Page:Petrach, the first modern scholar and man of letters.djvu/16

vi excellent edition of Petrarch's Epistolæ de Rebus Familiaribus et Variæ, by Giuseppe Fracassetti, 3 vols., 8$o$, Florence, 1859–63. For the Epistolæ de Rebus Senilibus, and the remaining Latin works, they have necessarily relied upon the lamentably incorrect edition of the Opera printed at Basle in 1581, for in spite of its imperfections it is the most complete collection of Petrarch's writings that we possess. The references in the foot-notes are, therefore, to the pages of Fracassetti's edition or of that of 1581, as the case may be. Much aid has been derived from Körting's standard work, Petrarca's Leben Und Werke; from Fracassetti's elaborate notes to his Italian version of the letters; from Voigt's masterly analysis of Petrarch's character and career, at the opening of Die Wiederbelebung des classischen Alterthums; and especially from M. Pierre de Nolhac's scholarly and fascinating study, Pétrarque et l'Humanisme}.

Part third of the present volume, upon Petrarch's classical studies, is the work of Mr. Rolfe, and the whole book has had the benefit of his acute and painstaking revision. J. H. R.