While there could be no popular distribution, in the modern sense of the term, for necessarily costly books in manuscript, in a community of which only a small proportion had any knowledge of reading and writing, it is evident from the chronicles of the time that there was an active and prompt exchange of literary novelties between the court circles and the literary groups of the different cities, and also between the Faculties of the universities. A controversy between two scholars or men of letters (and there were, as said, many such controversies, some of them exceedingly bitter) appears to have excited a larger measure of interest and attention in cultivated circles throughout the country than could probably be secured to-day for any purely literary or scholastic issues. There must, therefore, have been in existence and in circulation a very considerable mass of literature in manuscript form, and we know from various sources that Florence particularly was the centre of an important trade in manuscripts. I have not thus far, however, been able to find any instances of the writers of this period receiving any compensation from the publishers, booksellers, or copyists, or any share in such profits as might be derived from the sale of the manuscript copies of their writings. It seems probable that the authors gave to the copyists the privilege (which it was in any case really impracticable to withhold) of manifolding and distributing such copies of the books as might be called for by the general public, while the cost of the complimentary copies (often a considerable number) given to the large circle of friends, seems as a rule to have been borne by the author. As the author had to take his compensation in the shape of fame (except in the cases of receipts from patrons), the wider the circulation secured for copies of his productions (provided only they were not plagiarised), the larger his fund of--satisfaction. For substantial compensation he could look only to the patron. Fortunately for the impecunious writers of the day, it became fashionable for not a few of the princes and nobles of Italy to play the rôle of Mæcenas, and by many of these the support and encouragement given to literature was magnificent, if not always judicious.