Quite new,
quite unadorned, untouched by the corrector's fangs, it comes out of my
young servant's hands. You will notice some defects in spelling, but no
gross mistakes. In a word, you will perhaps find things in it which will
exercise but not disturb your understanding. Read it then, and ponder
upon it. This book, which would enflame a heart of ice, must set your
ardent soul on fire.'
On a summer night of the year 1374, Petrarch died peacefully at Arqua,
alone in his library. His few remaining books were sold, and some of them
may still be seen in Rome and Paris. Those which he had given to Venice
suffered a strange reverse of fortune. How long the gift remained in the
Palazzo Molina we cannot tell. We conjecture that it was discarded in the
next century, before Bessarion presented his Greek books to the senate,
and became the actual founder of the library of St. Mark. The antiquary
Tomasini found Petrarch's books cast aside in a dark room behind the
Horses of Lysippus. Some had crumbled into powder, and others had been
glued into shapeless masses by the damp. The survivors were placed in the
Libraria Vecchia, and are now in the Ducal Palace; but it was long before
they were permitted to enter the building that sheltered the gift of
Bessarion.
CHAPTER V.
OXFORD--DUKE HUMPHREY'S BOOKS--THE LIBRARY OF THE VALOIS.
The University Library at Oxford was a development of Richard de Bury's
foundation. The monks of Durham had founded a hall, now represented by
Trinity College, in which Richard had always taken a fatherly interest.
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