Israel left Egypt, stop the waves in stone,
Or hues of Hell be by his pencil pour'd
Over the damn'd before the Judgment-throne,*
Such as I saw them, such as all shall see,
Or fanes be built of grandeur yet unknown,
The stream of his great thoughts shall spring
from me,+

The Ghibelline, who traversed the three realms
Which form the empire of eternity.
Amidst the clash of swords, and clang of helms,
The age which I anticipate, no less
Shall be the Age of Beauty, and while whelms,
Calamity the nations with distress,

The genius of my country shall arise,
A Cedar towering o'er the Wilderness,
Lovely in all its branches to all eyes,

Fragrant as fair, and recognized afar,
Wafting its native incense through the skies.
Sovereigns shall pause amidst their sport of war,
Wean'd for an hour from blood, to turn and
gaze

On canvas or on stone; and they who mar
All beauty upon earth, compell'd to praise,
Shall feel the power of that which they destroy;
And Art's mistaken gratitude shall raise
To tyrants who but take her for a toy,

Emblems and monuments, and prostitute
Her charms to pontiffs proud, who but em-
The man of genius as the meanest brute [ploy
To bear a burthen, and to serve a need,
To sell his labours, and his soul to boot.
Who toils for nations may be poor indeed,

But free; who sweats for monarchs is no more
Than the gilt chamberlain, who, clothed and
fee'd,

Stands sleek and slavish, bowing at his door.

Oh, Power that rulest and inspirest! how
Is it that they on earth, whose earthly power
Is likest thine in heaven in outward show,
Least like to thee in attributes divine,
Tread on the universal necks that bow,
And then assure us that their rights are thine?
And how is it that they, the sons of fame,
Whose inspiration seems to them to shine
From high, they whom the nations oftest name,
Must pass their days in penury or pain,
Or step to grandeur through the paths of
shame,

And wear a deeper brand and gaudier chain?
Or if their destiny be born aloof

E voi sue turbe un rio vitello alzaste?
Alzata aveste imago a questa eguale!
Ch' era men fallo l'adorar costui.

The Last Judgment, in the Sistine Chapel.

I have read somewhere (if I do not err, for I cannot recol.

lect where), that Dante was so great a favourite of Michael Angelo's, that he had designed the whole of the Divina Commedia: but that the volume containing these studies was lost by sea.

See the treatment of Michael Angelo by Julius II., and his neglect by Leo X.

From lowliness, or tempted thence in vain,
In their own souls sustain a harder proof,
The inner war of passions deep and fierce?
Florence! when thy harsh sentence razed my
roof,

I loved thee, but the vengeance of my verse,
The hate of injuries which every year
Makes greater, and accumulates my curse,
Shall live, outliving all thou holdest dear,
Thy pride, thy wealth, thy freedom, and even
that,

The most infernal of all evils here,
The sway of petty tyrants in a state;

For such sway is not limited to kings,
And demagogues yield to them but in date,
As swept off sooner; in all deadly things,
Which make men hate themselves, and one
another,

In discord, cowardice, cruelty, all that springs,
From Death the Sin-born's incest with his mother,
In rank oppression in its rudest shape,

The faction Chief is but the Sultan's brother,
And the worst despot's far less human ape:
Florence! when this lone spirit, which so long
Yearn'd, as the captive toiling at escape,
To fly back to thee in despite of wrong,
An exile, saddest of all prisoners,
Who has the whole world for a dungeon
strong,

Seas, mountains, and the horizon's verge for
bars,
[earth,
Which shut him from the sole small spot of
Where-whatsoe'er his fate-he still were hers,
His country's, and might die where he had
birth-

Florence! when this lone spirit shall return
To kindred spirits, thou wilt feel my worth,
And seek to honour with an empty urn
The ashes thou shalt ne'er obtain-Alas!
'What have I done to thee, my people?'
Stern

Are all thy dealings, but in this they pass
The limits of man's common malice, for
All that a citizen could be I was;
Raised by thy will, all thine in peace or war,
And for this thou hast warr'd with me-'Tis
I may not overleap the eternal bar [done:
Built up between us, and will die alone,
Beholding with the dark eye of a seer
The evil days to gifted souls foreshown,
Foretelling them to those who will not hear.
As in the old time, till the hour be come
When truth shall strike their eyes through
many a tear,

And make them own the Prophet in his tomb.

E scrisse più volte non solamente a particolari cittadini del reggimento ma ancora al popolo, e intra l' altre una Epis tola assai lunga che comincia: Popule mi, quid feci tibi )" -Vita di Dante scritta da Lionardo Aretino.

THE MORGANTE MAGGIORE

DI MESSER LUIGI PULCI.

1822.

ADVERTISEMENT.

