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Although Galileo had now the happiness of rejoining his family under their paternal roof, yet, like all sublunary blessings, it was but of short duration. His favourite daughter Maria, who along with her sister had joined the convent of St Matthew in the neighbourhood of Arcetri, had looked forward to the arrival of her father with the most affectionate anticipations.
Galileo's bust was executed by Giovanni Battista Foggini; the figure of Astronomy by Vincenzio Foggini, his son; and that of Geometry by Girolamo Ticciati. Galileo's house at Arcetri still remains. In 1821 it belonged to one Signor Alimari, having been preserved in the state in which it was left by Galileo; it stands very near the convent of St Matthew, and about a mile to the S. E. of Florence.
Galileo, a more impassioned defender of the system, strained his ears, as it were, from Arcetri, in his blind and sorrowful old age, for news of a discovery which two more centuries had still to wait for. Hooke believed he had found a parallax for the bright star in the Head of the Dragon; but was deceived. Bradley convinced himself that such effects were too minute for his instruments to measure.
In the spring of 1639, however, he was allowed to go back to his villa at Gioiello, near Arcetri, and Milton obtained admission to him, old, frail, and blind, but in full possession of his mental faculty. There is observable in Milton, as Mr. Masson suggests, a prophetic fascination of the fancy on the subject of blindness.
It was arranged that the two daughters of Galileo, while still scarcely more than children, should both enter the Franciscan convent of St. Matthew, at Arcetri. The elder daughter Polissena, took the name of Sister Maria Celeste, while Virginia became Sister Arcangela.
"And I missed it for an insufferable affair. He stood under the window " "With a guitar," Lavinia proceeded evenly. "It was very beautiful." "Heavens! Bembo's going to fetch him to the Guarinis' sale, and I forgot and promised Anna Mantegazza to drive out to Arcetri! But Anna won't miss this. It was really a very pretty compliment."
In 1638 he obtained leave to visit Florence, still under the same restrictions as to society; but at the end of a few months he was remanded to Arcetri, which he never again quitted. From that time, however, the strictness of his confinement was relaxed, and he was allowed to receive the friends who crowded round him, as well as the many distinguished foreigners who eagerly visited him.
After having spent nearly six months under the hospitable roof of his friend, with no other restraint than that of being confined to the limits of the palace, Galileo was permitted to return to his villa near Florence under the same restrictions; and as the contagious disease had disappeared in Tuscany, he was able in the month of December to re-enter his own house at Arcetri, where he spent the remainder of his days.
But once back in his village home at Arcetri, Galileo again went to work with his telescope, mapping the heavens. A goodly degree of health and animation came back to him, but his eyesight, so long misused, now failed him and he became blind. Thus John Milton found him in Sixteen Hundred Thirty-eight.
But the most touching incident of Galileo's story is yet to come. After several years of confinement at Arcetri, the great astronomer was permitted to retire to Florence, upon the conditions that he should neither quit his house, nor receive the visits of his friends. They removed him from a prison, to make a prison of his home. Alas! it was even worse than this.
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