Art. VII. Rome; a Poem. In Two Parts. 8vo. pp. 146. Price 6s. London. 1821.

THE Author of this poem pays, in his Preface, some elegant compliments to the critics-those 'moderu harpies, chat

tering thieves who suck the eggs of the nightingale,mousers whose kindness, like the indulgence of a cat to a wounded mouse, is worse than their severity; and he is simple enough to implore the protection of the Public' against us. He might just as rationally implore the House of Commons to protect his country against Lord Londonderry. He had much better have thrown himself at once upon our clemency, instead of bestowing upon us these hard names, and calling in question our preroga tives. Why, his appeal to our constituents will be indebted to our zeal in forwarding it as addressed, for ever reaching them. In consideration of the inexperience of the offender, we have been induced to overlook his rashness; and, as from his earnest and tremulous deprecation of severity, we judge that he has much at stake in the success of his volume, we will endeavour to shew ourselves to be, according to another of his ingenious similies, more of cooks than epicures,-less fastidious than considerate of the labour of providing, picking, and dressing.'" But we will not roast our nightingale. The following strains are at least plaintive enough to stop the mouth of Cerberus, if not to win the ear of Pluto himself.

Presumptuous he, who now his feeble wings
Advent'rous spreads, yet trembles as he sings,
Shrinks from the critic's scourge, whose lash severe
Draws from pale Famine's eye the bitter tear-
Stings with a scorpion's point the bosom's core,
And dooms the trembling bard to sing no more;
Robs him of all his cherish'd golden dreams,
And turns to gall the Heliconian streams.
To that fell cloud his smiling harvest yields,
Like the black swarms that waste the Lybian fields:
Beneath that frown, his golden sun's o'ercast-
Hope's trembling blossoms wither in the blast;
His airy castles fall-bis laurels fade,

That promised age a sweet, an honour'd shade;
His children shrink beneath the win'try shed,

And stretch in vain their little hands for bread.' pp. 19-20.

We take this to be a fancy picture. Our Author bad not been home from his travels long enough to get married and have children already; nor are we to imagine that the proceeds of the present work are destined to meet the exigency of a baker's bill, or a quarter's rent. Nevertheless, when we think of Kirke White, we are ready enough to believe, that an acute degree of

suffering, and even a serious injury may be inflicted by the random hand of a professional oritic; and we feel disposed to recommend at once this honest six shillings' worth to our readers, rather than put our Author's profits in jeopardy by fastidious criticism, or torture his feelings with what he might deem the refined cruelty of faint praise. His subject, though not unsung, is, for a descriptive poem, a good one. Dyer's erudite elegy in blank verse on the Ruins of Rome, is in a style little adapted to please modern readers of poetry. But Lord Byron's portrait of the Niobe of nations,' could surely not have been seen by our Author, when he wrote his preface. It is as well, perhaps, that he had not seen it. The great disadvantage of all such subjects, is, that they admit of little more than description, and the most elegant description soon becomes tedious. Our Author's 1 sketches are by no means inelegant, but he himself becomes heartily tired of Rome before he has arrived at the end of his poem; and he is glad to get back to his native Erin, and to forget all the Cæsars, Michael Angelo, and the Pope, in the galaxy' of Irish talent- Sterne, Goldsmith, Burke, Curran, the Kirwans, Grattan, Philips, Bushe, LADY MORGAN, Miss O'Neill (!!!) Moore, and Wellington. This decline and fall' of his subject must, however, be pronounced rather in Irish taste it does more credit to our Author's patriotism than to his power of discrimination. But a good epicure will not quarrel with his company; and at a Lord Mayor's feast, the Duke of Wellington has in person found himself in a scarcely less motley assemblage than that in which our Poet has here placed his name. Yet, we fear that, to many readers who are neither cooks' nor epicures,' this arrangement of the bill of fare will appear strangely infelicitous-an Italian dessert ending in potatoes and buttermilk. And wo be to the Author, should he fall into the hands of a Quarterly Reviewer, for his compliment to Lady Morgan! It is but fair that his own apology should be heard for thus breaking down with his subject, and leaving his reader in a bog.

This little poem was written immediately on the Author's return from Rome, while the glowing scenes of Italy were still warm in his memory; and his descriptions are merely a transcript of ideas which arose in his mind, while contemplating the wonders of art and nature, so numerous in that charming country, He paints no scene from the florid pictures of Eustace, or other enthusiastic travellers, but has examined every thing impartially with the eyes which nature bestowed on him. The pompous title of "Rome" to so short a poem, may excite a smile, and bring to recollection the old fable of "Parturiunt Montes;" but the truth is, that the Author undertook what he was unable to perform; his intention was to take a wider range, and embrace nearly the whole of Italy; but he sank under the weight of his subject, like a

dwarf bearing the armour of a giant, or Atlas with the heavens on his shoulders; and this feeble effort may be compared to that of a child playing with the limbs of a Colossus. In the present age, however, when the press groans with works tending rather to degrade than to exalt human nature, rendered doubly dangerous by the talent which forces them into notice, a writer may claim some indulgence from his mere choice of a subject, calculated to raise every noble sentiment of our nature, and to induce the aspiring artist and the classic youth to visit those favoured shores, which art has enriched with her choicest treasures, and nature blessed with every charm.'

Without further preface or further comment, we shall lay before our readers some specimens of the skill with which the Poet has executed his task. They will shew that his talents want only the guidance of a maturer judgement and the genial sunshine of Fortune, to rescue him from obscurity. The following is part of the description of St. Peter's.

The Nave appears. Bramante's matchless art
In tones so sweet has tuned each swelling part,
That fair proportion softens every ray,
And giant forms to angels melt away.

