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καλὴν φράσιν τῆς νῦν καθ' ἡμᾶς ὁμιλίας, καὶ ἐκδόντες τοῦτο

6.

εἰς τύπον, θέλομεν τὸ καλλωπίσει μὲ τοὺς γεογραφικούς And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves. πίνακας μὲ ἁπλᾶς Ρωμαϊκὰς λέξεις ἐγκεχαραγμένους εἰς δικά μας γράμματα, προστιθέντες ὅ, τι ἄλλο χρήσιμον καὶ ἁρμόδιον εἰς τὴν ἱστορίαν.

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Stanza xxvii. line 1. The wood of Soignies is supposed to be a remnant of the "forest of Ardennes," famous in Όλον τὸ σύγγραμμα θέλει γένει εἰς τόμους δώδεκα κατὰ Βoiardo's Orlando, and immortal in Shakspeare's μίμησιν τῆς Ἰταλικῆς ἐκδόσεως. Η τιμὴ ὅλου τοῦ συγγράμ- " As You Like It." It is also celebrated in Tacitus ματος εἶναι φιορίνια δεκαέξη τῆς Βιέννες διὰ τὴν προσθήκην as being the spot of successful defence by the Ger τῶν γεωγραφικῶν πινάκων. Ο φιλογενὴς οὖν συνδρομητής mans against the Roman encroachments. I have πρέπει νὰ πληρωση εἰς κάθε τόμον φιορίνι ἕνα καὶ Καραντα- ventured to adopt the name connected with nobler νία εἴκοσι τῆς Βιέννης, καὶ τοῦτο χωρὶς καμμίαν πρόδοσιν, associations than those of mere slaughter. ἀλλ ̓ εὐθὺς ὁποῦ θέλει πῷ παραδοθῇ ὁ τόμος τυπωμένος καὶ δεμένος.

Εῤῥωμένοι καὶ εὐδαίμονες διαβιώοιτε, Ἑλλήνων παῖδες. Τῆς ὑμετέρας ἀγάπης ἐξηρτημέναι,

Ιωάννης Μαρμαροτούρης.
Δημήτριος Βενιέρης.
Σπυρίδων Πρεβέτος.

Εν Τριεστίω, τη πρώτη Οκτωβρίου, 1799.

7.

I turn'd from all she brought to those she could
not bring.
Stanza xxx. line 9.

My guide from Mont St. Jean over the field seemed intelligent and accurate. The place where Major Howard fell was not far from two tall and solitary trees (there was a third cut down or shivered in battle) which stand a few yards from each a pathway's side.-Beneath these he died buried. The body has since been removed to England. A small hollow for the present marks where it lay, but will probably soon be effaced; the plough has been upon it, and the grain is.

THE LORD'S PRAYER IN ROMAIC. 'Ω ΠΑΤΕΡΑ μας ὁποῦ εἶσαι εἰς τοὺς οὐρανοὺς, ἂς ἁγιασ After pointing out the different spots where θῇ τὸ ὄνομά σον. Ας ἔλθῃ ἡ βασιλεία σου. Ας γίνῃ τὸ θέλημά Picton and other gallant men had perished, the σου, καθὼς εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν, ἔτζη καὶ εἰς τὴν γήν. Το ψωμί guide said, “ here Major Howard lay; I was near μας τὸ καθημερινὸν, δός μας τὸ σήμερον. Καὶ συγχώρησε him when wounded.” I told him my relationship, μας τὰ χρέη μας, καθὼς καὶ ἐμεῖς συγχωροῦμεν τοὺς κρεο- and he seemed then still more anxious to point out φειλέτας μας. Καὶ μὴν μᾶς φέρε εἰς πειρασμόν, ἀλλὰ ἐλευ- the particular spot and circumstances. The place θέρωσέ μας ἀπὸ τὸν πονηρόν. Ὅτι ἐδική σου εἶναι ἡ βασι. is one of the most marked in the feld from the λεία δὲ, ἡ δύναμη, καὶ ἡ δόξα, εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας. ̓Αμήν.

