viam populo Dei, qui transivit sicco pede:  fu qui mirabile a vedere; idest, miraculosius, chel soccorso que, idest, quam esset mirabile succursum divinum hic venturum ad puniendos perversos.”  Now this whole passage is omitted in Signor Tamburini’s work; and in its place appears a literal transcript from Costa’s note, as follows:  “Veramente fu piu mirabile cosa vedere il Giordano volto all’ indietro o fuggire il mare, quando cosi volle Iddio, che non sarebbe vedere qui il provvedimento a quel male, che per colpa de’ traviati religiosi viene alia Chiesa di Dio.”

Another instance of this complete desertion of Benvenuto, and adoption of another’s words, occurs just at the end of the same Canto, v. 150; and the Florentine edition again gives us the original text.  It is even more inexplicable why the so-called translator should have chosen this course here than in the preceding instance; for he has copied but a line and a half from Costa, which is not a larceny of sufficient magnitude to be of value to the thief.

We have noted misappropriations of this sort, beside those already mentioned, in Cantos II. and III. of the “Purgatory,” and in Cantos I., II., XV., XVI., XVIII., XIX., and XXIII., of the “Paradise.”  There are undoubtedly others which have not attracted our attention.

We have now finished our exposure of the false pretences of these volumes, and of the character of their author.  After what has been said of them, it seems hardly worth while to note, that, though handsome in external appearance, they are very carelessly and inaccurately printed, and that they are totally deficient in needed editorial illustrations.  Such few notes of his own as Signor Tamburini has inserted in the course of the work are deficient alike in intelligence and in object.

A literary fraud of this magnitude is rarely attempted.  A man must be conscious of being supported by the forces of a corrupt ecclesiastical literary police before venturing on a transaction of this kind.  No shame can touch the President of the “Academy of the Industrious.”  His book has the triple Imprimatur of Rome.  It is a comment, not so much on Dante, as on the low standard of literary honesty under a government where the press is shackled, where true criticism is forbidden, where the censorship exerts its power over the dead as well as the living, and every word must be accommodated to the fancied needs of a despotism the more exacting from the consciousness of its own decline.

It is to be hoped, that, with the new freedom of Italian letters, an edition of the original text of Benvenuto’s Comment will be issued under competent supervision.  The old Commentator, the friend of Petrarch and Boccaccio, deserves this honor, and should have his fame protected against the assault made upon it by his unworthy compatriot.

Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character.  By E.E.  RAMSAY, M.A., LL.D., F.R.  S.E., Dean of Edinburgh.  From the Seventh Edinburgh Edition.  Boston:  Ticknor & Fields. 12mo.