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fought the bull, the matadore steps forward and bows to him for permission to kill the animal. If the bull has done his duty by killing two or three horses, or a man, which last is rare, the people interfere with shouts, the ladies wave their handkerchiefs, and the animal is saved. The wounds and death of the horses are accompanied with the loudest acclamatious, and many gestures of delight, especially from the female portion of the audience, including those of the gentlest blood. Every thing depends on habit. The author of Childe Harold, the writer of this note, and one or two other Englishmen, who have certainly in other days borne the sight of a

from the professional gladiators. Aurelian and Claudius | presides; and, after the horsemen and piccadores have supplied great numbers of these unfortunate victims, the one after his triumph, and the other on the pretext of a rebellion. No war, says Lipsius,' was ever so destructive to the human race as these sports. In spite of the laws of Constantine and Constans, gladiatorial shows survived the old established religion more than seventy years; but they owed their final extinction to the courage of a Christian. In the year 404, on the kalends of January, they were exhibiting the shows in the Flavian amphitheatre before the usual immense concourse of people. Almachius or Telemachus, an eastern monk, who had travelled to Rome intent on his holy purpose, rushed into the midst of the area, and endea-pitched battle, were, during the summer of 1809, in the voured to separate the combatants. The prætor Alypius, a person incredibly attached to these games,3 gave instant orders to the gladiators to slay him: and Telemachus gained the crown of martyrdom, and the title of saint, which surely has never, either before or since, been awarded for a more noble exploit. Honorius immediately abolished the shows, which were never afterwards revived. The story is told by Theodoret and Cassiodorus, and seems worthy of credit, notwithstanding its place in the Roman martyrology. Besides the torrents of blood which flowed at the funerals, in the amphitheatres, the circus, the forums, and other public places, gladiators were introduced at feasts, and tore each other to pieces amidst the supper tables, to the great delight and applause of the guests. Yet Lipsius permits himself to suppose the loss of courage, and the evident degeneracy of mankind, to be nearly connected with the abolition of these bloody spectacles.7

Note 61. Stanza cxlii.

Here, where the Roman million's blame or praise
Was death or life, the playthings of a crowd.

governor's box at the great amphitheatre of Santa Maria, opposite to Cadiz. The death of one or two horses completely satisfied their curiosity. A gentleman present, observing them shudder and look pale, noticed that unusual reception of so delightful a sport to some young ladies, who stared and smiled, and continued their applauses as another horse fell bleeding to the ground. One bull killed three horses off his own horns. He was saved by acclamations, which were redoubled when it was known he belonged to a priest.

An Englishman, who cau be much pleased with seeing two men beat themselves to pieces, cannot bear to look at a horse galloping round an arena with his bowels trailing on the ground, and turus from the spectacle and the spectators with horror and disgust.

Note 62. Stanza exliv.

Like laurels on the bald first Cæsar's head.

Suetonius informs us that Julius Cæsar was particularly gratified by that decree of the senate, which enabled him to wear a wreath of laurel on all occasions. He was anxious, not to show that he was the conqueror of the world, but to hide that he was bald. A stranger at Rome would hardly have guessed at the motive, nor should we without the help of the historian.

Note 63. Stanza cxlv.

While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand, etc.
This is quoted in the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire: and a notice on the Coliseum may be seen in
the Historical Illustrations to the IVth Canto of Childe
Harold.

When one gladiator wounded another, he shouted he has it, hoc habet,» or « habet.» The wounded combatant dropped his weapon, and, advancing to the edge of the arena, supplicated the spectators. If he had fought well, the people saved him; if otherwise, or as they happened to be inclined, they turned down their thumbs, and he was slain. They were occasionally so savage, that they were impatient if a combat lasted longer than ordinary without wounds or death. The emperor's presence generally saved the vanquished: and it is recorded as an instance of Caracalla's ferocity, that he sent those who supplicated him for life, in a spectacle at Nicomedia, to ask the people; in other words, handed them over to be slain. A similar ceremony is observed at the Spanish bull-fights. The magistrate though exposed to repeated fires, though sometimes

Vopiscus, in vit. Aurel.; and, in vit. Claud. ibid.

2. Credo, imo scio, nullum bellum tantam cladem vastitiemque generi humano intulisse, quam hos ad voluptatem ludos.» Just. Lips. ibid. lib. i, cap. xii.

1 Augustinus, (lib. vi, confess. cap. viii,) Alypium suum gladiatorii spectaculi inhiatu incredibiliter abreptum, scribit. Ibid. lib. i, cap. xii.

