"Quand'io varai la mia barchetta, prima
Per ubbidir chi sempre ubbidir debbe
La mente, e faticarsi in prosa e in rima,
E del mio Carlo Imperador m'increbbe;
Che so quanti la penna ha posto in cima,
Che tutti la sua gloria prevarrebbe:
E stata quella istoria, a quel ch'i' veggio,
Di Carlo male intesa, e scritta peggio.">[
[ [336] {287}[Philomela and Procne were daughters of Pandion, King of Attica. Tereus, son of Ares, wedded Procne, and, after the birth of her son Itys, concealed his wife in the country, with a view to dishonouring Philomela, on the plea of her sister's death. Procne discovered the plot, killed her babe, and served up his flesh in a dish for her husband's dinner. The sisters fled, and when Tereus pursued them with an axe they besought the gods to change them into birds. Thereupon Procne became a swallow, and Philomela a nightingale. So Hyginus, Fabulæ, xlv.; but there are other versions of Philomela's woes.]
[ [337] [In the first edition of the Morgante Maggiore (Firenze, 1482 [B.M.G. 10834]), which is said (vide the colophon) to have been issued "under the correction of the author, line 2 of this stanza runs thus: "comegliebbe u armano el suo turpino;" and, apparently, it was not till 1518 (Milano, by Zarotti) that Pipino was substituted for Turpino. Leonardo Bruni, surnamed Aretino (1369-1444), in his Istoria Fiorentina (1861, pp. 43, 47), commemorates the imperial magnificence of Carlo Magno, and speaks of his benefactions to the Church, but does not—in that work, at any rate—mention his biographers. It is possible that if Pulci or Bruni had read Eginhard, they thought that his chronicle was derogatory to Charlemagne. (See Gibbon's Decline and Fall, 1825, iii. 376, note 1, and Hallam's Europe during the Middle Ages, 1868, p. 16, note 3; et vide post, [p. 309].)]
[ [338] {288}[For an account of the Benedictine Monastery of San Liberatore alla Majella, which lies to the south of Manoppello (eight miles southwest of Chieto, in the Abruzzi), see Monumenti Storici ed. Artistici degli Abruzzi, by V. Bindi, Naples, 1889, Part I. (Testo), pp. 655, sq. The abbey is in a ruinous condition, but on the walls of "un ampio porticato," there is still to be seen a fresco of Charlemagne, holding in his hands the deed of gift of the Abbey lands.]
[ [339] [That is, the valley of Jehoshaphat, the "valley where Jehovah judges" (see Joel iii. 2-12); and, hence, a favourite burial-ground of Jews and Moslems.]
[ [340] [The text as it stands is meaningless. Probably Byron wrote "dost arise." The reference is no doubt to the supposed restoration of Florence by Charlemagne.]
[ [341] {289}["The Morgante is in truth the epic of treason, and the character of Gano, as an accomplished but not utterly abandoned Judas, is admirably sustained throughout."—Renaissance in Italy, 1881, iv. 444.]
["Così per Carlo Magno e per Orlando,
Due ne segui lo mio attento sguardo,
Com' occhio segue suo falcon volando."
Del Paradiso, Canto XVIII. lines 43-45.]