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THE

LITERARY EXAMINER.

No. IV.-SATURDAY, JULY 26, 1823.

REVIEW OF BOOKS.

The Liberal, No. IV.

THE fourth number of The Liberal is about to appear, and being very pleasantly miscellaneous, we cannot possibly do any thing which falls in more with the plan and spirit of this publication, than to accompany a slight account of it with a few brief specimens of its contents.

The present number opens with a translation of the first canto of the "Morgante Maggiore" of Pulci, by Lord Byron. In a brief advertisement his Lordship observes, that this work divides with the "Orlando Innamorato," the honour of having formed the style and story of Ariosto; that great poet having attempered the too great gravity and chivalric stateliness of Boiardo, by an attractive admixture of the lightness and gaiety of Pulci. The latter has also the honour of having suggested the recent eccentric English poem of Whistlecraft, which in regard both to incident and expression has evidently been modelled on the "Morgante Maggiore." Adverting to the extraordinary blending of licence with devotion which has uniformly prevailed in Italy, Lord Byron remarks that it has always been a question whether Pulci intended his work for a satire upon religion or not and is of opinion that its reception among the classics of Italy proves to the contrary. "That he intended to ridicule the monastic life, and suffered his imagination to play with the simple dulness of his converted giant, seems evident enough," continues his Lordship, "but surely it were as unjust to accuse him of irreligion on this account, as to denounce Fielding for his Parson Adams, Barnabas, Thwackum, Supple, and the Ordinary in Jonathan Wild; or Scott, for the exquisite use of his Covenanters in the Tales of my Landlord."

In the execution of this, the first translation of this singular production, Lord Byron has retained the stanza and versification of the original, the text of which is given along with it. This he hints was no very easy task, but let him once more speak for himself:

The reader, on comparing it with the annexed original, is requested to remember that the antiquated language of Pulci, however pure, is not easy to the generality of Italians themselves, from its great mixture of Tuscan proverbs; and he may therefore be more indulgent to the present attempt. How far the translator has succeeded, and whether or no he shall continue the work, are questions which the public will decide. He was induced to make the experiment party by his love for, and partial intercourse with, the Italian language, of which it is so easy to acquire a slight knowledge, and with which it is so nearly impossible for a foreigner to become accurately conversant. The Italian language is like a capricious beauty, who accords her smiles to all, her favours to few, and sometimes least to those who 4

VOL I.

have courted her longest. The translator wished also to present in an English dress a part at least of a poem never yet rendered into a northern language; at the same time that it has been the original of some of the most celebrated productions on this side of the Alps, as well as of those recent experiments in poetry in England, which have been already mentioned.

Pulci commences his poem in the following very characteristic

manner:

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In the beginning was the Word next God;

God was the Word, the Word no less was he:
This was in the beginning, to my mode

Of thinking, and without him nought could be:
Therefore, just Lord! from out thy high abode,
Benign and pious, bid an Angel flee,

One only, to be my companion, who

Shall help my famous, worthy, old song through.
And thou, oh Virgin! daughter, mother, bride,
Of the same Lord, who gave to you each key
Of heaven, and hell, and every thing beside,
The day thy Gabriel said, "All hail !" to thee,
Since to thy servants pity's ne'er denied,

With flowing rhymes, a pleasant style and free,
Be to my verses then benignly kind,

And to the end illuminate my mind.

After some further prefatory matter, we are suddenly introduced to the court of Charlemagne on Christmas-day, at which period of festivity, the treacherous Ganellone contrives to work the disgrace of the Paladin Orlando, who retires from court in disgust, and wanders like a true Knight-errant, until he lights on an abbey situated midst glens obscure," in a distant land which " formed the Christian and the Pagans' bound." This holy receptacle, the pious abbot informs him, is much annoyed by three paynim brothers of giant brood, Passamont, Alabaster, and Morgante, who had taken up their abode in the neighbourhood, and who annoy the godly fraternity with the most unheard-of pranks. We supply a specimen of the humour: it is the worthy father abbot who speaks:

"Our ancient fathers living the desart in,

"For just and holy works were duly fed;

"Think not they lived on locusts sole, 'tis certain

"That manna was rain'd down from heaven instead ;

"But here 'tis fit we keep on the alert in

"Our bounds, or taste the stones shower'd down for bread,

"From off yon mountain, daily raining faster,

"And flung by Passamont and Alabaster.

"The third, Morgante, 's savagest by far; he

"Plucks up pines, beeches, poplar-trees, and oaks,

"And flings them, our community to bury,

"And all that I can do but more provokes."

While thus they parley in the cemetery,

A stone from one of their gigantic strokes,

Which nearly crushed Rondell,* came tumbling over,
So that he took a long leap under cover.

