5. BOCCACCIO AND OTHER PROSE WRITERS.--The fourteenth century forms a brilliant era in Italian literature, distinguished beyond any other period for the creative powers of genius which it exhibited. In this century, Dante gave to Europe his great epic poem, the lyric muse awoke at the call of Petrarch, while Boccaccio created a style of prose, harmonious, flexible, and engaging, and alike suitable to the most elevated and to the most playful subjects. Boccaccio (1313-1875) was the son of a Florentine merchant; he early gave evidence of superior talents, and his father vainly attempted to educate him to follow his own profession. He resided at Naples, where he became acquainted with a lady celebrated in his writings under the name of Fiammetta. It was at her desire that most of his early pieces were written, and the very exceptionable moral character which attaches to them must be attributed, in part, to her depraved tastes. The source of Boccaccio's highest reputation, and that which entitles him to rank as the third founder of the national literature, is his "Decameron," a collection of tales written during the period when the plague desolated the south of Europe, with a view to amuse the ladies of the court during that dreadful visitation. The tales are united under the supposition of a party of ten who had retired to one of the villas in the environs of Naples to strive, in the enjoyment of innocent amusement, to escape the danger of contagion. It was agreed that each person should tell a new story during the space of ten days, whence the title Decameron. The description of the plague, in the introduction, is considered not only the finest piece of writing from Boccaccio's pen, but one of the best historical descriptions that have descended to us. The stories, a hundred in number, are varied with considerable art, both in subject and in style, from the most pathetic and sportive to the most licentious. The great merit of Boccaccio's composition consists in his easy elegance, his _naïveté_, and, above all, in the correctness of his language.