the most welcome staple of conversation in palaces and universities.  Leo X. had them read aloud during supper, in the presence of his sister and a chosen group of cardinals.  It must be noted that the form of the Decades did not escape criticism at the pontifical court, nor did the censures, passed on the liberties he took with the tongue of Cicero, fail to reach and sting his ears.  In several passages, he defends his use of words taken from the Italian and Spanish languages.  He handled Latin as a living, not as a dead language, and his style is vigorous, terse, vitalised.  He cultivated brevity and was chary of lengthy excursions into the classics in search of comparisons and sanctions.  His letters frequently show signs of the haste in which they were composed:  sometimes the messenger who was to carry them to Rome, was waiting, booted and spurred, in the ante-chamber.  Juan Vergara, secretary to Cardinal Ximenes, declared his opinion that no more exact and lucid record of contemporary events existed than the letters of Peter Martyr, adding that he had himself often been present and witnessed with what haste they were written, no care being taken to correct and polish their style.

The cultivated ears of Ciceronian Latinists—­such as Cardinal Bembo who refused to read the Vulgate for fear of spoiling his style—­were naturally offended by the phraseology of the Decades.  Measured by standards so precious, the Latin of Peter Martyr is faulty and crude, resembling rather a modern dialect than the classical tongue of ancient Rome.[2]

[Note 2:  Ciampi’s comment is accurate and just:  Non si, puo dire che sia un latino bellisimo.  E quale lo parlavano e scriveano gli uomini d’affari.  A noi e, pero, men discaro che non sia ai forestieri, in quanta che noi troviamo dentro il movimento, il frassegiare proprio della nostra lingua, e sotto la frase incolta latina, indoviniamo il pensiero nato in italiano che, spogliato da noi della veste imbarazzanta ci ritorna ignudo si, ma schietto ed efficace.]

It is their substance, not their form, that gives Martyr’s writings their value, though his facile style is not devoid of elegance, if measured by other than severely classical standards.  Not as a man of letters, but as an historian does he enjoy the perennial honour to which in life he aspired.  Observation is the foundation of history, and Martyr was pre-eminently a keen and discriminating observer, a diligent and conscientious chronicler of the events he observed, hence are the laurels of the historian equitably his.  Similar to the hasty entries in a journal, daily written, his letters possess an unstudied freshness, a convincing actuality, that would undoubtedly have been marred by the retouching required to perfect their literary style.  The reproach of carelessness in neglecting to systematise his manuscripts applies more to the collection in the Opus Epistolarum than to the letters composing the Decades which we are especially considering, and likewise in the former work are found those qualities of lightness and frivolity, justifying Sir Arthur Helps’s description of him as a gossipy man of letters, reminding English readers occasionally of Horace Walpole and Mr. Pepys.  Hakluyt praised his descriptions of natural phenomena as excelling those penned by Aristotle, Pliny, Theophrastus, and Columella.[3]