Heroes of Modern Europe

								

which resisted his imperial mandates.  The assault was unsuccessful,
and Henry of Luxemburg died without accomplishing his laudable
intention of making Italy more peaceful.
Dante lived under the protection of the powerful Uguccione, lord of
Pisa, while he wrote the Purgatorio.  The second part of his epic
dealt with the region lying between the under-world of torment and the
heavenly heights of Paradise itself.  Here the souls of men were to be
cleansed of their sins that they might be pure in their final ecstasy.
A revolt against his patron led the poet to follow him to Verona, where
they both dwelt in friendship with the young prince, Cane della Scala.
The later cantos of the great poem, the Divine Comedy, were sent to
this ruler as they were written.  Cane loved letters, and appreciated
Dante so generously that the exile, for a time, was moved to forget his
bitterness.  He dedicated the Paradiso to della Scala, but he had to
give up the arduous task of glorifying Beatrice worthily and devote
himself to some humble office at Verona.  The inferiority of his
position galled one who claimed Vergil and Homer as his equals in the
world of letters.  He lost all his serene tranquillity of soul, and his
face betrayed the haughty impatience of his spirit.  Truly he was not
the fitting companion for the buffoons and jesters among whom he was
too often compelled to sit in the palaces where he accepted bounty.  He
could not always win respect by the power of his dark and {29} piercing
eyes, for he had few advantages of person and disdained to be genial in
manners.  Brooding over neglect and injustice, he grew so repellant
that Cane was secretly relieved when thoughtless, cruel levity drove
the poet from his court.  He never cared, perhaps, that Dante, writing
the concluding cantos of his poem, decided sadly not to send them to
his former benefactor.
The last goal of Dante's wanderings was the ancient city of Ravenna,
where his genius was honoured by the great, and he derived a melancholy
pleasure from the wonder of the people, who would draw aside from his
path and whisper one to another: "Do you see him who goes to hell and
comes back again when he pleases?"  The fame of the Divine Comedy was
known to all, and men were amazed by the splendid audacity of the
Inferno.
Yet Dante was still an exile when death took him in 1321, and Florence
had stubbornly refused to pay him tribute.  He was buried at Ravenna,
and over his tomb in the little chapel an inscription reproached his
own city with indifference.


"Hic claudor Dantes patriis extorris ab oris,
Quem genuit parvi Florentia mater amoris."


"Here I am enclosed, Dante, exiled from my native country,
Whom Florence bore, the mother that little did love him."

{30}
Chapter III
Lorenzo the Magnificent
The struggle in which Dante had played a leading part did not cease for
many years after the poet had died in exile.  The Florentines proved