I see it not unfrequently quoted by writers on Italian subjects.

Then I made a more ambitious attempt, and produced a _History of the Commonwealth of Florence_, in four volumes.
Such a work appeals, of course, to a comparatively limited audience.
But that it was recognised to have some value among certain Anglo-Saxons whose favourable judgment in the matter was worth having, may be gathered from the fact that it has been a text-book in our own and in transatlantic universities; while a verdict perhaps still more flattering (though I will not say more gratifying) was given by Professor Pasquale Villari (now senator of the kingdom of Italy), who, in a letter in my possession, pronounces my history of Florence to be in his opinion the best work on the subject extant.
Professor Villari is not only an accomplished scholar of a wide range of culture, but his praise of any work on Italian--and perhaps especially on Tuscan--history comes from no "prentice han'." His masterly _Life of Macchiavelli_ is as well known in our country as in his own, through the translation of it into English by his gifted wife, Linda Villari, whilom Linda White, and my very valued friend.
All these historical books were written _con amore_.

The study of bygone Florentines had an interest for me which was quickened by the daily and hourly study of living Florentines.

It was curious to mark in them resemblances of character, temperament, idiosyncrasy, defects, and merits, to those of their forefathers who move and breathe before us in the pages of such old chroniclers as Villani, Segni, Varchi, and the rest, and in sundry fire-graven strophes and lines of their mighty poet.

Dante's own local and limited characteristics, as distinguished from the universality of his poetic genius, have always seemed to me quintessentially Tuscan.
Of course it is among the lower orders that such traits are chiefly found, and among the lower orders in the country more than those in the towns.