Excerpt from Catalogue of the Dante Collection Presented by Willard Fiske, Vol. 1: Part 1, Dante's Works; Part 2, Works on Dante (A-G)IN April, 1892, while searching for Petrarch books in the shop of an Italian dealer, I came across a time-worn copy of the third and last Stagnino edition of the Divina Commedia, which bears the date of 1536, and which is by no means of over-frequent occurrence. Its price was so modest that I asked the bookseller to post it to the Cornell University Library. This was really the earliest-acquired volume of the collection here catalogued. It turned out to have an interest all its own, for on its arrival at Ithaca it was found to contain several living and laboring specimens of that destructive little animal, the bookworm, traces of whose active hostility to letters are so often visible in old books, but which is seldom caught at its toil. In consequence of this incidental feature the volume was given a temporary resting-place in the entomological laboratory at Cornell, where the breeding of the Anobium paniceum (or Sifadrq'a pam'aa) was for some time carried ou, and its habits diligently studied. Thus did Dante become an involuntary contributor to the stores of modern science. In August of the same year I transmitted to the Library three additional Dante books they had come to me, I remember, in a miscellaneous package, bought because it included several pieces desired for my Petrarch collection.

They could, of course, find no proper place on my shelves, and I was glad to be so easily rid of them.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.