THE PROPHECY OF DANTE. 'Tis the sunset of life gives me mystical lore, CAMPBELL. DEDICATION. LADY! if for the cold and cloudy clime I dare to build the imitative rhyme, Thou, in the pride of Beauty and of Youth, Such sounds are utter'd, and such charms display'd, So sweet a language from so fair a mouth— Ah! 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, |