Others are of a melancholy character; and one or two allude to the death of an infant son, whom she tenderly laments. But the most finished of all her poems is a Sonnet addressed to a lady whom her husband had formerly loved;[61] the sentiment of which is truly beautiful and feminine: never was jealousy so amiably, or so delicately expressed. There is something very dramatic and picturesque in the apostrophe which Faustina addresses to her rival, and in the image of the lady "casting down her large bright eyes:" as well as affecting in the abrupt recoil of feeling in the last lines. SONETTO. Donna! che tanto al mio bel sol piacesti! Che ancor de' pregi tuoi parla sovente, Lodando, ora il bel crine, ora il ridente Tuo labbro, ed ora i saggi detti onesti. Dimmi, quando le voci a lui volgesti Tacque egli mai, qual uom che nulla sente? O le turbate luci alteramente, (Come a me volge) a te volger vedesti? De tuoi bei lumi, a le due chiare faci Io so ch'egli arse un tempo, e so che allora-- Ma tu declini al suol gli occhi vivaci! Veggo il rossor che le tue guance infiora; Parla, rispondi! Ah non rispondi! taci Taci! se mi vuoi dir ch'ei t'ama ancora! TRANSLATION. Lady, that once so charm'd my life's fair Sun,[62] That of thy beauties still he talketh oft,-- Thy mouth, fair hair, and words discreet and soft. Speak! when thou look'dst, was he from silence won? Or, did he turn those sweet and troubled eyes On thee, and gaze as now on me he gazeth? (For ah! I know _thy_ love was then the prize, And then he _felt_ the grace that still he praiseth.) But why dost thou those beaming glances turn Thus downwards? Ha! I see (against thy will) All o'er thy cheek the crimsoning blushes burn. Speak out! oh answer me!--yet, no, no,--stay! Be dumb, be silent, if thou need'st must say That he who once adored thee, loves thee still.[63] Neither Zappi nor his wife were authors by profession: her poems are few; and all seem to flow from some incident or feeling, which awakened her genius, and caused that "craving of the heart and the fancy to break out into voluntary song, which men call inspiration." She became a member of the Arcadia, under the pastoral name of Aglaura Cidonia; and it is remarkable, that though she survived her husband many years, I cannot find any poem referring to her loss, nor of a subsequent date: neither did she marry again, though in the prime of her life and beauty.