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peculiarity of the two trees above mentioned.

I went on horseback twice over the field, comparing it with my recollection of similar scenes. As a plain, Waterloo seems marked out for the scene of some great action, though this may be mere imagination: I have viewed with attention those of Platea, Troy, Mantinea, Leuctra, Charonea, and Marathon, and the held around Mont St. Jean and Hougoumont appears to want little but a better cause, and that indefinable but impressive halo which the lapse of ages throws around a cel ebrated spot, to vie in interest with any or all of these, except perhaps the last mentioned.

8.

Like to the apples on the Dead Sea's shore.

Stanza xxxiv. line 6, The (fabled) apples on the brink of the lake Asphaltes were said to be fair without, and within ashes.-Vide Tacitus, Histor. 1, 5, 7.

9.

For sceptered cynics earth were far too wide a den.
Stanza xli. line last.

The great error of Napoleon, "if we have writ our annals true," was a continued obtrusion on mankind of his want of all community of feeling for or with them; perhaps more offensive to human vanity than the active cruelty of more trembling and suspicious tyranny.

Such were his speeches to public assemblies as well as individuals; and the single expression which he is said to have used on returning to Paris after the Russian winter had destroyed his army, rubbing his hands over a fire, "This is pleasanter than Moscow," would probably alienate more favor from his cause than the destruction and reverses which led to the remark.

10.

What want these outlaws conquerors should have.
Stanza xlviii. line 6.

"What wants that knave
'That a king should have ? "

was King James's question on meeting Johnny Armstrong and his followers in full accoutrements. -See the Ballad.

11.

whiteness imbibed by the bleaching of ars had The castled crag of Drachenfels. rendered them in great request. Of these relics! Page 41, verse 1. ventured to bring away as much as may have made The castle of Drachenfels stands on the highest that if I had not, the next passer by might ha a quarter of a hero, for which the sole exeuse is, summit of "the seven Mountains," over the Rhine perverted them to worse uses than the careful banks: it is in ruins, and connected with some preservation for which I intend for them. singular traditions: it is the first in view on the road from Bonn, but on the opposite side of the river: on this bank, nearly facing it, are the remains of another, called the Jew's castle, and a large cross commemorative of the murder of a chief by his brother: the number of castles and cities along the course of the Rhine on both sides is very great, and their situations remarkably beautiful.

12.

The whiteness of his soul, and thus men o'er him wept.
Stanza lvii. line last.

15.

Levell'd Aventicum hath strew'd her subject lands. Stanza lxv. line last. Aventicum (near Morat) was the Roman capital of Helvetia, where Avenches now stands.

16.

And held within their urn one mind, one heart, one
dust.
Stanza Ixvi. line last.
Julia Alpinula, a young Aventian priestess, died

The monument of the young and lamented Gen-soon after in endeavor to save her father, coneral Marceau (killed by a rifle ball at Alterl ender to death as a traitor by Aulius Cæcina. on the last day of the fourth year of the repitaph was discovered many years ago;-it is republic) still remains as described. thus

The inscriptions on his monument are rather too long, and not required: his name was enough; France adored, and her enemies admired; both wept over him.-His funeral was attended by the generals and detachments from both armies. In the same grave General Hoche is interred, a gallant man also in every sense of the word; but though he distinguished himself greatly in battle, he had not the good fortune to die there: his death was attended by suspicions of poison.

Julia Alpinula

Hic jaceo

Infelicis patris, infelix proles
Dea Aventiæ Sacerdos;

Exorare patris necem non potui
Male mori in fatis ille erat.
Vixi annos XXIII.

I know of no human composition so effecting as this, nor a history of deeper interest. These are A seperate monument (not over his body, which the names and actions which ought not to perish, is buried by Marceau's) is raised for him near and to which we turn with a true and healthy Andernach, opposite to which one of his most tenderness, from the wretched and glittering detail memorable exploits was performed, in throwing a of a confused mass of conquests and battles, with bridge to an island on the Rhine. The shape and which the mind is roused for a time to a false and style are different from that of Marceau's, and the feverish sympathy, from whence it recurs at length inscription more simple and pleasing. with all the nausea consequent on such intoxication.

