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My mother don’t do much because she can’t, But I may count it just as good as done, Knowing the way and not the will’s her want. To-day I tried a kiss with her—just one— To see if I could make her sulks avaunt; She said, 'The devil rip you up, my son!'

—ROSSETTI.ssss1

Another class of poetry, forming a connecting link with prose, should be briefly mentioned, the didactic. TheTesoretto of BRUNETTO LATINI (1210-1294), celebrated as an encyclopædist of the knowledge of his time, and still more so as the preceptor or rather Mentor of Dante, describes a vision in which the poet supposes the secrets of nature to be revealed to him, and is interesting as in some measure prefiguring the machinery of theDivina Commedia. Francesco Barberino, a notary, wrote both in prose and verse on the bringing-up of girls, and although he is an indifferent writer his work is valuable as a picture of manners. He seriously discusses the question whether girls should be taught to read, and decides it in the negative. An anonymous poem entitled La Intelligenzia, treating philosophically of the emanation of Divine Wisdom, a conception resembling that of the Logos, attains a higher grade of poetical merit, but the best passages appear to be translated from the French and Provençal. The religious lyric of St. Francis of Assisi and of the Umbrian school, more interesting in a psychological than in a literary point of view, culminated about the end of the thirteenth century in the lays of Jacopino di Todi, remarkable examples of impassioned mysticism, and sometimes of satiric force. He is particularly interesting as a popular poet who owes nothing to culture, but derives all his inspiration from the ecstatic devotion which in his day animated a large portion of the Italian common people. The same spirit inspired theRappresentazioni of a rather later period, which will be more appropriately considered along with the Italian drama.