Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/159

 9" s. vii. FEB. 23, 1901.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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Lady Dacre, whose polished style would no readily lend itself to the composition o society verses ; and it does not appear tha any one of the four sisters Russell, with whom Foscolo was intimate, had any poetical talent although they appreciated poetry. Foscok was patronized by Lord and Lady Holland and must have been acquainted with most o1 the distinguished persons who frequentec Lady Holland's receptions, among whom were several "literary ladies," as Byron scornfully terms them, who were capable of composing the verses addressed to Foscolo.

It is not improbable that the authoress of the verses was Maria Graham, afterwards the wife of Sir Augustus Callcott, the painter, to whom, in a letter dated 3 February, 1821, Foscolo promised to send one of the edition of sixteen copies of his essay on Petrarch, in which he observes, with intention, that he has endeavoured " to disclose the hitherto mysteri- ous heart of the most coquettish, most saint- like, lady Laura," la civettissima, santissima, madonna Laura (' Epistolario,' p. 561, Orlan- dini & Mayer, ed. 1854).

Maria Graham's first husband was a captain in the Royal Navy, and with him she spent some time in Italy in 1819, which visit she described in a book entitled 'Three Months in the Mountains east of Rome,' published in 1820. She was the authoress of several other works, the most popular being 'Little Arthur's History of Englana.'

The vicar of Turnham Green, in a com- munication to 'N. & Q.' (4 th S. xi. 447) referring to an inquiry in ' N. & Q.' in 1871, states that Ugo Foscolo died in a house long occupied by the late Dr. Coller on the north side of Turnham Green Road, opposite Chis- wick Lane. Dr. Coller's house, which is still standing, and is now No. 100, Chiswick High Road, was formerly part of an inn with the sign of " The King of Bohemia. " This inn was divided into three tenements, the doctor's house being in the centre. The vicar gives an interesting account of the disinterment of Foscolo's body, which was found to be well preserved, the features being recognizable by persons who had known him in life.

JOHN HEBB.

Much interesting information concerning Ugo Foscolo may be found in 'N. & Q.,' 4 th S. ii. 238 ; vii. 528 ; viii. 107, 255 ; xi. 447, particularly his residence in his latter days at Turnham Green, where he died in 1827. He was buried in Chiswick Churchyard, whence his body was exhumed, forty-four years afterwards, in 1871, and reinterred at Santa Croce, Florence. It is stated that

though Foscolo's remains were interred in a common earth grave at Chiswick, they were found quite perfect, and the features recog- nizable. The soil must have been of a very antiseptic nature. '

In a little memoir of Ugo Foscolo prefixed to an extract from his famous poem ' I Sepol- cri,' the dates of his birth and death are given as 1777 and 1827. This occurs in a well-chosen selection of Italian poetry, ' I Poeti Italiani Moderni,' edited by Miss Louisa Merivale, published by Williams & Norgate in 1865. Ugo Foscolo instances in fine language his own feelings on seeing the tombs of Machia- velli, Michel Angelo, and Galileo in the church of Santa Croce at Florence, and now his own remains repose amongst those of the mighty dead :

A egregie cose il forte animo accendono L' urne de' forti, o Pindemonte ! e bella E santa fanno al peregrin la terra Che le ricetta. lo, quando il monumento Vidi ove posa il corpo di quel grande Che temprando lo soettroa' regnatori Gli allor ne sfronda.

Lord Byron in ' Childe Harold's Pilgrimage,' canto iv., published originally in 1818, after an interval of several years from the issue of the first canto, has beautifully alluded to the place of interment. In Santa Croce's holy precincts lie Ashes which make it holier, dust which is Even in itself an immortality, Though there were nothing save the past, and this, The particle of those sublimities Which have relapsed to chaos : here repose Angelo's, Alfieri's bones, and his, The starry Galileo, with his woes ; Here Machiavelli's earth return'd to whence it rose.

Stanza liv.

JOHN PICKFORD, M.A.

AN UNCLAIMED POEM BY BEN JONSON (9 th S. iv. 491 ;.v. 34, 77, 230, 337, 477; vi. 96, 430, 477 ; vii. 96)." On the mind of an adversary," Matthew Arnold once said, " one never makes
 * he faintest impression." Criticism of MR.

CURRY'S diffuse and inaccurate article is not a gracious task, but silence would be mis- nterpreted.

The Goodyere family. My information was derived from the Rev. F. C. Cass's valuable parish history, ' Monken Hadley,' 1880. The wo Sir Henrys are fully dealt with on pp. 145-51. If MR. CURRY requires the )riginal authority for the date of the elder Sir Henry's death, it is Harleian MS. 757, "olio 145. The younger Goodyere dabbled in rerse-writing ; for a catalogue of his efforts ee a note by Mr. G. F. Warner in H. A. Bright's 'Poems from Sir Kenelm Digby's Papers,' Roxburghe Club ed., 1877, pp. 35-6.