his sable favourite in the daughter of one of his nobles, greatly to the scandal of some members of her family, and to the extreme dissatisfaction of the young lady, she having already provided herself with a lover more to her liking, though not her father's. Another of his pieces is a critique on Chateaubriand's Milton, or rather, observations on Milton and on Chateaubriand, in which he shows himself very well acquainted with both the writings and the character of our great English bard; and in the course of which he takes occasion to animadvert very strongly on Victor Hugo and Alfred de Viguy, for the little respect manifested for Milton in the part they have severally assigned him in "Cromwell" and "Cinq Mars." We may observe, this is not the first time Victor Hugo has been taken to task by a Russian, since his Notre Dame is treated very cavalierly by Baron Brambeus, alias Senkovsky, in his satirical tale intituled Satan's Levee, in which production there are many traits reminding us of Swift's sarcasm and general freedom of speech.

Our regret at finding so few articles of critical disquisition in the Sovremennik is rather increased than lessened by the perusal of the one above referred to, and Prince Viazemsky's literary biography of the dramatist Von Visin. The latter is the more acceptable, because this is a department of literature hitherto almost untouched in Russia; and the biography introduced furnishes an excellent model for an entire series, wherein the characters and writings of all the principal authors should be analytically examined. Prince Volkonsky has contributed an article on the Divina Commedia; but whether Voltaire be correct or not in saying Dante is now never read, we are made to read so much about him and his poem,-upon which every dabbler in Italian has something to say,-that we could very well have spared what is not at all recommended by novelty of any kind. The same may in some measure be said of Byron; nevertheless, as many of our readers may be curious to learn what view is taken of their countrymen's talents and character by a critic so far north, we extract the following picture of him from a tale, which, were we to trust to the initials affixed to it, we might conclude to be by Ivan Bulgarin, though the story itself has too much of German mysticism and mysteriousness in it to allow us to imagine it proceeds from that writer.

Shakspeare," said the baron," comprised in himself a type of all nations and all ages. In him we have the essence of romance and of poetry; of playful song, and of profound philosophy. Since his death, his fame has extended itself immeasureably; accordingly, thousands of commentators have fastened upon his writings, and, after tearing them to pieces with their claws, have employed themselves in attempting to

analyse them chemically, or in examining them microscopically. Yet, up to this moment, they have obtained nothing from all their experiments; their retorts have not been able to extract his essence; and why? because Shakespeare is nature,- because his genius took its root in the human heart, while with its topmost boughs it reached the sky." Yet, what has all this to do with Byron? It does not follow, because Shakspeare was great that Byron was not so likewise. Shakspeare was not fully appreciated by his contemporaries; neither, at first, was the other, for the Edinburgh Review lashed his first performance very severely.'

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"

And very justly. In fact, his Hours of Idleness betray such feebleness and mediocrity, that on reading them, it is difficult for us to be persuaded they were penned by a writer of talent-and after all, Byron certainly was a man of talent-just that and no more."

"How!-a mere man of talent-a talented poet and no more! Is it thus you describe him whose genius has excited the admiration of all Europe! Excuse me, baron, but I really did not take you to possess so much prejudice or so much pride, as in contradiction to the opinion of the whole world"

"As for the opinion of the world, that you know has no weight with me; neither can I be said to show myself the slave of prejudice in venturing to oppose it, consequently, you are not very logical in your expressions when you charge me with being prejudiced in opposing the prejudices of other people. But, to return to Byron, how can you pretend to say that he was undervalued by his contemporaries, when there never was a writer whose literary fame stood so high during his lifetime?"

"Yet, was he not persecuted by his countrymen, because he ventured to unmask their hypocritical pretensions to morality? Even now the traditions have not entirely died away which represented him to be a young man devoid of principle, the champion of immorality in his poems, and a nobleman of insufferably bad ton (!) Thus was he judged and spoken of in London society, which, for whatever poetic feeling it may now possess, has to thank Byron himself. Before he appeared it had produced no distinguished talent; for I do not here include eminent political characters, who constitute a class by themselves. Do you, therefore, I ask, side with those public adversaries who endeavoured to cry down the poet of Childe Harold?"

