He proved his enthusiasm in the most undeniable manner. He was born poor, even to privation; yet he spent large sums of money in the acquisition of ancient manuscripts: he transcribed many with his own hand. His labours in this way were immense: many volumes of the poets, orators, and historians, were copied by him: among these are mentioned the whole of the works of Tacitus and Livy, Terence and Boetius, with various treatises of Cicero and Varro, besides many of the productions of the fathers. He made journeys in search of manuscripts, and records one anecdote, which shows how often disappointment must have attended his labours. He visited the celebrated convent of Monte Cassino, under the idea that he might find some ancient manuscripts, hitherto unknown. He asked for the library, and was taken up a ladder into a loft, exposed to the weather, where the books were lying on the floor moth-eaten, and covered with damp mould. While he indignantly regarded the materials of learning which lay desolate before him, he was told, to add to his horror, that the monks were in the habit of effacing the writing from their venerable parchments, and of replacing it by scraps from the ritual, for which they found a ready sale among the neighbouring villagers. Nor was his enthusiasm, like Petrarch's, confined to the ancients. He could not only feel and appreciate the genius of Dante, but exerted himself to inspire others with the admiration with which he was filled. He awoke the Florentines to a just sense of the merits of this sublime poet, and persuaded them to erect a professorship in their university for the explanation of the Divina Commedia. He himself first filled the chair, and wrote a commentary on several of the books, besides a Life of Dante. This has been usually considered unauthentic, but it is difficult to see on what grounds this judgment rests. He takes the account of Dante's love of Beatrice from his own work of the Vita Nuova; and in all other particulars of his life the information he gives is slight; but, as far as we are enabled to form an opinion, correct. His genuine enthusiasm for the beauties of his favourite author led him to regret that Petrarch did not sufficiently admire him. He copied for his use the whole of his poem with care and elegance, and sent it to the laureate, with a poetic epistle, in which he besought him to bestow more attention and admiration on their illustrious countryman. Petrarch was bigoted to the notion that any thing written in the vulgar tongue was beneath the regard of a learned man; and received his present with a coldness that penetrates through his assumed praises. This celebrated manuscript belongs to the Vatican library. The epistle mentioned is addressed "To Francis Petrarch, illustrious and only poet," and is subscribed "thy Giovanni da Certaldo." The manuscript is illuminated, and the arms of Petrarch, consisting of a gold bar in an azure field, with a star, adorns the head of each canto.