315 



VENIERO, DOMENICO. 



VERB, SIR FRANCIS. 



318 



him, urging that he still wished to work. However, as soon as 

 Domeuico was gone, he started by another route, waylaid him, killed 

 him by striking him on the head with a piece of lead, and returned 

 immediately afterwards to his work, as Domunico had left him, where 

 he was found by those who came to tell him of the accident. Castagno 

 accompanied them to the spot, before Domenico was quite dead, and 

 the murdered man breathed his last in the arms of his murderer, who 

 pretended to be deeply afflicted. It should be mentioned that these 

 facts depend apparently entirely upou a reported confession of Cas- 

 tagno on his death-bed. Domeoico was fifty-six years of age when he 

 died, and he was buried in Santa Maria Nuova. His works in this 

 church were never completed, and they have now long eiuce been 

 destroyed, but there is still a picture by him in Sauta Lucia de' 

 Magnoli. He excelled in colouring aud in perspective : in fore- 

 shortening he was very skilful, and good also in design. 

 (Vusari, Vite de' Pittori, &c. ; Lanzi, Storia Pittonca, &c.) 

 VENIE'RO, DOME'NICO, was born at Venice 111 1517, of a patri- 

 cian family. He applied himself to literature, and especially to 

 poetry ; and was a friend of Bembo and other learned contempora- 

 ries. At the age of thirty-two he was attacked by a nervous disease 

 which rendered him an invalid for the rest of his life. Confined to his 

 apartments for many years, he found comfort in the society of learned 

 men, who resorted thitherto converse, debate, aud compose extempore 

 poetry. These meetings were the origin of the ' Acaderuia Veneziaua,' 

 instituted in 1558, of which Veniero, Federico Badoaro, and Paolo 

 Manuzio were the leading members. 



Veniero wrote a number of poems, remarkable for their lively con- 

 ceptions and power of expression : ' Rime di Domenico Veniero Sena- 

 tore Veueziano raccolte ed illustrate dall' Abate Pier Antonio Serassi,' 

 Bergamo, 1751, with a biography of the author. Veniero however 

 indulged at times in strained rhetorical figures and conceits. He was 

 one of the first to introduce acrostics into Italian poetry. He trans- 

 lated several Odes of Horace, which were published by Narducci, 

 together with translations from the same Roman writer by Annibal 

 Caro, Trissino, Giulio Cavalcanti, and others : ' Odi Diverse di Orazio 

 volgarizzate da alcuni nobilissimi Ingegni,' Venice, 4to, 1605, a very 

 rare edition. 



Veuiero died in 1582. His brother Lorenzo was a friend of Pietro 

 Aretiuo, and like him wrote obscene compositions. Maffeo Veniero, 

 son of Lorenzo, born at Venice in 1550, was an elegant poet both in 

 the Italian language and in his native Venetian dialect. His Venetian 

 poems are of the erotic kind, and very free, although the author held 

 the dignity of archbishop of Corfu, which he obtained at an early age 

 through family and personal interest, but it does not appear that he 

 ever resided in his see. He died in 1586, at the early age of thirty-six 

 years. Among his Venetian poems, one of the most successful was a 

 canzone entitled ' La Strazzosa,' or ' The Ragged Beauty,' which is a 

 very humorous parody of one of Petrarch's canzoni in praise of Laura. 

 There is a very obscene poem entitled ' La Zaffeta,' falsely attributed 

 to Maffeo Veniero, but which was published in 1531, long before he 

 was born, and, it appears, by his father Lorenzo. (Gamba, 'Col- 

 lezione di Poeti Antichi nel Dialetto Veneziano ;' Haym, ' Biblioteca 

 Italiana.') The Italian poems of Maffeo and his brother Luigi have 

 been inserted in the edition of the poems of their uncle Domenico. 

 (Tiraboschi, ' Storia della Letteratura Italiana.') 



VENUSTI, MARCELLO, a celebrated painter of the 16th century, 

 was born at Mantua, but in what year is unknown. He studied in 

 Home under Perino del Vaga, for whom he executed many works. He 

 was selected by Michel Angelo to paint a small copy in oil of his Last 

 Judgment, in the Sistine Chapel, for the Cardinal Farnese, and he 

 executed it so entirely to the satisfaction of Michel Angelo, that he 

 gave him many other designs to paint. This excellent picture of the 

 Last Judgment is now in the Royal Museum at Naples : there is a 

 copy of it in the Aguado Collection at Paris. Venusti painted many 

 pictures for various churches in Rome ; Baglione has given a long list 

 of his works : but he acquired a greater reputation by his pictures 

 from the designs of Michel Augelo. He died at Florence, in the 

 pontificate of Gregory XIII. (1572-1585.) 



* VERDI, GIUSEPPE, is the most popular Italian composer of the 

 day, though his popularity may be regarded as being of an ephemeral 

 description. The occurrences of his life have been without interest, 

 as they have not been recorded by any biographer ; his name being 

 known only as the author of a number of Italian operas, rapidly pro- 

 duced within the last twenty years, and attended with a degree of 

 success which must be ascribed to the degeneracy of the present Italian 

 school, and the total absence of competition ; for Verdi, such as he is, 

 has the field entirely to himself. He is the last remnant of the once 

 splendid race of Italian musicians, and has not even the shadow of a 

 rival. Among his numerous operas the following may be mentioned, 

 as possessed of the greatest merit, and the most generally known : 

 The ' Lombardi,' ' Ernani,' the ' Due Foscari,' ' Nabucodonassar,' or 

 ' Nabuco ' (performed in England under the title of ' Nino '), ' Rigo- 

 lotto,' the ' Trovatore,' and the ' Traviata.' From his productions it 

 may easily be gathered that Verdi's musical education has been slight. 