"All this sounds very fine: yet I do not perceive wherefore the London public, or rather the public of Great Britain, ought to be slandered, because Lord Byron was a young man devoid of religious or moral principle; or, what is still worse, desired to pass for such. Englishmen readily concede him very high poetical merit-great power of versification, mastery of language, brilliance of expression, with occasionally a really profound thought, generally borrowed, however, from Shakspeare, who seems to have held the torch to your favourite poet; yet this does not blind them to the extravagances of his conduct, -extravagances he could very well have afforded to dispense with, and which certainly did not add any real lustre to bis literary character. On the whole, it is less as a poet than as a man that I judge Byron. Per

haps I am deficient in that warmth of feeling that would enable me to do justice to him in the former capacity: but I must say that his Corsairs, whose flag the sceptre all who meet obey,' strike me as being not a little ridiculous and theatrical withal, because your real corsair trembles in good earnest as soon as he catches sight of the flag of an English frigate, and instantly makes all sail he can, in order to escape from the countrymen of the poet who has described him to be a prodigy of valour and daring hardihood. In my opinion, the warfare of pirates partakes very little of the heroic or poetical, since they invariably reserve their attacks for the weakest foe, and have no higher ambition than to pillage traders and merchant ships, carefully avoiding men of war. Doubtless Childe Harold made in its day a very strong sensation, on account of its being quite a novelty-the first Childe Harold the world had seen; yet since then we have had so many of the race, both in real life and poetry, that I hardly know whether we ought to feel grateful towards the prototype, or anathematize it for having infested the world with its monster brood. Notwithstanding that he had a limping foot, Byron had no little of the fop in his composition, and had cleverness and vogue enough to be able to set new fashions in poetry and in shirt-collars, giving a highly poetical turn to the latter. In the year 1812, Childe Harold made its appearance, and forthwith caused a kind of misanthropical scepticism to be considered good ton: every one, accordingly, affected it, and pretended to hold the whole human race in contemptuous scorn. Such, at least, was then the prevailing mood in England. From that instant Byron began to pour out, one after the other, effusions conceived in the same strain, breathing fierce despair and icy misanthropy in every line; and so far I give him credit for knowing how to avail himself of the foible of public taste.

*

Trust me, the time is approaching when Byron will take his place in the category of the past; and when, although his talent will always command respect, it will cease to have any influence whatever upon literature."

This speaker in the dialogue then goes on to criticise Manfred, which he contends is merely a puny imitation of Göthe's Faust; and otherwise animadverts very freely upon the English poet, both as a writer and a man: giving us a quantity of paltry and mistaken criticism like much of the foregoing, suited only to the poorest capacity.

Of the Russian novel-writers we need merely observe that at present they are pursuing an erroneous course, adhering, as if it were a particular merit, to all the conventional and worn-out forms; falling in consequence into the flimsy and vapid, no less in the serious than in the frivolous; and studiously avoiding, as it would seem, all that bears upon the stronger and more permanent interests of society, and comes home to its feelings and understanding. If this species of literature is incapable of higher aim than furnishing a gossiping kind of reading to the idle and indolent; if, like Scheherzade, its office is to lull us into an agreeable drow

siness between sleeping and waking, then indeed it matters little of what its gossip consists, so long as it is not positively pernicious. But such productions, far from advancing the literature of a country must themselves lose all literary caste, and find their level infinitely lower among the mass of trifles that engage the trifling, and on which alone they fix their lethargic attention; mistaking moonshine for reality through utter ignorance, wilful or involuntary, of what constitutes the interests and pursuits not of mere idlers but of the active and actual world.

