He was, when we knew him at Florence in his old age, a somewhat crabbed old man, not at all disposed to make new acquaintances, and, I think, somewhat soured and disappointed, not certainly with the meed of admiration he had won from his countrymen as a poet, but with the amount of effect which his writings had availed to produce in the political sentiments and then apparent destinies of the Italians.
But he was conquered by the young Englishwoman's translation of his favourite, and, I think, his finest work.

It is a thoroughly trustworthy and excellent translation; but the execution of it was child's play in comparison with the translations from Giusti.
She translated a number of the curiously characteristic _stornelli_ of Tuscany, and especially of the Pistoja mountains.

And here again it is impossible to make any one, who has never been familiar with these _stornelli_ understand the especial difficulty of translating them.

Of course the task was a slighter and less significant one than that of translating Giusti, nor was the same degree of critical accuracy and nicety in rendering shades of meaning called for.

But there were not--are not--many persons who could cope with the especial difficulties of the attempt as successfully as she did.