4 Hist. Eccles. cap. xxvi, lib. v.

Cassiod. Tripartita, I. x, c. xi. Saturn. ib. ib.

• Baronius ad ann. et in notis ad Martyrol. Rom. 1. Jan. See Marangoni delle memorie sacre e profane dell' Amfiteatro Flavio, p. 25. edit. 1746.

7. Quod? non tu Lipsi momentum aliquod habuisse censes ad virtatem? Magnum. Tempora nostra, nosque ipsos videamus. Oppidum ecce unum alterumve captum, direptum est; tumultus circa nos, non in nobis: et tamen concidimus et turbamur. Ubi robur, ubi tot per annos meditata sapientiæ studia? ubi ille animus qui possit dicere, si fractus illabatur orbis?" etc. ibid., lib. ii, cap. xxv. The protoType of Mr Windham's panegyric on bull-baiting.

Note 64. Stanza cxlvi.
spared and blest by time.

<«<<Though plundered of all its brass, except the ring which was necessary to preserve the aperture above,

flooded by the river, and always open to the rain, no
monument of equal antiquity is so well preserved as
this rotunda. It passed with little alteration from the
Pagan into the present worship; and so convenient were
its niches for the Christian altar, that Michael Angelo,
ever studious of ancient beauty, introduced their desigu
as a model in the Catholic church.>>

Forsyth's Remarks, etc., on Italy, p. 137. sec. edit.
Note 65. Stanza cxlvii.

And they who feel for genius may repose
Their eyes on honour'd forms, whose busts around them close.

The Pantheon has been made a receptacle for the busts of modern great, or, at least, distinguished men. The flood of light which once fell through the large orb above on the whole circle of divinities, now shines on

a numerous assemblage of mortals, some one or two of From the same eminence are seen the Sabine hills, whom have been almost deified by the veneration of their countrymen.

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The Tiber winds, and the broad ocean laves
The Latian coast, etc. etc.

The whole declivity of the Alban hill is of unrivalled beauty, and from the convent on the highest point, which has succeeded to the temple of the Latian Jupiter, the prospect embraces all the objects alluded to in the cited stanza: the Mediterranean; the whole scene of the latter half of the Eneid; and the coast from beyond the mouth of the Tiber to the headland of Circæum and the Cape of Terracina.

The site of Cicero's villa may be supposed either at the Grotta Ferrata, or at the Tusculum of Prince Lucien Buonaparte.

The former was thought some years ago the actual site, as may be seen from Middleton's Life of Cicero. At present it has lost something of its credit, except for the Domenichinos. Nine monks, of the Greek order, live there, and the adjoining villa is a cardinal's summerhouse. The other villa, called Ruffinella, is on the summit of the hill above Frascati, and many rich remains of Tusculum have been found there, besides seventytwo statues of different merit and preservation, and seven busts.

embosomed in which lies the long valley of Rustica. There are several circumstances which tend to establish the identity of this valley with the « Ustica » of Horace: and it seems possible that the mosaic pavement which the peasants uncover by throwing up the earth of a vineyard, may belong to his villa. Rustica is pronounced short, not according to our stress upon-« Usticæ cubantis.»>—It is more rational to think that we are wrong, than that the inhabitants of this secluded valley have changed their tone in this word. The addition of the consonant prefixed is nothing: yet it is necessary to be aware that Rustica may be a modern name which the peasants may have caught from the antiquaries.

The villa, or the mosaic, is in a vineyard on a knoll covered with chesnut-trees. A stream runs down the valley, and although it is not true, as said in the guidebooks, that this stream is called Licenza, yet there is a village on a rock at the head of the valley which is so deuominated, and which may have taken its name from the Digentia. Licenza contains 700 inhabitants. On a peak a little way beyond is Civitella, containing 300. On the banks of the Anio, a little before you turn up into Valle Rustica, to the left, about an hour from the villa, is a town called Vico-varo, another favourable coincidence with the Varia of the poet. At the end of the valley, towards the Anio, there is a bare hill, crowned with a little town called Bardela. At the foot of this hill the rivulet of Licenza flows, and is almost absorbed in a wide sandy bed before it reaches the Anio. Nothing can be more fortunate for the lines of the poet, whether in a metaphorical or direct sense :

Me quotiens reficit gelidus Digentia rivus,
Quem Mandela bibit rugosus frigore pagus.»

The stream is clear high up the valley, but before it reaches the hill of Bardela looks green and yellow like a sulphur rivulet.

