Note 118 — Chapter VIII

Memorie concernenti la Città d'Urbino. It was edited by Monsignor Bianchini, and was meant to extend to four folio volumes, illustrating: (1) the city of Urbino; (2) the princes who ruled there; (3) its most famous citizens; (4) their works. Of these only the first volume saw the light, at the expense of Pope Clement XI., an Albani of Urbino. It contains, 1st, Baldi's prolix and fulsome Encomio della Patria; 2nd, his equally dull description of the ducal palace, with seventy-four engravings of its architecture and sculpture; 3rd, Bianchini's catalogue of the sculptured trophies, with seventy-two engravings; 4th, his geometrical survey of the province of Urbino in 1723. It is a curious example of a volume compiled from promising materials, but destitute of interest, and is dedicated to an English exile whose name, once a watchword ominous to our island, frequently meets us in Central Italy, and whose wanderings here found a brief repose. See an account of the Chevalier de St. George's residence at Urbino, in an article on the Stuarts in Italy, contributed by the author of these pages to the Quarterly Review for December, 1847, vol. LXXX.