treatise on the principles of government and nationality men, they have no wings to fly from God: war is as applied to the affairs of Spain and Portugal during beadle, war is his vengeance." Act IV., Scene 1 the Peninsular War. — H. R.] Page 260. O'er the wide earth, on mountain and on plain." [That thoughtful and eloquent writer, the younger Aubrey De Vere, in quoting this sonnet, has accompanied it with the following classical comment: H. R.] Page 273. "Perilous is sweeping change, all chance unsound "All change is perilous, and all chance unsound. SPENSER Page 278. Sonnet 1. If in this Sonnet I should seem to have borne a lit too hard upon the personal appearance of the wort Poissards of Calais, let me take shelter under the aut rity of my lamented friend, the late Sir George Ba mont. He, a most accurate observer, used to say them, that their features and countenances seemed have conformed to those of the creatures they dealt at all events the resemblance was striking. Page 321. "The fact that defensive wars are religious wars, and assisted by religious sanctions, is in no instance more remarkably illustrated than in the glorious defence of Greece against Persia. Among the instances of supernatural aid by which the righteous cause was supposed to have been vindicated, perhaps the most remarkable was the interference of the god Pan, who had promised to leave his Arcadian retreats, and to help the Athenians at Marathon. It was in commemoration of such aid that the Athenians dedicated to that pastoral, and not less mystical divinity, the cave in the rocky foundations of the Acropolis, which still bears his name. As I gazed on that cave, I could not but call to mind that the support which the Athenians believed they had received, was no other than that to which Wordsworth out the English Church;- a movement that takes, appealed on behalf of the Tyrolese. The circumstance is a singular instance of that analogy of thought which is to be found in all places and at all times, when great minds are moved by great events. The deepest poet of modern times uttering, in his 'Sonnets Dedicated to Liberty,' his solemn and authoritative protest against the aggressive tyranny of Buonaparte, and exhorting each nation of Europe, in turn, to withstand that aggression to the death, admonishes them likewise that The power of armies is a visible thing, Formal and circumscribed in time and place.' And bids them place their trust in that universal prin ciple of Strength, Justice and Immortality, of which the soul of man is the special abode, and of which Pan was a Pagan type." Aubrey De Vere's Picturesque Sketches of Greece and Turkey, Vol. I., p. 204, Chap. viii.-H. R.] Page 260. "Zaragoza." It would be ungenerous not to advert to the relig movement that, since the composition of these verses 1837, has made itself felt, more or less strongly, throug its first principle, a devout deference to the voice tone of piety more earnest and real, than that produced temper and judgment shall be controlled by those of Page 321. Within a couple of hours of my arrival at Rome, I saw from Monte Pincio, the Pine tree as described In this Sonnet I am under some obligations to one of the sonnet; and, while expressing admiration at the an Italian author, to which I cannot refer. beauty of its appearance, I was told by an acquaintance of my fellow-traveller, who happened to join us at the moment, that a price had been paid for it by the late Sir G. Beaumont, upon condition that the proprie should not act upon his known intention of cutting down. Page 325. “Camaldoli." This famous sanctuary was the original establishment of Saint Romualdo, (or Rumwald, as our ancestors saxonised the name) in the 11th century, the ground a) being given by a Count Maldo. The Camaldokne, however, have spread wide as a branch of Benecates, and may therefore be classed among the genlimes of the monastic orders. The society comprebends two orders, monks and hermits; symbolised by er arms, two doves drinking out of the same cup. The monastery in which the monks here reside, is ally situated, but a large unattractive edifice, as unlike a factory. The hermitage is placed in a ter and wilder region of the forest. It comprehends beween 20 and 30 distinct residences, each including fr as single hermit an inclosed piece of ground and ree very small apartments. There are days of inence when the hermit may quit his cell, and when ced age arrives, he descends from the mountain and takes his abode among the monks. My companion had, in the year 1831, fallen in with e monk, the subject of these two sonnets, who showed Lo his abode among the hermits. It is from him that I received the following particulars. He was then about 40 years of age, but his appearance was that of aider man. He had been a painter by profession, best on taking orders changed his name from Santi to Rañez, perhaps with an unconscious reference