Among the distinguished literary names which have issued from Arezzo, several members of the ACCOLTI family were conspicuous in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. BERNARDO,[*48] of whom we are now to speak, had a father noted as a historian, a brother and a nephew who reached the dignity of cardinal, and were remarkable in politics and letters. He obtained from Leo X. the fief of Nepi, as well as various offices of trust and emolument; of these, however, his wealth rendered him independent, enabling him to indulge in a life of literary ease. His poetical celebrity exceeded that of his contemporaries, and seems to have been his chief recommendation at the court of Guidobaldo. There, and at Rome, he was in the habit of reciting his verses in public to vast audiences, composed of all that was brilliant in these cultivated capitals. Nor was his popularity limited to a lettered circle. When an exhibition was announced, the shops were closed, the streets emptied, and guards restrained the crowds who rushed to secure places among his audience. This extraordinary enthusiasm appears the more unaccountable, when we find his printed poetry characterised by a bald and stilted style, which leaves no pleasing impression on the reader. The mystery seems explained by a supposition that his talent lay in extemporary declamation. [Footnote *48: On the Unico Aretino Bernardo Accolti, see especially D'ANCONA, _Studi sulla Lett. Ital. de' primi secoli_ (Ancona, 1884), in the essay, _Del Seicentismo nella poesia cortigiana del Secolo XV._, pp. 217-18. He professed an extraordinary devotion for the Duchess of Urbino.] Instances are far from uncommon in Italy, of similar effects produced by the _improvisatori_, whose torrent of melodious words, directed to a popular theme, and accompanied by music and impassioned gesticulation, hurries the feelings of a sympathising auditory to bursts of tumultuous applause, whilst on cool perusal, the same compositions fall utterly vapid on the reader. Be this as it may, the success of Accolti had the common result of superficial powers, and so egregiously inflated his vanity, that he assumed as his usual designation "the unique Aretine," by which he is always accosted in the _Cortegiano_. Nine years later we find him devoting to Duchess Elisabetta attentions which were attributed to a passion more powerful than gratitude, but which, knowing as he well did, her immaculate modesty, could only have been prompted by despicable vanity, and hence exposed him to keen ridicule. * * * * *