"The Army of the Sambre and Meuse
to its Commander in Chief
Hoche."

This is all, and as it should be. Hoche was esteemed among the first of France's earlier gen-3, erals before Bonaparte monopolized her triumphs. He was the destined commander of the invading army of Ireland.

13.

17.

In the sun's face, like yonder Alpine snow.
Stanza Ixvii. line 8.

This is written in the eye of Mont Blanc, (June 1816,) which even at this distance dazzles mine. the distinct reflection of Mont Blanc and Mont (July 20th.) I this day observed for some time Argentierre in the calm of the lake, which I was crossing in my boat; the distance of these mountains from their mirror is sixty miles.

18.

By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone.
Stanza Ixxi. line 3.

The color of the Rhone at Geneva is blue, to a depth of tint which I have never seen equalled in water, salt or fresh, except in the Mediterranean

Here Ehrenbreitstein, with her shatter'd wall. Stanza lviii. line 1. Ehrenbreitstein, i. e. "the broad stone of Honor," one of the strongest fortresses in Europe, was dismantled and blown up by the French at the truce of Leoben.-It had been and could only be reduced by famine or treachery. It yielded to the former, aided by surprise. After having seen the fortifications of Gibraltar and Malta, it did not and Archipelago. much strike by comparison, but the situation is commanding. General Marceau besieged it in vain for some time, and I slept in a room where I was shown a window at which he was said to have been standing observing the progress of the siege by moonlight, when a ball struck immediately below it. 14.

Unsepulchred they roam'd, and shriek'd each wandering ghost.

Stanza Ixiii. line last.

19.

Than vulgar minds may be with all they seek possest.

Stanza lxxix. line last.

This refers to the account in his "Confession,” of his passion for the Countess d'Houdetot, (the mistress of St. Lambert,) and his long walk every morning for the sake of the single kiss which was the common salutation of French acquaintance.Rousseau's description of his feelings on this occasion may be considered as the most passionate, yet The chapel is destroyed, and the pyramid of not impure description and expression of love that bones diminished to a small number by the Bur- ever kindled into words; which after all must be gundian legion in the service of France, who felt, from their very force, to be inadequate to the anxiously effaced this record of their ancestors' less delineation-a painting can give no sufficient idea successful invasions. A few still remain, notwith- of the ocean. standing the pains taken by the Burgundians for ages, (all who passed that way removing a bone to their own country,) and the less justifiable larcenies of the Swiss postillions, who carried them off to sell for knife-handles, a purpose for which the

20.

Of earth-o'ergazing mountains.
Stanza xci. line 3.

It is to be recollected, that the most beautifu)

and impressive doctrines of the divine Founder of Christianity were delivered, not in the Temple, but on the Mount.

mais ne les y cherchez pas." Les Confessions, livre iv. page 306, Lyons ed. 1796.

In July, 1816, I made a voyage round the Lake To waive the question of devotion, and turn to of Geneva; and as far as my own observations have human eloquence, the most effectual and splendid led me, in a not uninterested nor inattentive survey specimens were not pronounced within walls. of all the scenes most celebrated by Rousseau in Demosthenes addressed the public and popular his "Heloise," I can safely say, that in this there assemblies. Cicero spoke in the forum. That this is no exaggeration. It would be difficult to see added to their effect on the mind of both orator Clarens, (with the scenes around it, Vevay, Chillon, and hearers, may be conceived from the difference Boveret, St. Gingo, Meillerie, Eivan, and the between what we read of the emotions then and entrances of the Rhone,) without being forcibly there produced, and those we ourselves experience struck with its peculiar adaptation to the persons in the perusal in the closet. It is one thing to and events with which it has been peopled. But read the Iliad at Sigæum and on the tumuli, or by this is not all: the feeling with which all around the springs with Mount Ida above, and the plain Clarens, and the opposite rocks of Meillerie, is and river and Archipelago around you; and another invested, is of a still higher and more comprehento trim your taper over it in a snug library-this I sive order than the mere sympathy with individual know. passion; it is a sense of the existence of love in its Were the early and rapid progress of what is most extended and sublime capacity, and of our called Methodism to be attributed to any cause own participation of its good and of its glory: it is beyond the enthusiasm excited by its vehement the great principle of the universe, which is there faith and doctrines (the truth or error of which I more condensed, but not less manifested; and of presume neither to canvass nor to question) I which, though knowing ourselves a part, we lose should venture to ascribe it to the practice of our individuality, and mingle in the beauty of the preaching in the fields, and the unstudied and whole. extemporaneous effusions of its teachers.