Rocca Giovane, a ruined village in the hills, half an hour's walk from the vineyard where the pavement is

shown, does seem to be the site of the fane of Vacuna, and an inscription found there tells that this temple of the Sabine victory was repaired by Vespasian.' With these helps, and a position corresponding exactly to every thing which the poet has told us of his retreat, we may feel tolerably secure of our site.

The ill which should be Lucretilis is called Campanile, and by following up the rivulet to the pretended Bandusia, you come to the roots of the higher mountain Gennaro. Singularly enough, the only spot of ploughed land in the whole valley is on the knoll where this Ban

dusia rises,

.. Tu frigus amabile Fessis vomere tauris Præbes, et pecori vago."

The peasants show another spring near the mosaic pavement, which they call «Oradina,» and which flows

trickles over into the Digentia. But we must not hope

down the hills into a tank, or mill-dam, and thence

To trace the Muses upwards to their spring,

by exploring the windings of the romantic valley in search of the Bandusian fountain. It seems strange that

1 IMP. CESAR VESPASIANVS PONTIFEX MAXIMVS. TRIB. POTEST. CENSOR. ELEM VICTORIE. VETVSTATE ILLAPSAM STA. IMPENSA. RESTITUIT.

moment they cease to assist, and more particularly if they obstruct, his actual survey.

any one should have thought Bandusia a fountain of the exhortations of the moralist, may have made this work Digentia-Horace has not let drop a word of it; and this something more and better than a book of travels, but immortal spring has, in fact, been discovered in pos- they have not made it a book of travels; and this obsersession of the holders of many good things in Italy, the vation applies more especially to that enticing method monks. It was attached to the church of St Gervais of instruction conveyed by the perpetual introduction and Protais near Venusia, where it was most likely to of the same Gallic Helot to reel and bluster before the be found. We shall not be so lucky as a late traveller rising generation, and terrify it into decency by the in finding the occasional pine still pendant on the poc- display of all the excesses of the revolution. An anitie villa. There is not a pine in the whole valley, but mosity against atheists and regicides in general, and there are two cypresses, which he evidently took, or mis- Frenchmen specifically, may be honourable, and may took, for the tree in the ode. The truth is, that the pine be useful, as a record; but that antidote should either is now, as it was in the days of Virgil, a garden tree, and be administered in any work rather than a tour, or, at it was not at all likely to be found in the craggy accli- least, should be served up apart, and not so mixed with vities of the valley of Rustica. Horace probably had one the whole mass of information and reflection, as to give of them in the orchard close above his farm, immediately a bitterness to every page: for who would chuse to have overshadowing his villa, not on the rocky heights at the antipathies of any man, however just, for his trasome distance from his abode. The tourist may have velling companions? A tourist, unless he aspires to the easily supposed himself to have seen this pine figured in credit of prophecy, is not answerable for the changes the above cypresses, for the orange and lemon trees which may take place in the country which he describes : which throw such a bloom over his description of the but his reader may very fairly esteem all his political royal gardens at Naples, unless they have been since dis-portraits and deductions as so much waste paper, the placed, were assuredly only acacias and other common garden shrubs.3 The extreme disappointment experienced by chusing the Classical Tourist as a guide in Italy must Neither encomium nor accusation of any governbe allowed to find vent in a few observations, which, it ment, or governors, is meant to be here offered; but it is asserted without fear of contradiction, will be con- is stated as an incontrovertible fact, that the change firmed by every one who has selected the same conduc-operated, either by the address of the late imperial sysfor through the same country. This author is, in fact, one of the most inaccurate, unsatisfactory writers that have in our times attained a temporary reputation, and is very seldom to be trusted even when he speaks of objects which he must be presumed to have seen. His errors, from the simple exaggeration to the downright misstatement, are so frequent as so induce a suspicion that he had either never visited the spots described, or had trusted to the fidelity of former writers. Indeed the Classical Tour has every characteristic of a mere compilation of former notices, strung together upon a very slender thread of personal observation, and swelled out by those decorations which are so easily supplied by a systematic adoption of all the common-places of praise, applied to every thing, and therefore signifying nothing. The style which one person thinks cloggy and cumbrous, and unsuitable, may be to the taste of others, and such may experience some salutary excitement in ploughing through the periods of the Classical Tour. It must be said, however, that polish and weight are apt to beget an expectation of value. It is amongst the pains of the damned to toil up a climax with a huge round stone.

