sometimes lighted up with such anima- tion of the charms of loveliness—an tion at the sound of but one kind word, union of fancy and feeling, forming that I have thought to myself, what might in fact, the basis of all true Poetry. not be done with these people, if they Hence, those who through the mewere taken by the hands sincerely as diuni of verse, have most successfully brei hren! That they are capable of the strongest attachment, their firm and steady of Creation, are such as we most de pourtrayed the graces and sublimities adherence to their claus or septs has repeatedly manifested, and nothing can be light to peruse-o feed upou and to warmer even now, than the aliachment feel with ;-who are always season. which I have seen manifested in the de- able and refreshing to our spirits, and pendants of a family to the head, when from whom we derive the purest enihey have been a long time in service. joyment with the least effort. Amid I must believe that the Irish are a kind the necessary duties of life - our and warm-hearted people, extremely dis- anxieties and disappointmenls - our posed to show kindness themselves, and strife and struggle, with untoward no less feelingly alive to receiving it from circumstances — broken boods, and others." A considerable number of engrav severed affections, - ibis description of poetry steals upon the soul, softly ings enbellish this Volume. Allo and balmlily, like the breeze of the gether, the performance is creditable South in an hour of sultriness and to the Author (who, we regret to suffering. Yet are we selfish beings, leari), has recently passed “ to that and love Nature, not for herself alone, bourne from whence no traveller re but only inasmuch as she ministers turns *"). In the extracts we have to human wants and wishes-lo humade, we have carefully avoided any allusions to the Author's political mau affections and feelings; her pic. tures must respond to us, and hold prejudices, which are too well known intimate connection with our inteto be insisted on here; and, finally, we rests ;-and thus Poetry, purely deapprehend that no good-humoured scriplive, will always be more or less Reader will peruse this Volume with. out being pleased, or without ackpow. closing, in proportion as the Poet mingles his own imaginings and the ledging his obligations to the Au passions of his characters and him. thor. T. F. sell, with his delineations of inani. 23. Aonian Hours, a Poem, in Two Cantos, mate objects. It is this marked iodi. with other Poems. By J. H. Wiffen. viduality which gives to Lord Byron's pp. 180. Longman and Co. productions such deep and pervading THIS is a Volume of very delight- interest. All passion is poetical, and ful poetry; and we do not hesitate to most supremely sublime when evolved avow that, notwithstanding the fasci- in the language of Poetry. The Nopation of its tille, we have expe. ble “ Childe" mixes himself up so rienced greater pleasure than we had strongly with his intellectual beings, even anticipated from its perusal. and lights them up so intensely with We felt in laying it down, somewbat real emotion, that we are made imof that kind of regret which arises in mediately conscious of their truth, all minds endued with the love of Na. and the possibility of their existence. ture, when they return again to the This species of selfism has been constage of being—where man must be demned by many ; but we must conan actor, and controul the full and fess that the earnest and eager partifree impressions of his heart, in order cipation we take in his Poems, arises to play the part he has chosen in the from this very circumstance. We great drama of Life, from some still like to see an author ideotified with retreat in which they have had their bis writings, especially in works of hopes awakened, their passions sof- fancy and taste. We feel a greater teped, and their spirits invigorated, pleasure and keener sympathy when by a participation in the beauty of we can trace the habitual tone and external forms, and the soul elevating temper of his mind through the veil feelings they create. The love of of language and fiction. There is, Poetry, and the admiration of Na, perhaps, too little of this in the Voture, are so intimately blended, that iume before us; but we will now proit seems almost impossible for them ceed to make the selections by which to exist apart; an exquisite percep- our Readers may be enabled to judge * See vol. LXXXVIII. ii. 571, for themselves : “ To man memory of 1819.) 151 “ To wander at will,” says the Author, XV. in his Preface, “ in the earlier hours of “ In wonder risest thou, material Orb, spring, is one of the sweetest and niost re- And youthfulness-a symbol and a sign! fined enjoyments. The face of things, Change, revolution, age, decay, absorb and the mind's feelings have then a fresher All other essences, but harm not thine: aspect, and a dearer sensation than at any In thy most awful face reflected shine other period of the year. It is only at the Thy Maker's attributes, celestial Child ! first starting of Nature from the repose of When Shapelessness rul'd Chaos, the DIVINE winter, that these emotions are forcibly Look'd on the void tumultuous mass, and excited; for, after we have been accus. smil'd; (the pathless wild ! tomed but for a few weeks to the prospect Then siartedst thou to birth and trod'st of buds and flowers, and the gladness of XVI. all things, the mind recedes into its habi. Girt like a giant for the speed—the fighttual temper and tone of feeling. When The