The following additional account of the Franceschini murder case was
discovered a few years ago in the Royal Casanatense Library, Rome
(Misc. MS. 2037), in a volume entitled _Varii successi curiosi e degni
di esser considerate_, containing thirteen pamphlets by various
authors, most of them concerning famous criminal trials, from Rome of
the seventeenth century. The volume is in a hand of the early
eighteenth century, and contains an endorsement to the effect that a
copy was made from it in 1746. The Franceschini murder is the subject
of the tenth narrative of the volume. Internal evidences indicate that
it was written somewhat later than the secondary source pamphlet, by
one who has considerable knowledge of the crime and whose attitude of
mind shows him to have been a priest. It presents a better story and a
fuller account of the motives of the actors, especially those of Abate
Paolo and Violante, together with a number of additional matters of
fact not contained in _The Book_. It never fell in Browning's way, and
hence has no immediate source-relation to the poem, but it does prove
in some cases the accuracy of Browning's conjectures of unknown facts
when definite data failed him.
The pamphlet was printed in translation by W. Hall Griffin in the
_Monthly Review_, November 1900. The present version has been made by
the editor from a transcript of the original Italian executed by a
friend in Rome.--C.W.H.