The tourist had the choice of his words, but there was no such latitude allowed to that of his sentiments. The love of virtue and of liberty, which must have distinguished the character, certainly adorns the pages of Mr Eustace, and the gentlemanly spirit, so recommendatory either in an author or his productions, is very conspicuous throughout the Classical Tour. But these generous qualities are the foliage of such a performance. and may be spread about it so prominently and profusely, as to embarrass those who wish to see and find the fruit at hand. The unction of the divine, and the

See Historica! Illustrations of the fourth Canto, p. 43. 1 See Classical Tour, etc., chap, vii, p. 250, vol. ii. 1. Under our windows, and bordering on the beach, is the royal farda, laid out in parterres, and walks shaded by rows of orange Clas ical Tour, etc., chap. xi, vol. ii, oct. 365,

tem, or by the disappointment of every expectation by those who have succeeded to the Italian thrones, has been so considerable, and is so apparent, as not only to put Mr Eustace's Antigallican philippics entirely out of date, but even to throw some uspicion upon the competency and candour of the author himself. A remarkable example may be found in the instance of Bologna, over whose papal attachments, and consequent desolation, the tourist pours forth such strains of condolence and revenge, made louder by the borrowed trumpet of Mr Burke. Now, Bologna is at this moment, and has been for some years, notorious amongst the states of Italy for its attachment to revolutionary principles, and was almost the only city which made any demonstrations in favour of the unfortunate Murat. This change may, however, have been made since Mr Eustace visited this country; but the traveller whom he has thrilled with horror at the projected stripping of the copper from the cupola of St Peter's, must be much relieved to find that sacrilege out of the power of the French, or any other plunderers, the cupola being covered with lead.'

If the conspiring voice of otherwise rival critics had not given considerable currency to the Classical Tour, it would have been unnecessary to warn the reader, that, however it may adorn his library, it will be of little or no service to him in his carriage; and if the judgment of those critics had hitherto been suspended, no attempt would have been made to anticipate their decision. As it is, those who stand in the relation of posterity to Mr Eustace may be permitted to appeal from contemporary praises, and are perhaps more likely to be just

1 What, then, wi!! he the astonishment, or rather the horror of my reader, when I inform him.. the French Committee turned its attention to Saint Peter's, and employed a company of Jews to estimate and purchase the gold, silver, and bronze, that adorn the inside of the editice, as well as the copper that covers the vaults and dome on the outside. Chap. iv, p. 130. vol. ii. The story about the Jews is positively denied at Rom.

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AS A SLIGHT BUT MOST SINCERE TOKEN OF ADMIRATION OF HIS GENIUS, RESPECT FOR HIS CHARACTER, AND GRATITUDE FOR HIS FRIENDSHIP,

This Production is Inscribed,

BY HIS OBLIGED AND AFFECTIONATE SERVANT,

BYRON.

ADVERTISEMENT.

THE Tale which these disjointed fragments present is founded upon circumstances now less common in the East than formerly; either because the ladies are more circumspect than in the «olden time;» or because the Christians have better fortune, or less enterprise. The story, when entire, contained the adventures of a female slave, who was thrown, in the Mussulman manner, into the sea for infidelity, and avenged by a young Venetian, her lover, at the time the Seven Islands were possessed by the Republic of Venice, and soon after the Arnaouts were beaten back from the Morea, which they had ravaged for some time subsequent to the Russian invasion. The desertion of the Mainotes, on being refused the plunder of Misitra, led to the abandonment of that enterprise, and to the desolation of the Morea, during which the cruelty exercised on all sides was unparalleled even in the annals of the faithful.

THE GIAOUR.

No breath of air to break the wave
That rolls below the Athenian's grave,
That tomb which, gleaming o'er the cliff,
First greets the homeward-veering skiff,
High o'er the land he saved in vain :
When shall such hero live again?

Fair clime! where every season smiles
Benignant o'er those blessed isles,
Which, seen from far Colonna's height,
Make glad the heart that hails the sight,
And lend to loneliness delight.
There, mildly dimpling, Ocean's cheek
Reflects the tints of many a peak
Caught by the laughing tides that lave
These Edens of the eastern wave;
And if, at times, a transient breeze
Break the blue crystal of the seas,
Or sweep one blossom from the trees,
How welcome is each gentle air
That wakes and wafts the odours there!
For there-the rose o'er crag or vale,
Sultana of the nightingale,2

The maid for whom his melody,
His thousand songs are heard on high,
Blooms blushing to her lover's tale:

His
queen, the garden queen, his rose,
Unbent by winds, unchill'd by snows,
Far from the winters of the west,
By every breeze and season blest,
Returns the sweets by nature given,
In softest incense back to heaven;
And grateful yields that smiling sky
Her fairest hue and fragrant sigh.
And many a summer flower is there,
And many a shade that love might share,
And many a grotto, meant for rest,
That holds the pirate for a guest;
Whose bark in sheltering cove below
Lurks for the passing peaceful prow,
Till the gay mariner's guitar 3
Is heard, and seen the evening star;