If Rousseau had never written, nor lived, the The Mussulmans, whose erroneous devotion (at same associations would not less have belonged to least in the lower orders) is most sincere, and such scenes. He has added to the interest of his therefore impressive, are accustomed to repeat their works by their adoption; he has shown his sense prescribed orisons and prayers, wherever they may of their beauty by the selection; but they have be at the stated hours-of course frequently in the done that for him which no human being could do open air, kneeling upon a light mat, (which they for them.

carry for the purpose of a bed or cushion as re- I had the fortune (good or evil as it might be) to quired:) the ceremony lasts some minutes, during sail from Meillerie (where we landed for some time) which they are totally absorbed, and only living in to St. Gingo during a lake storm, which added to their supplication: nothing can disturb them. On the magnificence of all around, although occasionme the simple and entire sincerity of these men, ally accompanied by danger to the boat, which was and the spirit which appeared to be within and small and overloaded. It was over this very part upon them, made a far greater impression than any of the lake that Rousseau has driven the boat of general rite which was ever performed in places of St. Preux and Madame Wolmar to Meillerie for worship, of which I have seen those of almost every shelter during a tempest. persuasion under the sun; including most of our On gaining the shore at St. Gingo, I found that own sectaries, and the Greek, the Catholic, the the wind had been sufficiently strong to blow down Armenian, the Lutheran, the Jewish, and the Ma- some fine old chestnut trees on the lower part of hometan. Many of the negroes, of whom there the mountains. are numbers in the Turkish empire, are idolaters, On the opposite height of Clarens is a chateau. and have free exercise of their belief and its rites: The hills are covered with vineyards, and intersome of these I had a distant view of at Patras, spersed with some small but beautiful woods; one aud from what I could make out of them, they of these was named the "Bosquet de Julie," and it appeared to be of a truly Pagan description, and is remarkable that, though long ago cut down by not very agreeable to a spectator. the brutal selfishness of the monks of St. Bernard, (to whom the land appertained,) that the ground might be enclosed into a vineyard for the miserable drones of an exiled superstition, the inhabitants of Clarens still point out the spot where its trees stood, calling it by the name which consecrated and

21.

The sky is changed!-and such a change! Oh night.
Stanza xcii. line 1.
The thunder-storm to which these lines refer
Occurred on the 13th of June, 1816, at midnight.
I have seen among the Acroceraunian mountains of
Chimari several more terrible, but none more

beautiful.

22.

And sunset into rose-hues sees them wrought. Stanza xcix. line 5. Rousseau's Heloise, Lettre 17, part 4, note "Cesmontagnes sont si hautes qu'une demi-he après le soleil couche, leurs sommets sont encore éclairés de ses rayons; dont le rouge forme sur ces cimes blanches une belle couleur de rose qu'on apperçoit de forl loin This applies me particularly to the heights over Meillerie. ger à la Clef, et pendant deux

e

survived them.

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24.

Stanza cxii. fine last.
If it be thus,
For Banquo's issue have 1 filed my mind."

J'allai à Vey jours que j'y res s voir personne, je pris our Had I not filed my mind, which thus itself subdues cette ville un ar qui m'a suivi bans tous voyages, let qui ait établir enfin les hér mon roman. Je volontiers à ceux quut du goût et qui sont sensibles; allez à Vevai-vitez le pays, examinez les sites, promenez-vous sur le lac, et dites si la Nature n'a pas fait ce beau pays pour une Jelie, pour une Claire et pour un St. Preux;

25.