THE Morgante Maggiore, of the first canto of which this translation is offered, divides with the Orlando Innamorato the honour of having formed and suggested the style and story of Ariosto. The great defects of Boiardo were his treating too seriously the narratives of chivalry, and his harsh style. Ariosto, in his continuation, by a judicious mixture of the gaiety of Pulci, has avoided the one; and Berni, in his reformation of Boiardo's poem, has corrected the other. Pulci may be considered as the precursor and model of Berni altogether, as he has partly been to Ariosto, however inferior to both his copyists. He is no less the founder of a new style of poetry very lately sprung up in England. I allude to that of the ingenious Whistlecraft. The serious poems on Roncesvalles in the same language, and more particularly the excellent one of Mr Merivale, are to be traced to the same source. It has never yet been decided entirely whether Pulci's intention was or was not to deride the religion which is one of his favourite topics. It appears to me, that such an intention would have been no less hazardous to the poet than to the priest, particularly in that age and country; and the permission to publish the poem, and its reception among the classics of Italy, prove that it neither was nor is so interpreted. 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; 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 following translation I have used the liberty of the original with the proper names: as Pulci uses Gan, Ganellon, or Ganellone; Carlo, Carlomagno, or Carlemano; Rondel, or Rondello, &c., as it suits his convenience; so has the translator. In other respects the version is faithful to the best of the translator's ability in combining his interpretation of the one language with the not very easy task of reducing it to the same versification in the other. The reader, on comparing it with the 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 partly 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. Italian language is like a capricious beauty, who accords her smiles to all, her favours to few, and sometimes least to those who 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.

The

1.

CANTO THE FIRST.

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 [be:
Of thinking, and without Him nought could

|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 burst and madden'd with disdain and grief. As you perceive, yet without fear or blame

Like him a fury counsels; his revenge

On Gan in that rash act he seem'd to take,
Which Aldabella thought extremely strange;
But soon Orlando found himself awake;
And his spouse took his bridle on this change,
And he dismounted from his horse, and spake
Of everything which pass'd without demur,
And then reposed himself some days with her.

They seem'd to promise an asylum sure: From savage brutes alone, too fierce to tame, 'Twas fit our quiet dwelling to secure ; But now, if here we'd stay, we needs must guard Against domestic beasts with watch and ward. :

An abbey which in a lone desert lay, 'Midst glens obscure, and distant lands, he found, [bound. Which form'd the Christian's and the pagan's

Which nearly crush'd Rondell, came tumbling So that he swoon'd with pain as if he died, But more than dead, he seem'd so stupefied.

over,

'That Passamont has in his hand three darts-Orlando had Cortana bare in hand;
Such slings, clubs, ballast-stones, that yield |
you must:

You know that giants have much stouter hearts
Than us, with reason, in proportion just :
If go you will, guard well against their arts,
For these are very barbarous and robust.'
Orlando answer'd, This I'll see, be sure,
And walk the wild on foot to be secure.'

XXX.

The abbot sign'd the great cross on his front,
Then go you with God's benison and mine:
Orlando, after he had scaled the mount,

As the abbot had directed, kept the line
Right to the usual haunt of Passamont ;

Who, seeing him alone in this design, Survey'd him fore and aft with eyes observant, Then ask'd him, 'If he wish'd to stay as servant?'

XXXI.

And promised him an office of great ease.
But said Orlando, 'Saracen insane!

I come to kill you, if it shall so please

God, not to serve as footboy in your train; You with his monks so oft have broke the peaceVile dog! 'tis past his patience to sustain.' The giant ran to fetch his arms, quite furious, When he received an answer so injurious.

XXXII.

And being return'd to where Orlando stood,
Who had not moved him from the spot, and
swinging

The cord, he hurl'd a stone with strength so rude,
As show'd a sample of his skill in slinging;
It roll'd on Count Orlando's helmet good

And head, and set both head and helmet
ringing,

To split the head in twain was what he schemed :

Cortana clave the skull like a true brand,

And pagan Passamont died unredeem'd, Yet harsh and haughty, as he lay he bann'd,

And most devoutly Macon still blasphemed; But while his crude, rude blasphemies he heard, Orlando thank'd the Father and the Word,—

XXXVI.

Saying, 'What grace to me thou'st this day
given !

And I to thee, O Lord! am ever bound.
I know my life was saved by thee from heaven,
Since by the giant I was fairly down'd.
All things by thee are measured just and even ;
Our power without thine aid would nought
be found.

I pray thee take heed of me, till I can
At least return once more to Carloman.'

XXXVII.

And having said thus much, he went his way
And Alabaster he found out below,
Doing the very best that in him lay

To root from out a bank a rock or two.
Orlando, when he reach'd him, loud 'gan say,
'How think'st thou, glutton, such a stone to
throw?'

When Alabaster heard his deep voice ring,
He suddenly betook him to his sling,

XXXVIII.

And hurl'd a fragment of a size so large,
That if it had in fact fulfill'd its mission,
And Roland not avail'd him of his targe,
There would have been no need of a physician.