toil of unsumm'd ages; in thy zone, these sensations are connected with other Charm'd into motion by thy sacred light, associations—with the spot of our boyhood The glad Earth danc'd around thee with or our birth, or with the pleasures of ma the tone turer life; the charm becomes still stronger Of music;—for then Eden was her own, and sweeter ;' and we may truly say, as And all things breath'd of beauty;--chiefly the Arabian prophet exclaimed of Dainascus, .This is almost too delicious.' Prom Drank of an angel's joy; where are ye flown, my earliest years were these expressions Too fleeting suns? a mortal's thought may of Nature imprinted on my heart; from span [your race began. earliest memory my imagination has been Your course, for ye return'd to whence teeming with particular images with which XVII. it was first aud most intimately connected; And we became all shadow_in the abyss, and under these sensations, and to express The spirit's desolation, here we stand these interesting associations, the follow. Wrestling in darkness for a heavenly bliss, ing Poem was begun and finished.” And an immortal's essence : - brightly Grand ! After some reflections upon the [a band How climbest thou the skies? nor lend'st connexion between the To help us to thy allitude !-away, departed pleasures and present re Earth-born repinings, ye may not comgrets, a morning scene introduces the mand subject : A sparkle of that intellectual ray, Which yet from Heaven descends, and mingles with our clay !” “A world is at my feet of flowers and fern, Corn field and murmuring pine, vale, scribes his predilection for the “god The Author thus beautifully de. villa, heath, [cern dess of the downcast eye :" Aisles through whose sylvan vistas we dis XXXI. All Heaven on high, and fruitfulness be “ With a more melancholy tenderness, neath. Shades of my love and infancy! bequeath And more subdued intenseness, I would A portion of your glory to my lay ; [tress; A pilgrim of the woods - I twine a wreath Each scene, all life, all pleasure, all disof wild flowers for thy revel dancing May! The majesty and littleness of man; My theatre the woods--my theme one For Melancholy with my youth began, vernal day. And marked me for her votary ;-where fore ont? Is being bliss ?---but as my being ran, [lot. Where Night yet stands a centinel;-but With a more placid mind I scrutinize our * In the far streaky East the morning shines, XXXIII. The Iris of whose bursting glory lines He who hath ne'er invested Solitude With fire the firmament; distinct aud clear With an undying beauty, ne'er hath knelt 'Gainst the white dawn proud Ridgemount In worship when her sceptre brought the high reclines mood His mural diadem : lo! from his rear Of melancholy o'er him; hath not felt The breaking mists unfurl, and Day has Sweetness in sorrow-is not ns'd to melt reach'd me here.” With the humanities of life, nor hears This is followed by a very fine ad- The whisper'd love, the music which is dealt dress to the Sun : Invisibly around us from the spheres, The tender, bright, and pure-lhe para• Aspley Wood, near Woburn, Beds. dise of tears : scan got, soon * * XXXIV. spirit, and containing many trulyThe ineffably serene, the kind regret poetical passages, cannot be read by Which speaks without upbraiding, the persons of moral and religious feel. mild gloom ings without the most decided reproOf thought without austerity, but yet bation and contempt. Heavy with pensiveness; our future doom It seems evident that the Bookseller, Seen without fear, presages which assume The features of an Angel--feelings grand, to whom it is said to have been conGrand, and of incommunicable bloom, signed from abroad, did, not think The growth of Eden ;-0, he hath not proper to be responsible for its conspano'd tents, and therefore it is published The souls infinitude with an Archangel's without any bookseller's name. Inhaud ! deed, we have heard that the bookXXXV. seller to whom it was entrusted not Storm, wind, clouds, darkness, twilight, only demurred on publication, but and deep noon, stated his objections to the author, Summer and wizard Winter, and thou, Eye The latter, however, according to Of most mysterious night, thou moving report, was peremplory in his order Moon, Who yet hang'st out thy cresset in the sky; fore it is now given to the world at that it should be published, and therePale, but still beautiful !-ye know that I Have lov'd her as a Psyche, and have large. bound [were by, Her sweet zone round my loins when ye 25. Harold the Exile. pp. 918. 3 cols. And nought material utter'd voice or ANOTHER trick in the title-page sound; [most .ye frown'd." of this Book, which, like“ Don Juan," Whilst she her face unveil'd, smiling when is thrown into the world without the *** The limits of our present Number usual recommendation of the book. prevent us from enlarging on this interest- seller's name! Whether the intention ing Poem so fully as might be desired; of the Publisher is to excite, by this we shall therefore resuine it in our next. omission, the curiosity of the Pub24. Don Juan.' Printed by T. Davison, its contents, we are at a loss to guess. lick, or to waive the responsibility of White Friars. 