the choir. The way in which he died would, however, lead us to conjecture, that his meditations were not those of religion, and that he chose such a retreat in search of that solemn tranquillity which alone promised him a temporary repose from the relentless furies that preyed upon his heart:: "Due fere Donne, anzi due Furie atroci Tor' non mi posso-ahi misero !-dal fianco ; The complaint is from one of his own sonnets. He printed, during his lifetime, but he could never be persuaded to publish some prose works, and amongst them the treatise before mentioned, Della Tirannide,' and another entitled, “Il Principe e le Lettere.' They are in two small volumes. The first is a series of close arguments and severe remarks against monarchy. The second is written to prove that poets, historians, and orators, can flourish only amongst a free people, and that tyranny is interested in the advancement only of the sciences, and more especially of medicine and jurisprudence. In both these works he has shown that his address lay chiefly in the vigour of his attack; his preparations for defence were less skilfully disposed. Indeed he seems to forget that he was liable to a retort. Thus it is that although he may invigorate the partisans of freedom, he can hardly make a convert from the ranks of their opponents. The Italians look upon the prose of Alfieri as a model of style, particularly on political subjects. It is simple and energetic; his ideas are not abundant, but they are clear and precise, and connected according to the exactest rules of reasoning. It corresponds well with a metaphor employed for its description by one of his own countrymen"I suoi pensieri in prosa sono non tanto vagamente dipinti quanto profondamente scolpiti." His language is pure, and founded upon that of the oldest writers, but is free from the pedantry and the rust of antiquity. No man, therefore, was more qualified than Alfieri for the translation of Sallust. In fact his version of that historian is reckoned a masterpiece. He tells us, in his preface, that this translation cost him many years of painful application. The whole of his works, indeed, bear the mark not only of laborious effort, but of retouching, repeated and indefatigable. In the latter half of his own memoir he had not time to be equally scrupulous, and that part is written in a style occasionally careless, and in a language not always remarkably correct. Alfieri, however, was not born to be the translator of Virgil. Could perseverance have obtained his object, his success was certain; for he sat down to his task with the same constancy with which he commenced pupil in the Greek language, after he had passed his fortieth year. He translated the whole of the Æneid' three times over; and yet the version published after his death, generally speaking, gives us but the contents of Virgil. The harmony, the glowing style, have no representative in the Italian epic. Alfieri was a perfect master of his language; his words were admirably adapted to the expression of sentiments which flowed warm from his heart; but which, being invariably animated by the same ardent temperature, absorbed his imagination, and left no room for those finer and varied graces which constitute the charm of poetry. Above all, he was extremely deficient in that branch of his art, in which his original is so consummate a master-the elevation of a mean subject by the happy use of metaphor. He could not "Throw about his manure with dignity." This must appear the more surprising, since the Italian language is essentially metaphorical, and is by that very quality capable of being adapted to an unlimited variety of styles, according to the invention, the taste, and the imagination of each succeeding writer. Alfieri was not quite so unfortunate in his translation of Terence;' but even there his simplicity is studied, not natural; and in his happiest effort he betrays the secret that he had no genius for comic writing. The six comedies found amongst his posthumous works are compositions extravagant in the extreme. It is possible that some may admire them for their originality but the sober reader is much more astonished at the perseverance with which the poet pursued such unprofitable labour. One only, entitled The Divorce,' is a satire on Italian marriages. The others cannot possibly be adapted to the theatre. They are in the manner of Aristophanes, and all turn on political subjects. The One' (L'Uno) is a satire against monarchy, The Few' (I Pochi), and The Too Many' (I Troppi), attack the aristocratic and the popular government. A fourth is meant to teach that the One,' the 'Few,' and the 'Too Many,' should be mixed together, and may then compose a system somewhat tolerable. The other comedy, called Il Finestrino,' is a satire partly against religious impostors, but more against the philosophers who invent no good religion, but yet would destroy all the old creeds, although (so thinks Alfieri) a bad one is better than none at all. One of the principal persons of the drama is Mahomet. The verse and the language of these comedies are still more extravagant than their original conception. In short, they are