[25] Petrarch returned to Vaucluse in 1342, when he was toward thirty-eight years old. There is an air of Wahrheit und Dichtung noticeable elsewhere in the letter. It was, for example, probably later, in 1344, on a second visit to Parma, that he bought his house, and then went to Verona, where he found the letters of Cicero.

[26] 1349.

[27] Giacomo was killed by his nephew, December, 1350.

[28] The autobiography breaks off abruptly here; we know not why.

[29] The fact that Petrarch mentions the death of Urban V., which occurred in December, 1370, indicates that the autobiography was written during the last three years of its author's life.

[30] See the pathetic passage in the Convito, i., ch. 3.

[31] Fam., xxi., 15 (vol. iii., p. 110).

[32] Fam., vi., 3 (vol. i., p. 324).

[33] Cantiunculæ inanes, falsis et obscœnis muliercularum laudibus refertæ.—Fam., x., 3 (vol. ii., p. 73).

[34] See below, [Part VI].