4to. pp. 227. As, in the first supposition, curiosity THIS Work, which has been so will not affect the common class of mysteriously announced for some readers, who, taking this Book as time, has al-length been given to the coming from the manufactory of Publick ; and as our Readers will Leadenhall-street, will read it through, naturally be desirous of knowing without making any application to something respectiog it, we bave to the Noble Lord, whose life, or rather inform them, that it is obviously in- conduct, it is intended in some meatended as a Satire upon some of the sure to justify. As to the latter supconspicuous characters of the day. position, the responsibility of the It is written in the style of the Poem Bookseller for its contents, we conentitled “Beppo;" which was founded fess that, after an atteotive perusal of upon another, professed to be written the three Volumes, we have not been by Williain and Robert Whistlecraft; able to discover any thing that could and that evidently upon the manner at all impeach the Publisher, in case of the late Peter Pindar, but with- he had thought proper to conform to out his humour, imagination, and the usual forms of the trade. Withpoetical energy “Don Juan" is as- out pretending, however, to penecribed to a Nobleman, whose poetical trate the true motives, we rather vigour and fertility have raised him suspect that in this instance, as well into the highest rank of modern Bards. as in that of “ Don Juan," the BookBut the best friends of the Poet must, seller is acting under the direct and with ourselves, lament to observe abi- positivo orders of his Employer, whose lities of so high an order rendered sub- eccentricity will account for every servient to the spirit of infidelity and deviation, and is sufficient to justify Jibertinism, so evidently manifested the Publisher. throughout the whole. The Noble Harold the Exile, in which only a Bard, by employing bis genius on a few of Lord Byron's events in life a worthy subject, might delight and are related, is written with great force instruct maukind; but the present and energy; not, as might have been Work, though written with ease and expected, with a minute and correct parrative mean 7 1819.) 153 parrative of those incidents which are those adventures is nothing more or evidently chosen and brought for- less than the present Novel under our ward to diminish and extenuate the consideration; and the 83 pages of prejudices which have long since been the first Volume form the prologue, subsisting against him ; but they are an account of which we have just related at great length, and thrown given. Nothing in it appears to us with ability in the form of a Novel, very remarkable, except that the in which real and suppositious per- charming Alicia knew sonages are introduced, dressed with “ That the young and interesting obthe appropriate draperies of a com- ject of our admiration, is one of those mon drama, and contributing each in highly-gifted and unfortunate beings, on their way to its denouement. whom Nature bestows the most admired, The scene is on the Lake of Geneva. most perverted, and most fatal of her enLady G. and her friend Alicia are living dowmeuts, when she confers upon them in a pretty cottage situated on the the gift of genius. If you are disposed, lovely shores of the loveliest lake in my dear sister, to quarrel with me for this Europe." Lord Byroo, we expression, I cannot, I think, do better Lord Harold, resides in the neighbour than detail a conversation which passed hood.' Exhausted with all the misfor. sesterday with Delamere on the subject tunes which had made him take the in question, and which will evidence, more than the highest strain of eloquence I resolution of exiling bimself; be is could proffer, the insufficiency of the most found so very ill, that his life is de- exquisite genius to confer happiness on spaired of. An old woman comes to its possessors. It may dazzle by its the bouse of Lady G. lo acquaint her brightness—it may surprize by its oriand her friend with the alarming cir- ginaliiy-it may delight others, and miscumstance of a young gentleman fo- lead ourselves, but one virtuous action, reigner, who was likely to die, “with- one pious sentiment, one habitual prinout any one to see he was well done ciple of goodness in a well-regulated mind, by, or give bim Christian burial.” will weigh more in the comparative scale The ladies had heard of the bandsome of felicity than the most splendid corusca tions of genius where they are wanting. gentleman, and of his eccentricities; “The cabriolet is returned, and I must and feeling for him, as well as the old resume this subject in my next.” woman, they went immediately to the inn ; " for delays are criminal io a As it is usual in all romances, the case like this, and may be attended origin of the house of Harold, his with fatal copsequences to bim we poble ancestors, his father and modesire to serve." They found his ther, the castle, &c. introduce you Lordship in a.“violent delirium,” with the hero of the Novel. He was with “ deep stupors alternately suc educated at Harrow, after which he ceeding each other ş" and with the went to Oxford. His father being advice of Monsieur La Roche, the dead, his mother regularly corre apothecary, brought him up to their sponded with bim; and bappened in cottage in the Cabriolet, where, with one of her letters to him, to inform The assistance of a proper nurse, and bim, that a Miss Gabrielle Montgowith the most kind atteutions, he was mery bad lately been placed under finally restored, if not to a perfect her protection, and was now an inhealth, at least to that state of reco, mate of the Castle ; the encomiums very wbich enabled him to increase with 'which Lady Harold spoke of bis intimacy. Whilst these two good that amiable lady, transports the natured ladies were trying to cure the young