place himself almost simultaneously in the situation of all his characters, of a sympathy with the beings of his own imagination, which will enable him to think with their minds, to feel with their hearts, and speck with their tongues, as if they were real characters,-to become at once a Shylock and a Portia,-a Hamlet and the Queen Mother. So to conceive and to paint character, as to clothe it in the garb of nature, to model it to symmetry, and to inspire it with the animation of life, not merely in description, but in representation, so to invent a fable es to make it at once probable and interesting, to lead us into the society of men and women in the moment of suffering or heroism, and to light the whole with a radiant atmosphere of poetry,-from the frequency of the failure, must be concluded to be one of the most arduous of the enterprises of genius. Hence the miscarriages of men, even of great poetical talents; of whom some have brought upon the stage characters so cold and so correct, so stiff and so formal, so unlike the men and women with whom we mingle in real life, that we have no more sympathy with them than with the inhabitants of the moon. They are mere puppets, through which their authors pour forth their declamations on stale morality, and without the smallest regard to propriety; every thing is spoken in the same tone, and with the same emphasis. With these writers, every breeze is a whirlwind, and every feeling an extacy. They do not suit the language to the sentiment, nor study the processes of Nature, who never errs in fitness, but gives to every stream its own particular key sound, according to the weight of its waters and the rapidity of its descent. These hints, crude and indigested as they are, will be of practical application in my remarks on Greek Tragedy. Eschylus, in a glorious age, had perhaps a fairer claim to originality than any of his contemporaries. He did not improve, but create tragedy. He not only paved the way in which Shakepeare was afterwards to move with a splendour that should eclipse his own and every other name, but he gave to the acting manager the mechanism of scenery that was to represent the beauties of the landscape, not merely to delight the eye of the spectator, but to give a fit place for the action. The claims of this writer to the high reputation which he has obtained among the poets of Greece, is now to be examined; and I shall begin with a short analysis of the play of Prometheus. It is founded on a wellknown fable. In the wars of the gods, Prometheus had joined the party of Jupiter, to whom he gave important aid in the unnatural expulsion of his father, Saturn, from the throne of heaven. Jupiter, however, forgetful of past services and of solemn oaths, was no sooner seated on the throne, than he began to exercise his authority in acts of the most abominable tyranny over gods and men. His amusement was in insulting the subject gods, but men he determined to exterminate, by at once depriving them of food and fire. Prometheus was not like the submissive throng of courtier gods, so far corrupted by the contagion of sevility, as not to feel pity for the distresses of mankind. In defiance of the tyrant, he interposed to save them from the threatened destruction, and not only gave them fire and food, but instructed them in many of the useful and ornamental arts. Jupiter, enraged at this act of disobedience to his despotic mandates, condemned him to be chained to a rock on Mount Caucasus, there to remain till he should expiate his crime, and offer submission; and this sentence was carried into execution with many circunstances of cruelty and insult. This preface was necessary to the right understanding of the play. The main object of schylus in writing this tragedy, was to exhibit to his countrymen, in Jupiter, a ferocious tyrant, stained with every crime; and in Prometheus, a suffering patriot. Among the Athenians, such a subject could not fail to awaken the deepest interest. Never was an altar erected to freedom in any country on earth where her flame burnt purer than in that city; and this drama was an offering worthy of such a shrine. The fable is more than commonly simple, and all the characters mytho logical or allegorical except one. They are, Prometheus-a Chorus of ocean nymphs-Io, the daughter of Inachus Ocean-Vulcan-Force, and Violence; of whom the two latter, under the direction of Vulcan, bind Prometheus to a rock with chains of adamant. In their presence, neither pain, nor the insults of Force, who is a well painted executioner,-nor the sympathy of Vulcan, who is his kinsman,— draws from him a single word; but as soon as they retire, he apostrophizes the rivers, the ocean, the earth, the air, and the sun; and calls upon them to witness the injustice of his punishment. The sound of his lamentations draws to the scene of his sufferings a company of ocean nymphs, who form the Chorus, and consequently never leave the stage. They come as friends, to sooth and to sympathise; and to them he explains, that by his counsels Jupiter had succeeded in his designs on his father's throne, and that in him they