Of the great Poet-Sire of Italy

I dare to build the imitative rhyme,
Harsh Runic copy of the South's sublime,
THOU art the cause; and howsoever I
Fall short of his immortal harmony,
Thy gentle heart will pardon me the crime.
Thou, in the pride of Beauty and of Youth,
Spakest; and for thee to speak and be
obey'd

Are one; but only in the sunny South

Such sounds are utter'd, and such charms display'd,

So sweet a language from so fair a mouthAh! to what effort would it not persuade ?

RAVENNA, June 21, 1819.

PREFACE

In the course of a visit to the city of Ravenna in the summer of 1819, it was suggested to the author that having composed something on the subject of Tasso's confinement, he should do the same on Dante's exile, the tomb of the poet forming one of the principal objects

of interest in that city, both to the native and to the stranger.

On this hint I spake,' and the result has been the following four cantos, in terza rima, now offered to the reader. If they are understood and approved, it is my purpose to continue the poem in various other cantos to its natural conclusion in the present age. The reader is requested to suppose that Dante addresses him in the interval between the conclusion of the Divina Commedia and his death, and shortly before the latter event, foretelling the fortunes of Italy in general in the ensuing centuries. In adopting this plan I have had in my mind the Cassandra of Lycophron, and the Prophecy of Nereus by Horace, as well as the Prophecies of Holy Writ. The measure adopted is the terza rima of Dante, which I am not aware to have seen hitherto tried in our language, except it may be by Mr. Hayley, of whose translation I never saw but one extract, quoted in the notes to Caliph Vathek; so that

if I do not err this poem may be considered as a metrical experiment. The cantos are short, and about the same length of those of the poet, whose name I have borrowed, and most probably taken in vain.

Amongst the inconveniences of authors in the present day, it is difficult for any who have a name, good or bad, to escape translation. I have had the fortune to see the fourth canto of Childe Harold translated into Italian versi sciolti, - that is, a poem written in the Spenserean stanza into blank verse, without regard to the natural divisions of the stanza or of the sense. If the present poem, being on a national topic, should chance to undergo the same fate, I would request the Italian reader to remember that when I have failed in the imitation of his great Padre Alighier,' I have failed in imitating that which all study and few understand, since to this very day it is not yet settled what was the meaning of the allegory in the first canto of the Inferno, unless Count Marchetti's ingenious and probable conjecture may be considered as having decided the question.

He may also pardon my failure the more, as I am not quite sure that he would be pleased with my success, since the Italians, with a pardonable nationality, are particularly jealous of all that is left them as a nation — their literature; and in the present bitterness of the classic and romantic war, are but ill-disposed to permit a foreigner even to approve or imitate them, without finding some fault with his ultramontane presumption. I can easily enter into all this, knowing what would be thought in England of an Italian imitator of Milton, or if a translation of Monti, or Pindemonte, or Arici, should be held up to the rising generation as a model for their future poetical essays.

Of half a century bloody and black, And the frail few years I may yet expect Hoary and hopeless, but less hard to bear,

For I have been too long and deeply wreck'd

On the lone rock of desolate Despair

To lift my eyes more to the passing sail Which shuns that reef so horrible and bare;

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A bitter lesson; but it leaves me free: I have not vilely found, nor basely sought,

I am not of this people nor this age, And yet my harpings will unfold a tale Which shall preserve these times when not

With our old Roman sway in the wide West;

But I will make another tongue arise As lofty and more sweet, in which express'd

The hero's ardour, or the lover's sighs, Shall find alike such sounds for every theme

Is rent, supine Lie like the ocean waves ere winds arise, Heaving in dark and sullen undulation, Float from eternity into these eyes; The storms yet sleep, the clouds still keep their station,

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The unborn earthquake yet is in the womb,

The bloody chaos yet expects creation, But all things are disposing for thy doom; The elements await but for the word, 'Let there be darkness!' and thou grow'st a tomb!

Yes! thou, so beautiful, shalt feel the sword;

Thou, Italy! so fair that Paradise,

Revived in thee, blooms forth to man restored:

Ah! must the sons of Adam lose it twice? Thou, Italy! whose ever golden fields, 50 Plough'd by the sunbeams solely, would suffice

For the world's granary; thou, whose sky heaven gilds

With brighter stars, and robes with deeper blue;

Thou, in whose pleasant places Summer builds

Her palace, in whose cradle Empire grew, And form'd the Eternal City's ornaments

From spoils of kings whom freemen overthrew;

Birthplace of heroes, sanctuary of saints, Where earthly first, then heavenly glory made

Her home; thou, all which fondest fancy

Of the departed, and then go their way; But those, the human savages, explore

All paths of torture, and insatiate yet, With Ugolino-hunger prowl for more. 90 Nine moons shall rise o'er scenes like this and set;

The chiefless army of the dead, which late

Beneath the traitor Prince's banner met, Hath left its leader's ashes at the gate; Had but the royal Rebel lived, perchance Thou hadst been spared, but his involved thy fate.

Oh! Rome, the spoiler or the spoil of France,

From Brennus to the Bourbon, never,

never