Page:A translation of the Latin works of Dante Alighieri.djvu/398

Rh ' (it is uncertain who is referred to under this name); for should any evil befall him his friends at Ravenna would be inconsolable. Dante replies that for all the inferiority of Bologna, he would undertake the journey for Del Virgilio's dear sake, were it not that he does indeed dread the terrible Polyphemus; Fiducio presses this point still further, and Dante assents. Guido da Polenta, Dante's protector at Ravenna, overheard the whole conversation and reported it to the writer.

It will be noted that this second eclogue does not in any express way claim to be the work of Dante. The pastoral cipher on its geographical side is tangled. The way in which Dante himself is spoken of is more in the tone of an ardent disciple than of a man writing of himself, and the poem {Eclogue II.) adds no trait to our knowledge of Dante. The commentator above referred to has preserved a tradition that Del Virgilio received no answer to his second letter till Dante's son, after his father's death and a year after Del Virgilio had sent his letter, conveyed this answer to him.

All this justifies some doubt as to Dante's full authorship of the poem and his responsibility for its present form. It is, however, generally accepted as Dante's authentic work, and in any case it is a genuine contemporary document and in no sense a forgery. It may, and probably does, stand closer to Dante than it claims to do; but at any rate no claim that it does make can for a moment be disputed.