student, who takes advantage melancholy of Delamere (for that was of the terms, and hurries to his dative the name which Lord Harold wept Wales, anticipating the pleasure which by), bis Lordship began to suspect his mother bad led bin to expect, in their good intentions and fearing the acquaintance with Miss Montgo hest they should also fall in love with mery. His arrival at the Castle, his bim, came to the determination of running into the garden, where his separating himself from thein; as an, mother had retired, is described with indemnification for their trouble and a warmtb, wbich one would look for kiodoesses, be condescends, however, in vain in any author, except iv Rous to relate bis adventures to the sensible seau's Heloise, Alicia, with permission to communi. “ As he approached the pavilion, the cate them to Lady G. The recital of soft tones of a female voice, appareatly GENT. Mag. August, 1819. engaged engaged in reading, caught his ear; and consequence is, that he succeeds in gliding cautiously beneath the umbra. raising suspicions in the mind of Gageous foliage, be presented himself before brielle against Harold, and in that of the entrance unobserved. It was thrown Harold against Gabrielle; and being open to admit the reviving freshness of ordered to join his regiment in Sicily, the perfumed breeze, and the bright moonlight afforded bim an uninterrupted he contrives, by treacherous advices, to induce Lord Harold to accompany view of the objects within. In the centre of the pavilion, under what might justly him, and thereby prevents the two be termed a flowery canopy, say his be lovers being reconciled in his absence, loved and venerated mother; and beside by the discovery of his treachery, her stood a furm so fair, so ethereal in its Accordingly they both set off, at appearance, that it rather seemed the a day's notice. on their arrival, bright creation of poetic fancy, than Harold, by the means of Berrington, aught of mortal mould. The blushing becomes acquainted with a Countess wreaths that entwined the columns, of Marchmont, a lady who had but drooped over her graceful figure, and as an indifferent character; they exthe breeze swept at intervals the slender change civilities, and bere eods vosprays, their fragrant blossoms were in. lume the first. termingled with the ringlets of her luxu. riant hair. A white and feecy drapery (To be concluded in our next.). faintly marked the outlines of her perfect 26. A Narrutive of the Loss of the Hoform, aud a transparent veil floated back nourable East India Company's Ship upon ber shoulders, and slightly shaded Cabalva, which was wrecked, on the her seraphic countenance. Her bands Morning of July 7, 1818, upon the Carwere folded on her bosum, as if in devo- gados Garragos Reef in the Indian tion, and the blue and trembling light, Ocean. By C. W. Francken, Sixth Ofwhich the moon-beams shed upon her ficer. 8vo. Black and Co. pp. 65. figure, gave it a shadowy appearance, Of all calamities to which the life that finely harinonized with the surrounding scene.” of man is subject, none perbaps can exceed in horror that of shipwreck on The consequence of their living to- a barreu rock in remote and little gether under the same roof, is easily frequented latitudes. Yet, even in anticipated; Lord Harold becomes the most appalling and almost hopeextremely in love with the charming less exigencies, it is cheering to obGabrielle, and she with him. Thus, serve frequent iostances in which, by both “ lapt in Elisium," time flew ra- patient fortitude, wise consideration, pidly away, until Harold returned to and industrious and persevering efOxford. Uusurtunately, he had there forts, the evils of such a situation are cootracted a friendship for a young rendered tolerable, and at length, Berrington, to whom he communi- under the blessing of Divine Provicates his happiness ; for we all know dence, the means of deliverance that happiness does not exist, uuless achieved. The Narrative before us it have a canal to flow through. In in some measure exemplifies these rethe mean time, Lady Harold removes marks. It is well written, apd abounds from Wales to London, and inhabits in singular and interesting incidents. her house in Portman-square; soon The relation of the more serious mat. after, she is followed by her son, who ters is now and then relieved by a “ ja public as well as in private, was few very ludicrous circumstances ; ever by the side of Miss Montgo- avd the whole very forcibly illustrates mery." In a few weeks after they the odd compound of character exhihad been settled in Portman-square, biled io a British seaman. Berringtou, who had become an offi. The Court of Directors of the East cer in the Guards, conies to pay lodia Company have presented to Mr. them a visit io bis regimentals. Ha. Francken ihe sum of fifty guineas, rold and his mother bid bim welcome and a Sextant with the Company's to their house, and he is iotroduced arms, and a suitable inscription, " as to the angelic Gabrielle, who receives a mark of their approbation of his bin - with her usual modest ease." meritorious conduct in proceeding From that time, Berring tou had a from the Cargados Reef to the Maudaily access to Portman-square, and ritius in an open boat, to the speedy found many opportunities to play arrival of which at that place the false with Miss Montgomery, 'as he early relief and preservation of the had done with his friend Haroid. The crew may mainly be altributed." LITERARY |
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