invention and purity of language, Ariosto has eminently the advantage over Tasso; but majesty, pomp, numbers, and a style truly sublime, united to regularity of design, raise the latter so much above the other that no comparison can fairly

exist."

What Chapelain says is perhaps just; though I did not know that Ariosto's language was purer than Tasso's. The opinion of this critic, however, would not be more regarded here than it was by the Academy. Ariosto is the Shakspeare of Italy; Tasso may be said to be the Gray. Shakspeare delights all, though he must occasionally offend a correct taste: Gray can only be relished by the select few, who are admitted to the secret councils of the Muses.

It is the conceit of an Italian to give the name of April to Ariosto, because it is the season of flowers; and that of September to Tasso, which is that of fruits. Tiraboschi judiciously observes that no comparison ought to be made between these great rivals. It is comparing the "Ovid's Metamorphoses" with " Virgil's Æneid;” they are quite different things. His characters of the two poets are composed with infinite taste; and he distinguishes between a romantic poem and a regular epic. They both have perfected their designs, but these are different.

Boileau some time before his death, was asked

by a critic, if he had repented of his celebrated decision concerning the merits of Tasso, whom some Italians had compared with those of Virgil; this had awakened the vengeance of Boileau, who hurled his bolts at the violators of classical majesty. It is supposed that he was ignorant of the Italian language; no positive marks of his knowledge can be traced in his works; I find one or two quotations, but when an author quotes from another language it does not prove his knowledge of that language. By some expressions used by Boileau in the following answer which he made to the critic, one may be led to think he was not ignorant of the Italian.

"I have (he answered) so little changed my opinion, that in a re-perusal lately of Tasso, I was sorry that I had not more amply explained myself on this subject in some of my reflections on "Longinus." I should have begun by acknowledging that Tasso had a sublime genius, of great compass, with happy dispositions for the higher poetry. But when I came to the use he made of his talents, I should have shewn that judicious discernment rarely prevailed in his works. That in the greater part of his narrations, he attached himself to the agreeable oftener than to the just. That his descriptions are almost always overcharged with superfluous ornaments. That in painting the strongest passions, and in the midst

of the agitation they excite, frequently he degenerates into witticisms, which abruptly destroy the pathetic. That he abounds with images of too florid a kind; affected turns; conceits and frivolous thoughts, which, far from being adapted to his Jerusalem, could hardly be supportable in his "Aminta." So that all this, opposed to the gravity, the sobriety, the majesty of Virgil, what is it but tinsel compared with gold?"

It must be acknowledged that this passage, which is to be found in the "Histoire del'Academie, t. ii. p. 276, may serve as an excellent commentary on our poet's well-known censure. The merits of Tasso are exactly discriminated; and this particular criticism must be valuable to the lovers of poetry.

An anonymous gentleman has greatly obliged me with an account of the recitation of these two poets, by the gondoliers of Venice, extracted from his travelling pocket-book.

VENICE.

It is well known that in Venice the gondoliers know by heart long passages from Ariosto and Tasso, and are wont to sing them in their own melody. But this talent seems at present on the decline:-at least, after taking some pains, I could find no more than two persons who delivered to me in this way a passage from Tasso.

There are always two concerned, who alternately sing the strophes. We know the melody eventually by Rousseau, to whose songs it is printed; it has properly no melodious movement, and is a sort of medium between the canto fermo and the canto figurato; it approaches to the former by recitativical declamation, and to the latter by passages and course, by which one syllable is detained and embellished.

I entered a gondola by moonlight; one singer placed himself forwards, and the other aft, and thus proceeded to St. Georgio. One began the song: when he had ended his strophe the other took up the lay, and so continued the song alternately. Throughout the whole of it, the same notes invariably returned, but according to the subject matter of the strophe, they laid a greater or a smaller stress, sometimes on one, and sometimes on another note, and indeed changed the enunciation of the whole strophe, as the object of poem altered.

the

On the whole however their sounds were hoarse and screaming: they seemed in the manner of all rude uncivilized men, to make the excellency of their singing in the force of their voice: one seemed desirous of conquering the other by the strength of his lungs, and so far from receiving delight from this scene, (shut up as I was in the box of the gondola) I found myself in a very unpleasant situation.

My companion, to whom I communicated this circumstance, being very desirous to keep up the credit of his countrymen, assured me that this singing was very delightful when heard at a distance. Accordingly we got out upon the shore leaving one of the singers in the gondola, while the other went to the distance of some hundred paces. They now began to sing against one another, and I kept walking up and down between them both, so as always to leave him who was to begin his part. I frequently stood still and hearkened to the one and to the other.

Here the scene was properly introduced. The strong declamatory, and as it were shrieking sound, met the ear from far, and called forth the attention; the quickly succeeding transitions, which necessarily required to be sung in a lower tone, seemed like plaintive strains succeeding the vociferations of emotion or of pain. The other, who listened attentively, immediately began where the former left off, answering him in milder or more vehement notes, according as the purport of the strophe required. The sleepy canals, the lofty buildings, the splendor of the moon, the deep shadows of the few gondolas that moved like spirits hither and thither, increased the striking peculiarity of the scene, and amidst all these circumstances it was easy to confess the character of this wonderful harmony.