10* S.I. MARCH 5, 1904.] NOTES AND QUERIES.
183
fortifications and embankments raised on natural
dunes."
Finally, where the anti-climax exists "in adding as a second simile the embankment of the Brenta at Padua" I fail to recognize. Quality rather than quantity was in Dante's thought in connexion with the "duri mar- gini," and his travels furnished him with illustrations of it. Either reference would have served his purpose ; both are given with, presumably, the very pardonable vanity of the travelled author. The claims of Ghent to identity with Guizzante are too nebulous for serious consideration. Simi-
of either, but the rather a deepening of their
guilt, to admit that "the events are partly
invented by the dramatists, partly his-
torical"; that *
torical Dante "
our Dante
and that
is not the
"Gemma
his-
is a
character entirely created by the imagination
of the dramatists, who, nevertheless, are not
alone in giving an illegitimate child to Dante,
for certain critics, rightly or wrongly, have
cast doubts on the legitimacy of Dante's
daughter Beatrice/' And it is from the
"doubts" of these "certain critics" that an
unwarrantable slander is made "the central 1
episode of the drama." Verily these dra-
larly, the variants Guzzante = Guizzante are matists have out-Boccaccioed Boccaccio ! It
inconsiderable. As G rattan said of the ' '
" curosity " of an Irish witness, "The word is
not murdered ; only its eye is knocked out."
4. Let me appropriately, as I judge, in
this column lodge an indignant protest
against the slanderous treatment meted out
to Dante by Sardou and Moreau in their
joint drama bearing his name and staged
last year in London and Manchester. I have
already done so in the local press, and have
reaped the thanks of Bishop Casartelli,
Prof. Valgimigli, and others. The play itself
I have not seen, but I gleaned its merits (or
rather demerits) from various critiques and
from the booklet "presented by Sir Henry
Irving" to those who saw it. The latter
purports to be " some explanatory notes by
an Italian Student," and is divided into 'A
Note on the Story,' a ' Synopsis of Dante's
Life,' l The Symbolical Conception of Sardou
and Moreau's " Dante," ' ' The Central Episode
of the Drama,' and a ' Prologue,' containing
'The Episode of Count Ugoliuo ' and a detailec
synopsis of the four acts of the play. It is
in the first and fourth of these chapters that
lie the venom and travesty to which I take
indignant exception. Here is a sample of
both :
" Ainong the girl friends of Beatrice was one Pia
dei Tolomei, who has been forced into a loveless
marriage with Nello della Pietra, a depraved and
ferocious Florentine magnate. The unhappy young
wife has, through her intimacy with Beatrice, be-
come acquainted with Dante, and at the death of
Beatrice the mutual bereavement of the two has
gradually developed into an ardent mutual love.
During Nello's absence on affairs of state, a child,
Gemma, has been born to Pia and Dante."
The Pia is, of course, the Pia of 'Purg.,' v. 133 :
Ricorditi di me, che son la Pia ; Siena mi fe', disfecemi Maremma ;
and there is in the passage quoted a sufficiency of 'truth to give it a semblance of fact. But the calumny and perversion of history are doubly monstrous ; and it is no justification
is sheer trifling with common honesty, in the
face of such allegations, to assert boldly, as
' Sardou explained in an interview, ' There-
is more of the soul than of the body of Dante
in our drama.' " There is vastly too much of
the latter, and vastly too little of the former,
in it. As for the facts of the case, the only
one in the above passage which approaches
truth is the relationship between Pia and
Nello. But of the friendship between Pia
and Beatrice, and still less of the guilty inti-
macy between Pia and Dante, no shred of
historic evidence exists, so far as I know.
The poet was ignorant, as Scartazzini says
Dante non ne sapeva nulla " of Pia's mys-
terious death ; that he was equally ignorant
of any personal acquaintance with her in life
may be inferred with similar certitude from
the silence of history. Further, the identifi
cation of her with the "Donna Gentile" of
the ' Convito ' and ' Vita Nuova ' is as arbi-
trary as it is baseless, and founded only, as
the playwrights admit, upon a wretched
"play on words," the " bella pietra" of the
' Canzoniere.' I hope to deal with this Pia
when these notes reach her place in the
'D. C.'; meanwhile let this much be said here
as a permanent protest against this recent
attempt to besmirch the memories of the
great Florentine and the hapless Siennese.
Such pieces as Sardou's 'Dante' not only
grossly distort history and sully the grandest
of characters, but they are not calculated to
purify the stage a triple indictment which
should discredit them in the eyes of all lovers
of historic truth and moral beauty.
J. B. McGovERN. St. Stephen's Rectory, C.-on-M., Manchester.
"SILLY BILLY."
(See 7 th S. vi. 486.)
ADMIRERS of the ' D.N.B.' and of the late Sir Leslie Stephen will enjoy an article in the Atlantic Monthly for December, 1903 r