may see what reward they have to expect who serve a tyrant. To them he likewise narrates, at full length, the favours he had conferred on man. With Ocean, who was also attracted to the place by his complaints, he holds a dialogue on the same subject, who, after having reasoned with him in vain on the inutility of resistance, and advised submission, quits the stage. Io then enters. She, like Prometheus, was the victim of the cruelty and the crimes of Jupiter, and was wandering over the earth in solitary wretchedness, goaded on by the jealousy of Juno. Prometheus foretells her future wanderings, and gives a short but rapid and poetical description of the countries which she is to The most remarkable feature of difference between the ancient and modern dramas was the Chorus, a company of persons who might naturally be supposed present on the occasion, and interested in the events which were going on. The number of the chorus was at first indefinite. Eschylus, in his Eumonides, brought no fewer than fifty on the stage, but was obliged by the civil authority to reduce them to twelve. Sophocles was afterwards permitted to add three; and after that time fifteen seems to have been the number to which the chorus was restricted. This company was constantly on the stage. One of them, who was called Choragus, or Coryphæus, the leader or president of the chorus, generally spoke for the rest; but their odes were sung by the whole band, accompanied with music and dancing. It was the office of the chorus to deduce from the events represented those moral reflections which the principal actors were too busy, or too impassioned, to make; to direct the leading characters with their counsel; and, during the intervals of the action, to sing their odes, in which they prayed to the gods for success to the virtuous, lamented their misfortunes, and took occasion, from the events, to enforce upon their audience the lessons of religion and morality. VOL. I. traverse. In the last scene, Mercury appears, commissioned by Jupiter to extort from Prometheus a secret at which he had hinted in his conversation with Io,-that it was in the decrees of fate that the tyrant himself should be dethroned, and that he alone knew the means by which the danger might be averted. On the sight of this minion of the despot, he addresses him in the language of sarcasm and defiance, confessing his knowledge of the secrets of fate, and his resolution never to reveal them till his bonds should be loosed.-The rock to which he is fixed is struck with thunder, and he descends to the infernal regions amid the convulsions of nature. Such, divested of all poetical ornament, is an abstract of this singular play. Here there is none of the interest that arises from the hurry of incident, and the unexpected change of fortune. From the conclusion of the first scene to the beginning of the last, the action stands still-the intermediate scenes being merely conversational, and in nowise forwarding the plot. The only thing like business is in the first scene, where Prometheus is chained; and in the last, when he sinks amid the thunder. Nor are the subordinate characters more interesting than the incidents, displaying none of those fine creations in which the charm of dramatic poetry consists, nor of the language well imagined, yet suitable to the situation of the speaker. They do nothing more than utter common places of sympathy and submission to the powers that be; and what is said by one, may, with equal propriety, be put into the mouth of any other. In what then, it may be asked, does the merit of this tragedy consist? In the character of Prometheus alone ;-in the benevolence that refines, and in the sublimity that elevates, the soul of man ;-in the consciousness of rectitude, that reposes on itself, independent of fortune;-in the glorious energy of spirit, that resists oppression, though armed with omnipotence ;-and in the fortitude that rises superior to unmerited sufferings. It was the love of independence, and the hatred of tyranny, and the unquenchable daring of a lofty mind, that rendered it the delight of the It was the bright reflection of their own souls, and the fair image returned to them again with all F Athenians. the joy of self-exaltation. This was the halo that shone from heaven, and shed over the tragedy a lustre by which it was sanctified in the eye of freedom. I have brought heavy charges against this performance as a drama, and it is only justice that I should bring forward some of its beauties in detail: and here enough of matter will be found to soften the rigour of criticism. However wide the tragedies of Eschylus may be of the standard of excellence established in the land that gave Shakespeare birth, yet in all ages and in all countries he must be considered an eminent poet. In the eye that kindles as it rolls over the beauties of nature, and in the imagination that teems with great conceptions, he is inferior to few poets. There is a grandeur and loftiness of soul about him, generated by the elevation of freedom, that is blazing forth on every fit occasion,-a mysterious sublimity that cannot