“Nevertheless, since in what precedes there has been occasion to make frequent mention of the number nine,[E] and apparently not without reason, and since in her departure this number appeared to have a large place, it is fitting to say something on this point, seeing that it seems to belong to our design.  Wherefore I will first tell how it had place in her departure, and then I will assign some reason why this number was so friendly to her.  I say, that, according to the mode of reckoning in Italy, her most noble soul departed in the first hour of the ninth day of the month; and according to the reckoning, in Syria, she departed in the ninth month of the year, since the first month there is Tismim, which with us is October; and according to our reckoning, she departed in that year of our indiction, that is, of the years of the Lord, in which the perfect number[F] was completed for the ninth time in that century in which she had been set in the world; and she was of the Christians of the thirteenth century.[G]

[Footnote E:  In the earlier part of the Vita Nuova there are many references to this number.  We translate in full the passage given above, as one of the most striking illustrations of Dante’s youthful fondness for seeking for the mystical relations and inner meanings of things.  The attributing such importance to the properties of the number nine, though it might at first seem puerile and an indication of poverty of feeling, was a portion of the superstitious belief of the age, in which Dante naturally shared.  The mysterious properties of numbers were a subject of serious study, and were connected with various branches of science and of life.

“Themistius vero, et Boethius, et Averrois Babylonius, cum Platone, sic numeros extollunt, ut neminem absque illis posse recte philosophari putent.  Loquuntur autem de numero rationali et formali, non de materiali, sensibili, sive vocali numero mercatorum....  Sed intendunt ad proportionem ex illo resultantem, quem numerum naturalem et formalem et rationalem vocant; ex quo magna sacramenta emanant, tam in naturalibus quam divinis atque coelestibus....  In numeris itaque magnam latere efficaciam et virtutem tam ad borum quam ad malum, non modo splendidissimi philosophi unanimiter docent, sed etiam doctores Catholici.”—­Cornelii Agrippae De Occulta Philosophia, Liber Secundus, cc. 2, 3.]

[Footnote F:  The perfect number is ten.]

[Footnote G:  Thus it appears that Beatrice died on the 9th of June, 1290.  She was a little more than twenty-four years old.]

“One reason why this number was so friendly to her may be this:  since, according to Ptolemy and the Christian truth, there are nine heavens which move, and, according to the common astrological opinion, these heavens work effects here below according to their relative positions, this number was her friend, to the end that it might be understood that at her generation all the nine movable heavens were in most