"For God's sake, cavalier, come in with speed,
"The manna's falling now," the abbot cried:
"This fellow does not wish my horse should feed,
"Dear abbot," Roland unto him replied;

"Of restiveness he'd cure him had he need;

"That stone seems with good will and aim applied."

The holy father said, "I don't deceive;

66

They'll one day fling the mountain, I believe."

* Orlando's horse.

The heroic Orlando immediately volunteers his services against the lubberly brethren, two of whom he slays very speedily, but strange to say, the third, Morgante, prevents a battle by declaring himself with more simplicity than eloquence, a convert to Christianity; and after having been favoured by the Paladin upon the proper bounds of Christian sympathy, the docile giant assures Orlando that the fact of his two slain brothers being in hell, which as in duty bound he now piously believes, does not abate his satisfaction in the least. Nay, in the genuine renegado spirit, our convert acts as like Mr. Southey as possible, for he gratuitously offers to cut off the hands of his dead brothers and associates, and to bear them as trophies to the monks, in proof of his pious sincerity:

"A word unto the wise," Morgante said,

"Is wont to be enough, and you shall see
"How much I grieve about my brethren dead;
"And if the will of God seem good to me,
"Just, as you tell me, 'tis in heav'n obey'd-
"Ashes to ashes, merry let us be!

"I will cut off the hands from both their trunks,
"And carry them unto the holy monks."

This religious duty is performed, without a pun,off hand; and after such an undeniable evidence of a Christian spirit, the giant is received very graciously by the holy brotherhood, and immediately (the Laureate again) employed in the dirty work of the convent. Morgante, in truth (and here the comparison fails) is a very stupid soul of the Jack-theGiant-Killer's breed, with scarcely wit to keep out of a well, or to save his nose from a post; but good-humoured in his way, and as frolicksome as a rhinoceros. We quote the following passage for the amusement and information of The Fancy who will doubtless be pleased at the explanation in the note. Morgante, be it understood, volunteers an expedition, with an enormous tub on his shoulder, to fetch water for the abbey from a neighbouring fountain; and in his progress encounters a monstrous herd of swine :

Morgante at a venture shot an arrow,

Which pierced a pig precisely in the ear,
And passed unto the other side quite thorough,"
So that the boar, defunct, lay tripped up near.
Another, to revenge his fellow farrow,

Against the giant rush'd in fierce career,
And reach'd the passage with so swift a foot,
Morgante was not now in time to shoot.
Perceiving that the pig was on him close,

He gave him such a punch upon the head*
As floor'd him, so that he no more arose-
Smashing the very bone; and he fell dead
Next to the other. Having seen such blows,
The other pigs along the valley fled:
Morgante on his neck the bucket took,

Full from the spring, which neither swerved nor shook.

This swinish victory made the convent for some time resemble the vast empire of China, after the discovery of "roast pig," as related by

* "Gli dette in sulla testa un gran punzone.' It is strange that Pulci should have literally anticipated the technical terms of my old friend and master Jackson, and the art which he has carried to its highest pitch. A punch on the head,' or a punch in the head,' un punzone in sulla testa,'-is the exact and frequent phrase of our best pugilists, who little dream that they are talking the purest Tuscan."

the ingenious Elia. Sufficient, however, in the way of sample; we shall therefore.conclude with observing, that the present canto terminates with preparations on the part of Orlando and the giant, to quit the monastery together in pursuit of the Knight-errant vocation; and whether the English reader will know any more of them, we have already shown that it will be for the public to decide. We have little doubt of the nature of the decision.

The succeeding article to Morgante Maggiore is No. IV of "Letters from Abroad." It relates principally to Genoa, in respect to which, it conveys a variety of information that can be acquired by organs of a refined and peculiar construction alone. Descriptive epistles of this class, close up the rear of matter-of-fact travellers with the happiest effect-a liqueur after dinner. Our meaning however will be best illustrated by extract, and the following will go near to convey it :