as to the great Sanzio d'Urbino as to the archangel. He assured my friend that he had been 13 years in the age and had never known melancholy or ennui. is the little recess for study and prayer, there was a cell collection of books. "I read only," said he, books of asceticism and mystical theology." On being taled the names of the most famous mystics, he enume"vel Scaramelli, San Giovanni della Croce, St. Diony the Areopagite (supposing the work which bears As me to be really his), and with peculiar emphasis Berdo di San Vittori. The works of Saint Theresa reso in high repute among ascetics. These names hay interest some of my readers. Page 325. "What aim had they the pair of Monks?" In justice to the Benedictines of Camaldoli, by whom notice, that I saw among them no other figures at all strangers are so hospitably entertained, I feel obliged to resembling, in size and complexion, the two Monks described in this Sonnet. What was their office, or the motive which brought them to this place of mortification, which they could not have approached without being carried in this or some other way, a feeling of delicacy prevented me from inquiring. An account has before been given of the hermitage they were about to enter. It was visited by us toward the end of the month of May; yet snow was lying thick under the pine-trees, within a few yards of the gate. Page 325. "At Vallombrosa." The name of Milton is pleasingly connected with Vallombrosa in many ways. The pride with which the Monk, without any previous question from me, pointed out his residence, I shall not readily forget. It may be proper here to defend the Poet from a charge which has been brought against him, in respect to the passage in "Paradise Lost," where this place is mentioned. It is said, that he has erred in speaking of the trees there being deciduous, whereas they are, in fact, pines. The fault-finders are themselves mistaken; the natural woods of the region of Vallombrosa are deciduous, and spread to a great extent; those near the convent are, indeed, mostly pines; but they are avenues of trees planted within a few steps of each other, and thus composing large tracts of wood; plots of which are periodically cut down. The appearance of those narrow We heard that Raffaello was then living in the con-avenues, upon steep slopes open to the sky, on account west; my friend sought in vain to renew his acquaintce with him. It was probably a day of seclusion. The reader will perceive that these sonnets were supposed to be written when he was a young man. of the height which the trees attain by being forced to grow upwards, is often very impressive. My guide, a boy of about fourteen years old, pointed this out to me in several places. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE. [The Author's political Work on " The Relations of are united, will have a firm mind, in whatever e Great Britain, Spain and Portugal," (referred to at p. 259, and in the Notes, pp. 377 and 389,) has become so rare a volume that I insert here the two following extracts, not only on account of the valuable truths expressed in them, but also as having an especial interest for the American reader. barrassments he may be placed; will look steadily the most undefined shapes of difficulty and danger. possible mistake or mischance; nor will they appar him more formidable than they really are. For attention is not distracted- he has but one busine and that is with the object before him. Neither general conduct nor in particular emergencies, are plans subservient to considerations of rewards, estu or title: these are not to have precedence in his thoug to govern his actions, but to follow in the train of a duty. Such men in ancient times, were Phoca Epaminondas, and Philopœmen; and such a man wa Sir Philip Sidney, of whom it has been said, that t first taught his country the majesty of honest dealing With these may be named the honour of our own age Washington, the deliverer of the American Continent with these, though in many things unlike, Lord Nels whom we have lately lost. Lord Peterborough, wh fought in Spain a hundred years ago, had the same ex cellence with a sense of exalted honour, and a tinge of romantic enthusiasm, well suited to the country which was the scene of his exploits."