Such power has symmetry. The vast, the grand,
Are sooth'd to beauty by her mellowing hand;
And soft emotions through our bosoms flow,
Which soon to warmest admiration glow.
Now the proud Baldachin, with sweeping fold,
Suspends its rich festoons of dusky gold,
Light as a gay pavilion's curtains fly,
Or golden fringe that decks the evening sky:
Four lucid columns shed an orient beam,
Bright with transparent alabaster's gleam.
But lo! where Angelo's intrepid hand,
(Spurning on sure and solid earth to stand,)
With daring step has climb'd the airy shrouds,
And raised the proud Pantheon in the clouds.
Vast as the starry canopy of night,
The splendid Cupola appals the sight;
Round the wide concave of colossal mould
Mosaic shines, enrich'd with sparkling gold;
And here Arpino's hand to saints has given
Seats emblematic of their native heaven.'

With gradual step we mount the airy height,
Each step presents some new and pleasing sight,
Till, raised aloft, above the topmost wreath,
We view with awe the classic world beneath.
Dark rolls the winding Tiber's yellow wave,
Within whose troubled bosom found a grave
The spoils of nations. Statues, busts, and urns,
For ever lost, th' exploring artist mourns-

Wild as the task to search the rolling main,
When gifted Devonshire has toil'd in vain.

'The murmuring sounds that from the Corso rise,
Processions, music, and Stentorian cries,

Seem like the gentle throb of ocean's breast,
When all its stormy waves are lull'd to rest.
With easy swell green Pincio's summit towers,
Where Sallust mused beneath his laurel bowers;
And Monte Mario, where, through purple vines,
The fossile shell, or lucid crystal shines.
To shield the Coliseum's shatter'd form,
The Capitol's proud turret breaks the storm;
The seven high hills, with ruins scatter'd wide,
Present the wrecks of Nero's golden pride.
Around the desolate Campagna spread,
In dust and weeds laments her glory fled.
Beyond Frascati, Tully's loved retreat,
Still shews the ruins of his sylvan seat;
And Tibur, where pellucid Anio roves
Through flowery vales and juicy olive groves;
While warm and bright the golden sun-beams glow,
And bathe in tears Soracte's crest of snow.
Unrivall'd prospect! Wheresoe'er we turn,
We glow with rapture, or in anguish mourn;
Contending passions, long and deep imprest,
Rend with delicious pains the classic breast.'

pp. 73-77. Some of the most pleasing lines in the poem, are those which introduce the home-sick Traveller's apostrophe to the land of his sires.

Alas! from home, from friends and country torn,

I trod these flow'ry vales and woods forlorn;

No sympathizing soul my heart to cheer,
Nor dry the solitary stranger's tear.

Man was not form'd to rove the pathless wild:
Alone he wanders like the helpless child
Whom Nature bade in social bonds to move,
And draw his nurture from the breast of Love.
No more on Tivoli's fair scene I stand,
But 'raptured tread my dear, my native land-
Wafted on Fancy's pinions to that isle,

Where earth's green breast and rosy beauty smile.
The modest flower, that gems the fields in May,
Expands its silver fringe to meet the day;
But, when no more the genial sun appears,
Dejected droops, and shuts its lids in tears.
Thus the lone exile mourns: his bosom chill
No kindling beams of joys domestic fill;
His vacant heart no social pleasures move-
The glow of friendship or the smile of love,

In vain Italian skies serene expand
Their azure arch o'er Europe's loveliest land:
In vain ambrosial flowers their sweets unfold,
Or fragrant orange shines with balls of gold-
Beneath Hesperian suns the valleys' fade,
And rose and flowery thorn are sunk in shade.
Dim shines the splendour of imperial Rome,
While memory flies to sweet, to sacred home.
Yon parting beam now gilds my native isle;
Her verdant bosom glows with evening's smile.
Sun of Hesperia! golden sun, adieu!
Farewell the blossom'd vale, the mountain blue,
Where blooms the nectar'd grape, the citron's gold,
And myrtles green their gems of pearl unfold.
To colder climes I turn; these feet no more
Shall press thy flowery banks, thy balmy shore.
A long, a last farewell! blow sprightly gales,
And bear my bounding bark to Erin's yales.
Waft me, ye zephyrs, on your downy wings,
And lay me down by Erin's crystal springs,
Where Mucrus towers above the lucid wave,
And ivy wraps the saint's and hero's grave.
Lay me beneath the green arbutus bowers,

Where crimson berries blush through snowy flowers-
From rifted rocks in wild luxuriance shoot,
And dip in azure streams the golden fruit:
A lovelier scene than Tempe's flowery vale,
Or watery woods, when sleeps the balmy gale-
When rock and tree, in softer hues exprest,

in

Lie pictur'd clear in Como's glassy breast. pp. 102-104 In a note to this passage, intended to meet the objection, that the Author has said nearly as much about his own country as about the antiquities of Rome, he frankly confesses that, truth, with all due respect for the natural and artificial beau ties to be met with on the Continent, one of the greatest advantages an Englishman reaps from his tour, is a conviction of the superiority of his own country.

Art. VIII. Incidents of Childhood. 24mo. pp. 186. (frontispiece) Price 2s. 6d. half-bound. London. 1821.

THE word December' staring us in the face on the first

page of our present Number, and startling us with the recollection that we are touching upon the close of another year, and another volume of our critical labours, has summoned up a host of slumbering recollections, among which have naturally turned up the incidents of childhood. Methinks the venerable snowcrowned form of Christmas rises before us, with his good natured old countenance and holiday smile, at which the heart of