seldom read, and are regarded, except by a very few, as unworthy the genius of Alfieri. His posthumous works contain also some translations from the ancient dramatic writers; the Frogs,' the 'Persians,' the Philoctetes,' and the Alceste.' To the latter he added another play of his own composition on the same subject, and formed exactly on the Greek model. He pleased himself with the innocent assertion that the new 'Alceste' was a translation from a recovered manuscript, which might fairly be attributed to Euripides. It is the happiest of his latter efforts, and is only not fit for the modern stage. In the closet it affects us by that pathetic tenderness with which Alfieri either could not or would not embellish his other tragedies, constructed as they were expressly for the purpose of bracing the relaxed vigour of his effeminate fellow-countrymen. With this noble design he composed a sort of drama, altogether new, which he called a melo-tragedy. His object here was to unite the music which the Italians look upon as a constituent part of the theatre, with the grandeur and pathos of tragedy. He chose the Death of Abel' for his subject, and he adopted that repeated change of scene which his countrymen would have regarded as a monstrous innovation, although it is one of the characteristics of their opera. Angels and demons are part of the persons of the drama, and are the singers of the play. The poetry of their songs is composed in different metres. Adam, Eve, and their two sons also discourse in verse, but in blank verse, and without music. This composition has some brilliant passages; but is, on the whole, devoid of interest. As an experiment it would perhaps be unproducible on the Italian stage, where the opera has formally excluded all display of ideas or sentiments, and almost of words, and is solely devoted to the musician and the ballet master. The satires of Alfieri will cherish the melancholy of every discontented member of human society. They are directed against every condition. Kings and nobles, rich and poor, priests and philosophers, physicians, lawyers, merchants, none are exempt; all of them, in fact, are made the subject, and furnish the title of a separate censure. The satirist is free from personality, and even all individual allusion; he strives no farther than to convince his reader, that whatever may be his place or pursuit, he runs a great risk of being unhappy, and wicked, and contemptible. Of the women alone he says nothing good, and nothing bad. His satire on them is contained in a very few verses, and resolves itself into the maxim, that the stronger is responsible for all the vices of the weaker sex. There are, however, certain of his satires which are recommendable from their wit, and from their acquaintance with human nature. We may select the 'Cavaliere Servente Veterano,' 'I Pedanti,' 'L'Educazione,' and 'Il Duello.' In the latter he steps forward, like another Johnson, in defence of a practice necessary for the protection of the man of honour, from the intrigues, and calumnies, and assaults of the coward and the bully. Another of the same class, 'I Viaggi,' is devoted to the censure of himself, and of the nobility, and of those who travel for want of occupation. This satire is in terza rima, and is the best specimen of that harshness of versification which the warmest admirers of Alfieri allow to be indefensible. He was seduced into this error by a wish to shun the opposite defect which characterised the poets of the preceding generation. The plant had been so warped and drawn to the earth on one side by Metastasio, that Alfieri thought he could never recover its position without bending it backwards as much on the other. The tree is not yet upright. Yet his strange words, and his capricious innovations in phraseology, profusely as they are spread over his satires and his comedies, will be forgotten or forgiven, and the force and purity of his diction will ever recommend the prose of Alfieri to the study of his countrymen. It is worthy of remark, that the Paris edition of his tragedies, which he printed at the press of Didot, is partially exempt from that harshness of versification observable in all his former editions. The errors of a man of genius are not unfrequently of service to the cause of literature. Mr. Bellotto, in his translation of Sophocles, chose Alfieri for his model, as far as regarded his method and general style; but he softened the diction, he harmonised the numbers of his prototype and thus succeeded in producing a work which had been long expected, and often essayed in vain. Alfieri, a little after the year 1790, and before his return to Italy, printed at Kell some specimens of lyrical poetry in two volumes. The first contains an ode on the taking of the Bastille, and a poem, comprising five odes on the emancipation of America. The one addressed to Washington is the best; but bespeaks, after all, only the originality of the poet. It no less shows that ne had misdirected his genius; for his ode is in the same harsh, dry style which spoils his translation of Virgil. The eulogist of America could not be expected to spare the English; but his dislike |