— Pages 54-5-6. Treating of the qualifications needed by military men, as "heads of an army," Wordsworth speaks of,* intellectual courage * *that higher quality, which is never found without one or other of the three accompaniments, talents, genius, or principle; talents matured by experience, without which it cannot exist at all; or the rapid insight of peculiar genius, by which the fitness of an act may be instantly determined, and which will supply higher motives than mere talents can furnish for encountering difficulty and danger, and will suggest better resources for diminishing or overcoming them. Thus, through the power of genius, this quality of intellectual courage may exist in an eminent degree, though the moral character be greatly perverted; as in those personages who are so conspicuous in history, conquerors and usurpers, the Alexanders, the Cæsars and Cromwells; and in that other class still more perverted, remorseless and energetic minds, the Catilines, and Borgias, whom poets have denominated "bold bad men." But though a course of depravity will neither preclude nor destroy this quality, nay, in certain circumstances will give it a peculiar promptness and hardihood of decision, it is not on this account the less true, that to consummate this species of courage, and to render it equal to all occasions (especially when a man is not acting for himself, but has an additional claim on his resolution from the circumstance of responsibility to a superior), principle is indispensably requisite. I mean that fixed and habitual principle, which implies the absence of all selfish anticipations, whether of hope or fear, and the inward disavowal of any tribunal higher and more dreaded than the mind's own judgment upon its own act. The existence of such principle cannot but elevate the most commanding genius, add rapidity to the quickest glance, a wider range to the most ample comprehension; but without this principle, the ordinary powers must, in the trying hour, be found utterly wanting. Neither without it can the man of excelling powers be trust-worthy, or have at all times a calm and confident repose in himself. But he, in whom talents, genius, and principle | 139-40.-H. R.] employ the true means of liberty and virtue for the ends Our duty is our aim ought to be of liberty and virtue. In such policy, thoroughly understood, there is fitness and concord and rational subordination; it deserves a higher name-organization, health, and grandeur. Contrast, in a single instance, the two processes; and the qualifications which they require. The ministers of that period found it an easy task to hire a band of Hessians, and to send it across the Atlantic, that they might assist in bringing the Americans (according to the phrase then prevalent) to reason. attack was gross-tangible—and might be calculated; The force with which these troops would but the spirit of resistance, which their presence would create, was subtle - ethereal - mighty-and incalcu lable. Accordingly, from the moment when these foreigners landed - men who had no interest, no business in the quarrel, but what the wages of their master bound them to, and he imposed upon his miserable slaves; tion, the success of the British was (as has since been nay, from the first rumour of their destinaaffirmed by judicious Americans) impossible." Pages The Reader must be apprised, that the Stoves in North-Ger many generally have the impression of a galloping Horse upon them, this being part of the Brunswick Arms. A PLAGUE on your languages, German and Norse! And the tongs and the poker, instead of that Horse See that Fly,—a disconsolate creature! perhaps A child of the field or the grove; And, sorrow for him! the dull treacherous heat Has seduced the poor fool from his winter retreat, And he creeps to the edge of my stove. Alas! how he fumbles about the domains He cannot find out in what track he must crawl, Stock-still there he stands like a traveller bemazed: The best of his skill he has tried; His feelers, methinks, I can see him put forth To the East and the West, to the South and the North; But he finds neither Guide-post nor Guide. UPON SEEING a coloured drawing of the bird WHO rashly strove thy image to portray? In all her brightness, from the dancing crest Or in the diver's grasp fetched up from caves How his spindles sink under him, foot, leg, and thigh! But whose rash hand (again I ask) could dare, His eyesight and hearing are lost; Between life and death his blood freezes and thaws; No Brother, no Mate has he near him—while I As if green summer grass were the floor of my room, Yet, God is my witness, thou small helpless Thing! Thy life I would gladly sustain Till summer comes up from the South, and with crowds Of thy brethren a march thou shouldst sound through the clouds, And back to the forests again! A NIGHT THOUGHT. Lo! where the moon along the sky But when the clouds asunder fly How bright her mien! Far different we -a froward race, Their way pursue, If kindred humours e'er would make 'Mid casual tokens and promiscuous shows, Plumes that might catch, but cannot keep, a stain; Resplendent Wanderer! followed with glad eyes Where'er her course; mysterious bird! To whom by wondering fancy stirred, Eastern Islanders have given A holy name And even a title higher still, - the Bird of Heaven! The Bird of God! whose blessed will Above a world that deems itself most wise CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR WHO is the happy Warrior? Who is het It is the generous Spirit, who, when brought |