Lodovico Ariosto (1474-1533) published the Orlando Furioso in 1516. A first edition of Cantos I.-XXV. of Luigi Pulci's (1431-1487) Il Morgante Maggiore was printed surreptitiously by Luca Veneziano in 1481. Francesco Berni, who recast the Orlando Innamorato, was born circ. 1490, and died in 1536.]
[ [333] [John Hermann Merivale (1779-1844), the father of Charles Merivale, the historian (Dean of Ely, 1869), and of Herman, Under-Secretary for India, published his Orlando in Roncesvalles in 1814.]
[ [334] {284}[Parson Adams and Barnabas are characters in Joseph Andrews; Thwackum and Supple, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling.]
[ [335] {285}[Byron insisted, in the first place with Murray (February 7, 1820, Letters, 1900, iv. 402), and afterwards, no doubt, with the Hunts, that his translation of the Morgante Maggiore should be "put by the original, stanza for stanza, and verse for verse." In the present issue a few stanzas are inserted for purposes of comparison, but it has not been thought necessary to reprint the whole of the Canto.
"IL MORGANTE MAGGIORE.