 They show the natural vein of melody with which the Italians are pre- 

 eminently gifted ; but they also betray great poverty in the resources 

 of art. He is a shallow contrapuntist, and in his use of the orchestra 

 he endeavours, by inordinate use of the most noisy instruments, to 



make up for the want of the varied and delicate combinations which 

 we find in the works of Mozart and Rossini. Even in his melody he 

 ias sacrificed the smooth and graceful style of the older Italian masters 

 .o a loud, violent, exaggerated manner ; and many singers of the day 

 lave learned by sad experience that of all the music of the Italian 

 stage Verdi's is the most destructive to the vocal powers. It is impos- 

 sible, nevertheless, that so much popularity could be gained without a 

 certain amount of merit. In addition to Verdi's gift of melody he has 

 considerable knowledge of dramatic effect; and he has generally been 

 lappy in the subjects of his pieces, most of which are interesting, and 

 some of them deeply tragic. It must be added, too, that however 

 defective his education seems to have been, he has made progress as an 

 artist by the cultivation of his art. His latest works are his best; and 

 n ' Uigoletto ' and the ' Trovatore ' there are scenes of concerted music 

 constructed with a degree of skill of which hit) earlier compositions 

 show no trace. On the whole, notwithstanding the present vogue of 

 Verdi's operas, no sound critic has ever esteemed him a great musician, 

 or even raised him to the level of Bellini and Donizetti, his immediate 

 predecessors. 



VERB, SIR FRANCIS, a distinguished English military com- 

 mander in the reign of Elizabeth, was born in 1554. His father, of 

 whose four sons he was the second, was Geoffrey de Vere, third son of 

 John de Vere, fifteenth earl of Oxford ; his mother was Elizabeth, 

 daughter of Sir Richard Hardekyn of Colchester. Of the first thirty 

 years of his life nothing appears to be known : he began his career of 

 active service as one of the captains of the force sent, under the com- 

 mand of the Earl of Leicester, to the assistance of the Dutch in the 

 latter end of the year 1585. Here he soon made himself conspicuous 

 both for bravery and conduct ; and he had a leading part in most of 

 the chief passages of the war between the Dutch and the Spaniards 

 throughout the next fifteen years. In 1587 he was one of the defen- 

 ders of the town of Sluys against the prince of Parma, to whom how- 

 ever the place was eventually forced to surrender. In 1588 he was 

 one of the garrison who successfully defended Bergen-op-Zoom against 

 the same assailant ; and for his services on this occasion he was 

 knighted by Lord Willoughby, who had succeeded Leicester in the 

 command of the English auxiliaries. In 1589, being put in command 

 of a small corps of six hundred of his countrymen, and left to defend 

 the Isle of Bjmmel against Count Mansfeldt, he so strengthened the 

 place by his active and judicious measure?, that the enemy, though in 

 great force, retired without attacking it. The same year he twice 

 threw a supply of provisions, and the second time also a reinforce- 

 ment of troops, into the town of Berg, while besieged by the Marquis 

 of Warrenbon. In the latter of these attempts he nearly lost his life 

 in an encounter with a party of the enemy ; his horse having been 

 killed by a pike, fell upon him, and he received several thrusts and 

 hurts before he could be extricated. In 1590 he in like manner 

 relieved the castle of Litkenhooven ; and in the same year he recap- 

 tured the town of Burick. His services in 1591 were, the surprise of 

 a fort near Zutphen, which materially facilitated the reduction of that 

 town ; the important assistance which he rendered Count Maurice at 

 the eiege of Deventer; and the share he had in the signal discomfiture 

 given to the Duke of Parma before Knodzenburg fort, near Nimeguen, 

 which is stated to have been brought about mainly by his management 

 aud exertions. In 1592 he obtained a seat in the House of Commons 

 as one of the members for Leominster ; but he is supposed to have 

 remained nevertheless in the service of the States of Holland, although 

 it does not appear how he was employed for the next three or four 

 years. When the first expedition against Cadiz was resolved upon, in 

 the beginning of 1596, Sir Francis Vere was sent for to England, and 

 thence despatched back immediately to intimate the design to the 

 States; and having then joined the expedition as one of the com- 

 manders of the land forces, and one of the council of war appointed 

 to advise the commanders-in-chief, Lords Essex and Howard of 

 Effingham, he greatly distinguished himself, both in the action with 

 the Spanish fleet, on the 20th of June, and in the successful attack 

 upon the town of Cadiz two days after. The latter part of this year 

 he spent in England ; but in the beginning of 1597 we find him again 

 in Holland, where he and Sir Robert Sidney commanded the English 

 auxiliaries in the engagement near Turnhout on the 24th of January, 

 in which the Spaniards were defeated with great slaughter by Count 

 Maurice. In the summer of this year he again accompanied his 

 patron the Earl of Essex on his second expedition against Spain, 

 which was attended with no result; and after his return home he 

 received from the queen the government of Briel (the Brill), which 

 was one of the cautionary towns, as they were called, given up for a 

 time by the Dutch to their English allies. He also held under the 

 States the command of the English troops in the service of Holland ; 

 and although he resided principally at his government, he made 

 repeated visits to England, and both attended at court and was 

 occasionally employed in negociating affairs of state between Elizabeth 

 and the Dutch government. In August 1599, when a Spanish inva- 

 sion was apprehended, he was sent for home in great haste, and con- 

 stituted lord-marshal ; and it is said that it was at one time proposed 

 to make him lord deputy of Ireland. He appears to have been per- 

 sonally a favourite of Elizabeth, and Essex also seems to have been 

 his steady friend, although he himself imagined at one time that he 

 had not been well used by that nobleman ; but he had drawn upon 