All the insect tribes, good and bad, acquire vigour and size as they get southwards. I have seen however but one scorpion yet, and the rascal was young: we were looking upon him with much interest, and speculating upon his turn of mind, when a female servant quietly took out her scissars and cut him in two. Her bile, with eating oil and minestra, was as much exalted as his. Is it true that all poison is nothing but an essential acid, exalted in proportion to its venom? The discovery of the Prussic Acid, which kills instantly, looks like it. Our antipathies are set up every now and then, by the sight of some new and hideous-looking insect; but we have not seen a twentieth part of what we expected. The flies bite so, that the zanzaliere (the bed-net against the gnats) seems quite as necessary against them as the enemy from whom it is named. The gnats have hardly come, yet we have been obliged to take to it. We have not yet seen the mantis, which I am told will turn its head round at music, and seem to listen. Of the silk-worms, notice has just been given us in the neighbourhood by a general stripping of the leaves off the mulberry trees. The beauty of the bees and butterflies you may imagine. But there is one insect, of so fairy-like a nature and lustre, that it would be almost worth coming in the south to look at, if there were no other attraction. I have already alluded to it, -the fire-fly. Imagine thousands of flashing diamonds every night powdering the ground, the trees, and the air; especially in the darkest places, and the corn-fields. They give at once a delicacy and brilliance to Italian darkness, inconceivable. It is the glow-worm, winged, and flying in crowds. In England, you know, the female alone gives light: at least, that of the male, who is the exclusive possessor of the wings, is hardly perceptible. Worm is a wrong word, the creature being a real insect. The Italian name is Lucciola, Little-light,-in Genoa, Cae-belle (Chiare belle)-Clear and fine. Its aspect, when held in the hand, is that of a darkcoloured beetle, but without the hardness or sluggish look. The light is contained in the under part of the extremity of the abdomen, exhibiting a dull golden-coloured partition by day, and flashing occasionally by day-light, especially when the hand is shaken. At night, the flashing is that of the purest and most lucid fire, spangling the vineyards and olive-trees, and their dark avenues, with innumerable stars. Its use is not known: in England, and I believe here, the supposition is, that it is a signal of love. It affords no perceptible heat, but is supposed to be phosphoric. In a dark room, a single one is sufficient to flash a light against the wall. I have read of a lady in the West Indies, who could see to read by the help of three under a glass as long as they chose to accommodate her. A few of them are generally in our rooms all night, going about like little sparkling elves. It is impossible not to think of something spiritual, in seeing the progress of one of them through a dark room. You only know it by the flashing of its lamp, which takes place every three or four inches apart, sometimes oftener, thus marking its track in and out the apartment, or about it. It is like a little fairy taking its rounds. These insects remind us of the lines in Herrick, inviting his mistress to come to him at night-time; and they suit them still better than his English ones:

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Their lights the glow-worms lend thee;

The shooting stars attend thee;

And the elves also,

Whose little eyes glow

Like the sparks of fire, befriend thee;

To me, who pass more of my time even than usual, in the ideal world, these spirituallooking little creatures are more than commonly interesting.

The next article in sequence is a poem entitled The Choice, which will be immediately and appropriately assigned to the author of "Letters from Abroad." The thought originated in a perusal of the tame, but once popular production under the same title, by Pomfret, to whom it proved of very fatal consequence. Owing to a not very well weighed expression, that he would have a housekeeper, but not a wife, he was misrepresented to the Bishop of London, by some of the slanderous religious Botherbys of the day, and coming up to London to clear himself, he caught the small pox, and died at the age of thirty-six : -another example of the endless bitter consequences of rancour and bigotry. This, by the way, and because it avowedly led to the article under consideration, otherwise, we believe there never was a man of a respectable portion of imaginative power yet, who did not speculate in the formation of a beau ideal-" some bright isle of rest," as T. Moore observes, which is to include all the humanities and felicities of life, with the least possible alloy of worldly anxiety. "Wishing," says Dr. Young, "is the constant hectic of a fool." We do not agree with him, unless it seduces from virtuous and necessary action, for in most other respects it affords a secret solace to the mind, and produces much of the complacency of reality. Often, indeed, more than reality will produce, for without altogether embracing the stately but uncomfortable moral of Dr. Johnson in his Rasselas, we apprehend there is no human elysium that is not haunted with the ghost of some "cruel something unpossess'd." But let us not be Johnsonian, for certainly our author is not; but dropping all " cogiabundity," hasten to supply a specimen of the poetry, in a description of the imaginary residence of the poet :

First, on a green I'd have a low, broad house,
Just seen by travellers through the garden boughs;
And that my luck might not seem ill-bestowed,
A bench and spring should greet them on the road.
My grounds should not be large; I like to go
To Nature for a range, and prospect too,
And cannot fancy she'll comprise for me,
Even in a park, her all-sufficiency.

Besides, my thoughts fly far; and when at rest,
Love, not a watch-tower, but a lulling nest.
But all the ground I had should keep a look
Of Nature still, have birds'-nests and a brook;
One spot for flowers, the rest all turf and trees;
For I'd not grow my own bad lettuces.
And above all, no house should be so near,
That strangers should discern me here and there;
Much less when some fair friend was at my side,
And swear I thought her charming, which I did.
I am not sure I'd have a rookery;

But sure I am I'd not live near the sea,

To view its great flat face, and have my sleeps
Filled full of shrieking dreams and foundering ships;
Or hear the drunkard, when his slaughter's o'er,

Like Sinbad's monster scratching on the shore.
I'd live far inland, in a world of glades,

Yet not so desart as to fright the maids:

A batch of cottages should smoke beside;

And there should be a town within a morning's ride.
My house of brick should not be great or mean,

Much less built formally, outside or in.

I hate the trouble of a mighty house,

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