Then stealing with the muffled oar,
Far shaded by the rocky shore,
Rush the night-prowlers on the prey,
And turn to groans his roundelay.
Strange-that where nature loved to trace,
As if for gods, a dwelling-place,

And every charm and grace hath mix'd
Within the paradise she fix'd,
There man, enamour'd of distress,
Should mar it into wilderness,

And trample, brute-like, o'er each flower
That tasks not one laborious hour;
Nor claims the culture of his hand
To bloom along the fairy land,
But springs as to preclude his care,
And sweetly woes him-but to spare!
Strange, that where all is peace beside
There passion riots in her pride,
And lust and rapine wildly reign
To darken o'er the fair domain.
It is as though the fiends prevail'd
Against the seraphs they assail'd,

And, fix'd on heavenly thrones, should dwell
The freed inheritors of hell;

So soft the scene, so form'd for joy,
So curst the tyrants that destroy!

He who hath bent him o'er the dead,

Ere the first day of death is fled,
The first dark day of nothingness,
The last of danger and distress
(Before decay's effacing fingers

Have swept the lines where beauty lingers),
And mark'd the mild angelic air,
The rapture of repose that's there,
The fix'd, yet tender traits that streak
The languor of the placid cheek,
And-but for that sad shrouded eye,

That fires not, wins not, weeps not, now,
And but for that chill, changeless brow,
Where cold obstruction's apathy 4
Appals the gazing mourner's heart,
As if to him it could impart

The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon;
Yes, but for these, and these alone,
Some moments, ay, one treacherous hour,
He still might doubt the tyrant's power;
So fair, so calm, so softly seal'd,
The first, last look by death reveal'd! 5
Such is the aspect of this shore:

Tis Greece, but living Greece no more!
So coldly sweet, so deadly fair,
We start, for soul is wanting there.
Hers is the loveliness in death,

That parts not quite with parting breath;
But beauty with that fearful bloom,
That hue which haunts it to the tomb,
Expression's last receding ray,

A gilded halo hovering round decay,
The farewell beam of feeling past away!

Spark of that flame, perchance of heavenly birth,

Which gleams, but warms no more its cherish'd earth!

Clime of the unforgotten brave! Whose land from plain to mountain-cave

Was freedom's home or glory's grave!
Shrine of the mighty! can it be,
That this is all remains of thee?
Approach, thou craven crouching slave:
Say, is not this Thermopyla?
These waters blue that round

you lave,
Oh servile offspring of the free,—
Pronounce what sea, what shore is this?
The gulf, the rock of Salamis!
These scenes, their story not unknown,
Arise, and make again your own;
Snatch from the ashes of your sires
The embers of their former fires:
And he who in the strife expires
Will add to theirs a name of fear
That tyranny shall quake to hear,
And leave his sons a hope, a fame,
They too will rather die than shame :
For freedom's battle once begun,
Bequeath'd by bleeding sire to son,
Though baffled oft is ever won.
Bear witness, Greece, thy living page,
Attest it many a deathless age!
While kings, in dusty darkness hid,
Have left a nameless pyramid,
Thy heroes, though the general doom
Hath swept the column from their tomb,
A mightier monument command,
The mountains of their native land!
There points thy muse to stranger's eye
The graves of those that cannot die!
'T were long to tell, and sad to trace,
Each step from splendour to disgrace;
Enough-no foreign foe could quell
Thy soul, till from itself it fell;

Yes! Self-abasement paved the way
To villain-bonds and despot-sway.

What can he tell who treads thy shore? No legend of thine olden time,

No theme on which the muse might soar,
High as thine own in days of yore,

When man was worthy of thy clime.
The hearts within thy valleys bred,
The fiery souls that might have led

Thy sons to deeds sublime,
Now crawl from cradle to the grave,
Slaves-nay, the bondsmen of a slave,6
And callous, save to crime;
Stain'd with each evil that pollutes
Mankind, where least above the brutes;
Without even savage virtue blest,
Without one free or valiant breast.
Still to the neighbouring ports they waft
Proverbial wiles, and ancient craft;
In this the subtle Greek is found,
For this, and this alone, renown'd.

In vain might liberty invoke
The spirit to its bondage broke,

Or raise the neck that courts the yoke:
No more her sorrows I bewail,

Yet this will be a mournful tale,

And they who listen may believe,
Who heard it first had cause to grieve.

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