be understood, much less felt, by the slaves of a despot. The following is a feeble attempt to render the meaning of the beautiful passage in which Prometheus describes the degraded state in which he found man, and by what means he had raised him from it; and it will be well if the meaning is given-the inspiration of poetry evaporates at the touch of franslation. Eyes had they, but they saw not; they had ears, But heard not: Like the shadows of a dream, For ages did they flit upon the earth, Rising and vanishing, and left no trace Of wisdom or of forethought. Their abodes Were not of wood nor stone, nor did the sun Warm them; for then they dwelt in light less caves. The time the constellations rose and set, I to the plough bound the submissive ox, The herbs' sweet influences, and the balm That wak'd the bloom upon the faded cheek, And strung the nerveless arm with strength again. I was man's saviour, but have now no power From these degrading bonds myself to save.' The most sublime passage in this sublime poem is that in which Prometheus replies to Mercury, when, in the name of Jupiter, he denounces a terrible vengeance if he refuse to reveal the secrets of fate touching the dethronement of the thunderer. "P. To be a slave, thy words sound wondrous well, The tyrant is but young in power, and deems And in him I shall soon behold a third, To humble me or wrest my secret from me. thee here, Else hadst thou from calamity been free. P. Think'st thou that I would change these galling bonds And to its centre rock it by the earthquake, He shall not shake me from my firm resolve." between this passage and Satan's adThere is so striking a resemblance dress to Infernal Horrors in the first book of Paradise Lost, that there is reason to believe that Milton's far-. famed line, "Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven," might have been suggested by this: "No! I would rather hang upon this rock For aye, than be the slave of Jupiter." It would be easy, were not this article already swelled too much in length, to draw such a parallel betwixt the two characters, as to give strong first idea of that of Satan from Promereason to suspect that Milton took his theus. Yet this is to detract little from the glory of one of the greatest of our poets. An accidental spark is sufficient to kindle the fires of a volcano. Z. NOTICES CONCERNING THE SCOTTISH GYPSIES. "HAST thou not noted on the bye-way side, Their children lolling round them on the grass, Strange are their annals !-list, and mark them well- THAT an Asiatic people should have resided four hundred years in the heart of Europe, subject to its civilized polity and commingled with its varied population, and yet have retained almost unaltered their distinct oriental character, customs, and language,-is à phenomenon so singular as only to be equalled, perhaps, by the unaccountable indifference with which, till very lately, this remarkable fact appears to have been regarded. Men of letters, while eagerly investigating the customs of Otaheite or Kamschatka, and losing their tempers in endless disputes about Gothic and Celtic antiquities, have witnessed with apathy and contempt the striking spectacle of a Gypsey camp, -pitched, perhaps, amidst the mouldering entrenchments of their favourite Picts and Romans. The rest of the community, familiar from infancy with the general character and appearance of these vagrant hordes, have probably never regarded them with any deeper interest than what springs from the recollected terrors of a nursery tale, or the finer associations of poetical and picturesque description. It may, in deed, be reckoned as one of the many remarkable circumstances in the history of this singular race, that the best and almost the only accounts of them that have hitherto appeared in this country, are to be found in works of fiction. Disregarded by philosophers and literati,-the strange, picturesque, and sometimes terrific features of the gypsey character, have afforded to our poets and novelists a favourite subject for delineation; and they have executed the task so well, that we have little more to ask of the historian, than merely to extend the canvass, and to affix the stamp of authenticity to the striking representations which they HOGG, have furnished. In presenting to the public the following desultory notices, we are very far from any thoughts of aspiring to this grave office-nor indeed is it our province. Our duty is rather to collect and store up (if we may so express it,) the raw materials of literature-to gather into our repository scattered facts, hints, and observations, which more elaborate and learned authors may afterwards work up into the dignified tissue of history or science. With this idea, and with the hope of affording to general readers something both of information and amusement on a subject so curious and so indistinctly known, we have collected some particulars respecting the Gypsies in Scotland, both from public records and popular tradition; and, in order to render the picture more complete, we shall introduce these by a rapid view of their carlier historyreserving to a