Macbeth

O'er others' griefs that some sincerely grieve.
Stanza cxiv. line 7.

It is said by Rochefoucault that "there is always | something in the misfortunes of men's best friends not displeasing to them."

CANTO IV.

1.

1 stood in Venice on the Bridge of Sighs;
A palace and a prison on each hand.
Stanza i. lines 1 and 2.

EGO IOHN BAPTISTA AD
ECCLESIAM CORTELLARIUS

3.

DE CHI MI FIDO GUARDAMI DIO

DE CHI NON MI FIDO MI GUARDARO 10

A

TA H A NA

V. LA S . C. K. R.

The copyist has followed, not corrected the solecisms; some of which are however not quite sc decided, since the letters were evidently scratched in the dark. It only need be observed, bestemmia and mangiar may be read in the first inscription, THE communication between the ducal palace which was probably written by a prisoner confined and the prisons of Venice is by a gloomy bridge, or for some act of impiety committed at a funeral; covered gallery, high above the water, and divided that Cortellarius is the name of a parish on terra by a stone wall into a passage and a cell. The firma, near the sea; and that the last initials state dungeons, called "pozzi," or wells, were sunk evidently are put for Viva la santa Chiesa Kattolica in the thick walls of the palace; and the prisoner Romana. when taken out to die was conducted across the gallery to the other side, and being then led back into the other compartment, or cell, upon the bridge, was there strangled. The low portal through which the criminal was taken into this cell is now walled

2.

She looks a sea Cybele, fresh from ocean.
Rising with her tiara of proud towers.
Stanza ii. lines 1 and 2.
An old writer, describing the appearance of
Venice, has made use of the above image, which
would not be poetical were it not true.

3.

In Venice Tasso's echoes are no more.

ORIGINAL.

up; but the passage is still open, and is still known by the name of the Bridge of Sighs. The pozzi are under the flooring of the chamber at the foot of the bridge. They were formerly twelve, but on the ritam telluris imaginem medio Oceano figuratam se "Quo fit ut qui superne urbem contempletur, turfirst arrival of the French, the Venetians hastily blocked or broke up the deeper of these dungeons. putet inspicere.”· You may still, however, descend by a trap-door, and crawl down through holes, half choked by rubbish, to the depth of two stories below the first Stanza iii. line 1. range. If you are in want of consolation for the The well-known song of the gondoliers, of alterextinction of patrician power, perhaps you may nate stanzas from Tasso's Jerusalem, has died with find it there; scarcely a ray of light glimmers into the independence of Venice. Editions of the poem, the narrow gallery which leads to the cells, and the with the original on one column, and the Venetian places of confiement themselves are totally dark. variations on the other, as sung by the boatmen, A small hole in the wall admitted the damp air of were once common, and are still to be found. The the passages, and served for the introduction of the following extract will serve to show the difference prisoner's food. A wooden pallet, raised a foot between the Tuscan epic and the "Canta alla from the ground, was the only furniture. The Barcariola." conductors tell you that a light was not allowed. The cells are about five paces in length, two and a half in width, and seven feet in height. They are directly beneath one another, and respiration is somewhat difficult in the lower holes. Only one prisoner was found when the republicans descended into these hideous recesses, and he is said to have been confined sixteen years. But the inmates of the dungeons beneath had left traces of their repentance, or of their despair, which are still] visible, and may perhaps owe something to recent ingenuity. Some of the detained appear to have offended against, and others to have belonged to, the sacred body, not only from their signatures, but from the churches and belfries which they have scratched upon the walls. The reader may not object to see a specimen of the records prompted by so terrific a solitude. As nearly as they could be copied by more than one pencil, three of them are are as follows:

1.

NON TI FIDAR AD ALCUNO PENSA e TACI
SE FUGIR VUOI DE SPIONI INSIDIE e LACCI
IL PENTIRTI PENTIRTI NULLA GIOVA
MA BEN DI VALOR TUO LA VERA PROVA

1607. ADI 2. GENARO. FULRE.
TENTO P' LA BESTIEMMA P' AVER DATO

DA MANZAR A UN MORTO
IACOMO. GRITTI. SCRISSE.