ART. V.-Doña Isabel de Solis, Reyna de Granada; Novela Historica. (Da. Isabel de Solis, Queen of Granada; an Historical Novel.) By Don Francisco Martinez de la Rosa. Madrid, 1837.

THE author of this novel has often been before the public; some of his works have already been reviewed by the literary periodicals of this metropolis, and his name as a statesman and politician has of late acquired no small celebrity: we may therefore take a passing glance of his life, so far as concerns his writings. Martinez de la Rosa began his literary career by the publication, in 1808, of some witty pamphlets upon the effects which the invasion of the Spanish territory by the troops of Buonaparte was calculated to produce on a nation eminently proud, and holding fast and tenaciously to its ancient institutions. After this first success, he obtained farther reputation by the publication of an essay upon the Spanish Insurrection of 1808, which appeared in a journal of that period called El Español. But at the same time that he cultivated literature, Martinez de la Rosa played a most conspicuous part in the Cortes of 1813, where he was considered as one of the most eloquent Spanish orators. This, as well as the active share which he took in the administration of the Peninsula during the captivity of King Ferdinand VII., brought upon him the ill-will and anger of that monarch, who, upon his return to his paternal dominions in 1814, caused the author to be cast together with Arguelles and several other eminent patriots, into one of the dungeons on the coast of Africa. It has been said that the persecution to which he was on this occasion exposed, and his long imprisonment, impaired his health and preyed upon his spirits it has even been hinted by critics, who, while reviewing his works, were, we fear, under the influence of party, that by his long confinement he has lost a great deal of that liveliness which was discernible in all the writings of his youthful years; and that, even after he had been restored to liberty and to

power, a certain dejection was always perceivable, both in his speeches and compositions. But this assertion is entirely unfounded; for in his numerous subsequent productions he has given ample proofs of a fecundity and liveliness of imagination unequalled by any of the modern Spanish authors. In 1820 he published his Arte Poetica, which by the voluminous notes he added to it may be called a critical work upon Spanish literature, rather than a mere treatise on versification, as its title would seem to imply. During his exile from 1823 to 1828, he published in Paris a collection of his lyrical and other poems, among which the "Siege of Saragossa" and a few light compositions were very much admired. He also wrote, while in Spain, some dramas for the theatre; namely, Lo que puede un Empleo (The Effects of a Place); and La Hija en Casa y la Madre en las Mascaras (The Mother at the Masquerade and the Daughter at Home). Tragedy he likewise attempted though without much success, and wrote La Viuda de Padilla (The Widow of Padilla), to an edition of which he prefixed a very learned introduction upon the wars of the Comunidades, written with great vigour and spirit; Moraima, Edipo, also tragedies; the Conspiracy of Venice, a drama, lately acted in the theatres of Madrid, and which, we believe, has never been printed; and another drama, written in French, and performed with some success at the Porte St. Martin in Paris, bearing the title of Aben-Omeya. Since his return to his country he has published an historical work with the title of Bosquejo Historico (Historical Sketch), containing a narrative of some of the events which preceded the conquest of Granada by Ferdinand and Isabella; and the first volume (only) of a political work, called El Espiritu del Siglo: The Spirit of the Age. In fact, he has left no branch of literature untouched; but, as he himself acquaints us in the preface to the novel now lying before us, seems to have undertaken the arduous task of trying all. The perusal of Scott's admirable novels, and those of his imitators in France, Germany, and Italy, led M. de la Rosa to write the present, the principal scene of which is in the city of Granada, his birth-place, and whose history and traditions he has investigated with peculiar interest and attention. We have stated so much with regard to this writer, and now proceed to the review of his work; although our judgment may be, we fear, in some measure restrained by the circumstance, not uncommon in Spain, of only the first volume having been published; without the author deeming it necessary to inform us whether the remainder is written or will ever be printed.

At the time when the novel begins (1475), the fortress of Martos, which belonged to the Knights of Calatrava, was occupied by