upon the long journey from Genoa to Jerusalem. It is significant that Petrarch deals principally in his little manual not with the half-legendary attractions of the Orient, but with the familiar beauties of their own Italy. He does not forget, at the very opening of the journey, the lovely valleys of the Riviera, with their tumbling brooks, and the pleasing contrast of wildness and verdure on the hills to the east of Genoa. But, like a true lover of nature, he felt himself powerless adequately to describe the scene, and contented himself with commending to his friend's admiration the beauties which no mortal pen could depict.[1] The four letters which follow have been chosen with the aim of illustrating Petrarch's attitude toward the world about him.
An Excursion to Paris, the Netherlands, and the Rhine.
To Cardinal Giovanni Colonna[2]
I have lately been travelling through France, not on business, as you know, but simply from a youth-
- ↑ “Quae multo facilius tibi sit mirari quam cuiquam hominum stylo amplecti.” Itinerariunt Syriacum, Opera, p. 557.
- ↑ Fam., i., 3, 4. The two letters in which Petrarch describes his journey to the north are here given together. The first is dated from Aix-la-Chapelle, June 21 [1333], and the second from Lyons, August 9, of the same year.