2.

UN PARLAR POCHO et
NEGARE PRONTO et

UN PENSAR AL FINE PUO DARE LA VITA
A NOI ALTRI MESCHINI

1605

Canto l'arme pietose, e 'l capitano

Che 'l gran Sepolcro liberò di Cristo,
Molto egli oprò col senno, e con la mano
Molto soffri nel glorioso acquisto ;

E in van l' Inferno a lui s' oppose, e in vane
S' armò d' Asia, e di Libia il popol misto,
Che il Ciel gli die favore, e-sotto a i Santi
Segni ridusse i suoi compagni erranti.

VENETIAN.

L'arme pietose de cantar gho vogia,

E de Goffredo la immortal braura
Che al in 'l ha libera co strassia, e dogia
Del nostro buon Gesú la Sepoltura
De mezo mondo unito, e de quel Bogia

Missier Pluton non l' ha bu mai paura:
Dio l' ha aginta, e 'l compagni sparpagnai
Tutti 'I ghi ha messi insieme i di del Dai.

Some of the elder gondoliers will, however, take up and continue a stanza of their once familiar bard.

On the 7th of last January, the author of Childe Harold, and another Englishman, the writer of this notice, rowed to the Lido with two singers, one of whom was a carpenter, and the other a gondolier. The former placed himself at the prow, the latter at the stern of the boat. A little after leaving the quay of the Piazzetta, they began to sing, and continued their exercise until we arrived at the island. They gave us, amongst other essays, the death of Clorinda, and the palace of Armida; and

• Marci Antonii Sabelli de Veneta Urbis situ narratio, edit. Taurin. 1527 lib. i. fol. 202.

did not sing the Venetian, but the Tuscan verses. ing up and down between them both, so as always The carpenter, however, who was the cleverer of to leave him who was to begin his part. I frequentthe two, and was frequently obliged to prompt his ly stood still and hearkened to the one and to the companion, told us that he could translate the other.

original. He added, that he could sing almost "Here the scene was properly introduced. The three hundred stanzas, but had not spirits (morbin strong declamatory, and, as it were, shrieking was the word he used) to learn any more, or to sing sound, met the ear from far, and called forth the atwhat he already knew: a man must have idle time tention; the quickly succeeding transitions which on his hands to acquire, or to repeat, and, said the necessarily required to be sung in a lower tone, poor fellow, "look at my clothes and at me; I am seemed like plaintive strains succeeding the vocifstarving." This speech was more affecting than erations of emotion or of pain. The other, who his performance, which habit alone can make listened attentively, immediately began where the attractive. The recitative was shrill, screaming, former left off, answering him in milder or more and monotonous, and the gondolier behind assisted vehement notes, according as the purport of the his voice by holding his hand to one side of his strophe required. The sleepy canals, the lofty mouth. The carpenter used a quiet action, which buildings, the splendor of the moon, the deep shadhe evidently endeavored to restrain; but was too ows of the few gondolas that moved like spirits much interested in his subject altogether to repress. hither and thither, increased the striking pecuFrom these men we learnt that singing is not con- liarity of the scene; and amidst all these circumfined to the gondoliers, and that, although the stances, it was easy to confess the character of this chant is seldom, if ever, voluntary, there are still wonderful harmony. several amongst the lower classes who are acquainted with a few stanzas.

