Soon after his arrival at Parma, he received one of those tokens, of his popularity which are exceedingly expressive, though they come from a humble admirer.  A blind old man, who had been a grammar-school master at Pontremoli, came to Parma, in order to pay his devotions to the laureate.  The poor man had already walked to Naples, guided in his blindness by his only son, for the purpose of finding Petrarch.  The poet had left that city; but King Robert, pleased with his enthusiasm, made him a present of some money.  The aged pilgrim returned to Pontremoti, where, being informed that Petrarch was at Parma, he crossed the Apennines, in spite of the severity of the weather, and travelled thither, having sent before him a tolerable copy of verses.  He was presented to Petrarch, whose hand he kissed with devotion and exclamations of joy.  One day, before many spectators, the blind man said to Petrarch, “Sir, I have come far to see you.”  The bystanders laughed, on which the old man replied, “I appeal to you, Petrarch, whether I do not see you more clearly and distinctly than these men who have their eyesight.”  Petrarch gave him a kind reception, and dismissed him with a considerable present.

The pleasure which Petrarch had in retirement, reading, and reflection, induced him to hire a house on the outskirts of the city of Parma, with a garden, beautifully watered by a stream, a rus in urbe, as he calls it; and he was so pleased with this locality, that he purchased and embellished it.

His happiness, however, he tells us, was here embittered by the loss of some friends who shared the first place in his affections.  One of these was Tommaso da Messina, with whom he had formed a friendship when they were fellow-students at Bologna, and ever since kept up a familiar correspondence.  They were of the same age, addicted to the same pursuits, and imbued with similar sentiments.  Tommaso wrote a volume of Latin poems, several of which were published after the invention of printing.  Petrarch, in his Triumphs of Love, reckons him an excellent poet.

This loss was followed by another which affected Petrarch still more strongly.  Having received frequent invitations to Lombes from the Bishop, who had resided some time in his diocese, Petrarch looked forward with pleasure to the time when he should revisit him.  But he received accounts that the Bishop was taken dangerously ill.  Whilst his mind was agitated by this news, he had the following dream, which he has himself related.  “Methought I saw the Bishop crossing the rivulet of my garden alone.  I was astonished at this meeting, and asked him whence he came, whither he was going in such haste, and why he was alone.  He smiled upon me with his usual complacency, and said, ’Remember that when you were in Gascony the tempestuous climate was insupportable to you.  I also am tired of it.  I have quitted Gascony, never to return, and I am going to Rome.’  At the conclusion of these words, he had reached the