No More Learning

In the month of May in this year, 1359, a courier from Bohemia brought
Petrarch a letter from the Empress Anne, who had the condescension to
write to him with her own hand to inform him that she had given birth to
a daughter. Great was the joy on this occasion, for the Empress had been
married five years, but, until now, had been childless. Petrarch, in his
answer, dated the 23rd of the same month, after expressing his sense of
the honour which her Imperial Majesty had done him, adds some
common-places, and seasons them with his accustomed pedantry. He
pronounces a grand eulogy on the numbers of the fair sex who had
distinguished themselves by their virtues and their courage. Among these
he instances Isis, Carmenta, the mother of Evander, Sappho, the Sybils,
the Amazons, Semiramis, Tomiris, Cleopatra, Zenobia, the Countess
Matilda, Lucretia, Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, Martia, Portia,
and Livia. The Empress Anne was no doubt highly edified by this
muster-roll of illustrious women; though some of the heroines, such as
Lucretia, might have bridled up at their chaste names being classed with
that of Cleopatra.

Petrarch repaired to Linterno, on the 1st of October, 1359; but his stay
there was very short. The winter set in sooner than usual. The constant
rains made his rural retreat disagreeable, and induced him to return to
the city about the end of the month.

On rising, one morning, soon after his return to Milan, he found that he
had been robbed of everything valuable in his house, excepting his
books. As it was a domestic robbery, he could accuse nobody of it but
his son John and his servants, the former of whom had returned from
Avignon. On this, he determined to quit his house at St. Ambrosio, and
to take a small lodging in the city; here, however, he could not live in
peace. His son and servants quarrelled every day, in his very presence,
so violently that they exchanged blows. Petrarch then lost all patience,
and turned the whole of his pugnacious inmates out of doors.
His son
John had now become an arrant debauchee; and it was undoubtedly to
supply his debaucheries that he pillaged his own father. He pleaded
strongly to be readmitted to his home; but Petrarch persevered for some
time in excluding him, though he ultimately took him back.

It appears from one of Petrarch's letters, that many people at Milan
doubted his veracity about the story of the robbery, alleging that it
was merely a pretext to excuse his inconstancy in quitting his house at
St. Ambrosio; but that he was capable of accusing his own son on false
grounds is a suspicion which the whole character of Petrarch easily
repels. He went and settled himself in the monastery of St. Simplician,
an abbey of the Benedictines of Monte Cassino, pleasantly situated
without the walls of the city.

He was scarcely established in his new home at St. Simplician's, when
Galeazzo Visconti arrived in triumph at Milan, after having taken
possession of Pavia. The capture of this city much augmented the power
of the Lords of Milan; and nothing was wanting to their satisfaction but
the secure addition to their dominions of Bologna, to which Barnabo
Visconti was laying siege, although John of Olegea had given it up to
the Church in consideration of a pension and the possession of the city
of Fermo.

This affair had thrown the court of Avignon into much embarrassment, and
the Pope requested Nicholas Acciajuoli, Grand Seneschal of Naples, who
had been sent to the Papal city by his Neapolitan Majesty, to return by
way of Milan, and there negotiate a peace between the Church and Barnabo
Visconti. Acciajuoli reached Milan at the end of May, very eager to see
Petrarch, of whom he had heard much, without having yet made his
acquaintance. Petrarch describes their first interview in a letter to
Zanobi da Strada, and seems to have been captivated by the gracious
manners of the Grand Seneschal.

With all his popularity, the Seneschal was not successful in his
mission. When the Seneschal's proposals were read to the impetuous
Barnabo, he said, at the end of every sentence "Io voglio Bologna. " It
is said that Petrarch detached Galeazzo Visconti from the ambitious
projects of his brother; and that it was by our poet's advice that
Galeazzo made a separate peace with the Pope; though, perhaps, the true
cause of his accommodation with the Church was his being in treaty with
France and soliciting the French monarch's daughter, Isabella, in
marriage for his son Giovanni. After this marriage had been celebrated
with magnificent festivities, Petrarch was requested by Galeazzo to go
to Paris, and to congratulate the unfortunate King John upon his return
to his country.