future occasion our observations on their present state, and on the mysterious subject of their national language and origin. That this wandering people attracted considerable attention on their first arrival in Christendom in the beginning of the fifteenth century, is sufficiently evident, both from the notices of contemporary authors, and from the various edicts respecting them still existing in the archives of every state in Europe. Their first appearance and pretensions were indeed somewhat imposing. They entered Hungary and Bohemia from the east, travelling in nume rous hordes, under leaders who assumed the titles of Kings, Dukeš, Counts, or Lords of Lesser Egypt, and they gave themselves out for Christian Pilgrims, who had been expelled from that country by the Saracens for their adherence to the true religion. However doubtful may now appear their claims to this sacred character, they had the address to pass themselves on some of the principal sovereigns of Europe, and, as German historians relate, even on the Pope himself, for real pilgrims; and obtained, under the seals of these potentates, various privileges and passports, empowering them to travel through all christian countries under their patronage, for the space of seven years. Having once gained this footing, however, the Egyptian pilgrims were at no great loss in finding pretences for prolonging their stay; and though it was soon discovered that their manners and conduct corresponded but little to the sanctity of their first pretensions, yet so strong was the delusion respecting them, and so dexterous were they in the arts of imposition, that they seem to have been either legally protected or silently endured by most of the European governments for the greater part of a century. When their true character became at length fully understood, and they were found to be in reality a race of profligate and thievish impostors, who from their numbers and audacity had now become a grievous and intolerable nuisance to the various countries that they had inundated,-severe measures were adopted by different states to expel them from their territories. Decrees of expulsion were is sued against them by Spain in 1492, by the German empire in 1500, and by France in 1561 and 1612. Whether it was owing, however, to the inefficient systems of police at that time in use, or, that the common people among whom they were mingled favoured their evasion of the pub lic edicts, it is certain, that notwithstanding many long and bloody persecutions, no country that had once admitted "theseunknown and uninvited guests," has ever again been able to get rid of them. When rigorously prosecuted by any government on account of their crimes and depredations, they generally withdrew for a time to the remote parts of the country, or crossed the frontiers to a neighbouring jurisdiction-only to return to their accustomed haunts and habits as soon as the storm passed over. Though their numbers may perhaps have since Grellmann been somewhat diminisned in particular states by the progress of civilization, it seems to be generally allowed that their distinctive character and modes of life have nowhere undergone any material alteration. In Germany, Hungary, Poland,-in Italy, Spain, France, and England, this singular people, by whatever appellation they may be distinguished,-Cingari, Zigeuners, Tziganys, Bohemiens, Gitanos, or Gypsies,—still remain uncombined with the various nations among whom they are dispersed, and still continue the same dark, deceitful, and disorderly race as when their wandering hordes first emigrated from Egypt or from India. They are still every where characterized by the same strolling and pilfering propensities, the same peculiarity of aspect, and the same pretensions to fortune-telling and warlockry* The estimate of their present numbers, by the best informed continental writers on the subject, is almost incredible." Independently," says Grellmann," of the multitudes of gypsies in Egypt and some parts of Asia, could we obtain an exact estimate of them in the countries of Europe, the immense number would probably greatly exceed what we have any idea of. At a moderate calculation, and without being extravagant, they might be reckoned at between seven and eight hundred thousand." The gypsies do not appear to have found their way to this Island till about 100 years after they were first known in Europe. Henry VIII. and his immediate successors, by several severe enactments, and by re-exporting numbers of them at the public expense, endeavoured to expel from their dominions "this outlandish peo ple calling themselves Egupeians,"but apparently with little better success than their brother sovereigns in other countries; for in the reign of Elizabeth the number of them in England is stated to have exceeded 10,000, and they afterwards became still more numerous. If they made any pretension to the character of pilgrims, on their arrival among our southern neighbours, it is evident at least that neither Henry nor * Grellmann.-See also Hume on Crim. Law of Scotland, vol. ii. p. 344--Mackem zie's Obs. on Stat. p. 333. |