"It suits perfectly well with an idle, solitary mariner, lying at length in his vessel at rest on one of It does not appear that it is usual for the per- these canals, waiting for his company, or for a fare, formers to row and sing at the same time. Al- the tiresomeness of which situation is somewhat though the verses of the Jerusalem are no longer alleviated by the songs and poetical stories he has casually heard, there is yet much music upon the in memory. He often raises his voice as loud as he Venetian canals; and upon holydays, those strang- can, which extends itself to a vast distance over the ers who are not near or informed enough to dis- tranquil mirror, and as all is still around, he is, as tinguish the words, may fancy that many of the it were, in a solitude in the midst of a large and gondolas still resound with the strains of Tasso. populous town. Here is no rattling of carriages, no The writer of some remarks which appeared in the noise of foot passengers; a silent gondola glides Curiosities of Literature, must excuse his being now and then by him, of which the splashings of twice quoted; for, with the exception of some the oars are scarcely to be heard. phrases a little too ambitious and extravagant, he "At a distance he hears another, perhaps utterly has furnished a very exact, as well as agreeable, unknown to him. Melody and verse immediately description. attach the two strangers: he becomes the respon

"In Venice, the gondoliers know by heart long sive echo to the former, and exerts himself to be passages from Ariosto and Tasso, and often chant heard as he had heard the other. By a tacit conthem with a peculiar melody. But this talent vention they alternate verse for verse; though the seems at present on the decline:-at least, after song should last the whole night through, they entaking some pains, I could find no more than two tertain themselves without fatigue: the hearers, persons who delivered to me in this way a passage who are passing between the two, take part in the from Tasso. I must add, that the late Mr. Berry amusement. once chanted to me a passage from Tasso, in the "This vocal performance sounds best at a great manner, as he assured me, of the gondoliers. distance, and is then inexpressibly charming, as it "There are always two concerned, who alternate- only fulfils its design in the sentiment of remotely sing the strophes. We know the melody event-ness. It is plaintive but not dismal in its sound, ually by Rousseau, to whose songs it is printed; it and at times it is scarcely possible to refrain from has properly no melodious movement, and is a sort tears. My companion, who otherwise was not a of medium between the canto fermo and the canto very delicately organized person, said quite unexfigurato; it approaches to the former by recitativical pectedly: e singolare come quel canto intenerisce, declamation, and to the latter by passages and course, e molto più quando lo cantano meglio.' by which one syllable is detained and embellished. "I was told that the women of Libo, the long "I entered a gondola by moonlight: one singer row of islands that divides the Adriatic from the placed himself forwards and the other aft, and thus Lagouns, particularly the women of the extreme proceeded to St. Georgio. One began the song; districts of Malamocco and Palestrina, sing in like when he had ended his strophe, the other took up manner the works of Tasso to these and similar the lay, and so continued the song alternately. tunes.

66

Throughout the whole of it, the same notes invari- They have the custom, when their husbands are ably returned, but, according to the subject matter fishing out at sea, to sit along the shore in the of the strophe, they laid a greater or a smaller evenings, and vociferate these songs, and continue stress, sometimes on one, and sometimes on another to do so with great violence, till each of them can note, and indeed changed the enunciation of the distinguish the responses of her own husband at a whole strophe as the object of the poem altered. distance." t

"On the whole, however, the sounds were hoarse The love of music and of poetry distinguishes all and screaming: they seemed, in the manner of all classes of Venetians, even amongst the tuneful rude uncivilized men, to make the excellency of sons of Italy. The city itself can occasionally furtheir singing in the force of their voice: one seem-nish respectable audiences for two and even three ed desirous of conquering the other by the strength opera-houses at a time; and there are few events in of his lungs; and so far from receiving delight from private life that do not call forth a printed and cirthis scene, (shut up as I was in the box of the gcn- culated sonnet. Does a physician or a lawyer take dola,) I found myself in a very unpleasant situation. his degree, or a clergyman preach his maiden serMy companion, to whom I communicated this mon, has a surgeon performed an operation, would circumstance, being very desirous to keep up the a harlequin announce his departure or his benefit, credit of his countrymen, assured me that this sing-are you to be congratulated on a marriage, or a ing was very delightful when heard at a distance.

Accordingly we got out upon the shore, leaving one

• The writer meant Lido, which is not a long row of islands, but a long

of the singers in the gondola, while the other went Island: littus, the shore.

to the distance of some hundred paces. They now ↑ Curiosities of Literature, vol. ii. p. 156, edit. 1807; ay / Appendix xxix. began to sing against one another, and I kept walk-to Black's Life of Tameo.

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