Southerns had at least as much right to secede as the Americans had originally to revolt from great Britain. And there are many who think that, considering the dreadful distress we have suffered from the cotton famine, we have shown great forbearance in withstanding temptation to recognize the Southern states, and break the blockade. Then, again,there are some who are provoked at the incessant railing at England, and threats of an invasion of Canada, which are poured forth in some of the American papers. "There are many also who consider that the present state of things cannot continue much longer if the Confederates continue to. hold their own as they have done hitherto, and that a people who shall have maintained their independence for two or three years will be recognized by the principal European powers. Such appears to have been the procedure of the European powers in all similar casessuch as the revolt of the Anglo-American and Spanish-American colonies of the Haytians and the Belgians. In these, and other like cases, the rule practically adopted seems to have been to recognize the revolters, not at once, but after a reasonable time had been allowed to see whether they could maintain their independence, and this without being understood to have pronounced any decision either way as to the justice of the cause. "Moreover, there are many who say that the negroes and people of colour are far from being kindly or justly treated in the Northern states. An emancipated slave, at any rate, has not received good training for earning his bread by the wages of labour; and if, in addition to this and his being treated as an outcast, he is excluded, as it is said, from many employments, by the refusal of the white labourers to work along with him, he will have gained little by taking refuge in the Northern States." 2. Mr. Baxter's lecture is not ill timed. He does not come forward as the advocate of either of the parties now, unhappily, engaged in a bloody contest on the continent of North America. But he thinks there is some little risk "of our being so far carried away by that chivalrous feeling which naturally inclines Britons to take the weaker side, by the superior pluck, the unanimity, the energy, the military talent, and the modest, but earnest, proclamations of the South,by the mismanagement, the divided counsels, the boastful language, the political corruptions of the North,-as to forget that all is not gold that glitters; that England is the friend of the slave, as well as the friend of struggling nationalities; and that there is something rotten in the state of a Confederacy, which neither recognition nor independence will cure; a root of bitterness which, if not eradicated during the present tornado, will be a never-ceasing source of trouble to the statesmen of both America and Europe, in all our time?" We hope the danger is not so great as Mr. Baxter seems to fear; but it is well to be upon our guard, and in a kind, but firm, temper, to put the Confederate States on theirs. We believe that, with scarcely an exception, all England now is anxiously awaiting the day on which we can recognize their independence; but it must not be inferred that we have become indifferent to the question of slavery, or can ever be reconciled to its existence. It is true, the decree of immediate abolition, intended only to raise the negro in the “rebellious” States against his master, excites amongst us a feeling of all but universal indignation. It is not by an enormous act of injustice and intended cruelty that even slavery is to be rooted out. But we hope that when peace returns, and the independence of the Confederate States is recognised in Europe, they themselves will remember how much they have been indebted to the loyalty of the blacks, and prepare without delay a scheme of gradual emancipation. For both North and South, England cherishes no other feelings than those of perfect goodwill; and therefore we stand aloof, and resolve not to add one drop of bitterness, on either side, to this cup of sorrow, which they have mingled for themselves. DANTE'S DIVINA COMMEDIA. Dante's Divina Commedia. Translated into English in the Metre and Triple Rhyme of the original. With Notes. By Mrs. Ramsay. London: Tinsley Brothers. ITALIAN literature is not, perhaps, so much studied now as it used to be; and at the present day is not so much a fashionable accomplishment as the German language, mainly from Court influences, has become. It would be easy, however, to enumerate a considerable list of translations of Dante, which have appeared of late years, showing that the study of an author, which even Italians consider to be surrounded with very great difficulties, is constantly conducted in this country with perseverance and success. We should imagine that Mrs. Ramsay need shrink from no comparison with such recent writers as Mr. Pollock and Mr. Wright. The translation appears to be spirited, and, in an unusual degree, accurate. It is thus that Mrs. Ramsay speaks of herself:-"This translation of the Divine Comedy was written during a long residence in the land of Dante, in the very house wherein he lived and wrote; beneath the shadow of the Tuscan hills, on the shores of the Bay of Naples, among the ruins of old Rome. For years, the Italian tongue has been as familiar to me as my own; and during those years, I have enjoyed the privilege of receiving the advice of some of the greatest Italian students of Dante. Their verdict has encouraged me to publish this translation of the Inferno and Purgatorio; to be followed afterwards by the Paradiso, the last great work of the greatest poet of Italy." Mrs. Ramsay deserves great credit for her successful attempt to reproduce the terza rima, which, so far as our knowledge extends, has been attempted in only one other instance. The Divine Comedy of Dante has ever presented almost insuperable difficulties to translators; and few indeed have ventured to attempt this formidable "terza rima," or triple rhyme, of the original. The truth is, that the English language does not number among its advantages that of possessing facilities for rhyming; and, moreover, Italian is, of all modern tongues, the one which has least in common with English; and is, consequently, the most difficult to render into English verse. This facility the Italian language possesses in the highest degree. As lieutenant Burton says, it is almost impossible to write Italian without rhyming. It must also be remembered that Dante is the most abstruse of Italian writers, both in thoughts and diction; and besides all this, in the five centuries and a-half which have elapsed since he lived and wrote, many of the historical facts to which he alludes have become dim, and half, or wholly, forgotten. When Dante was musing on the last words of his great poem, in the pine forest of Ravenna, Chaucer had not as yet penned a line. True, the changes in Italy, with respect to language, manners, and customs, have been less than with us during the same period. It is a long, long while since Edward the Second reigned in England. Since then, the Wars of the Roses have come and gone; the last of the Plantagenets lies in Westminster Abbey; the fires of Smithfield have burnt out; the terrors of the Star Chamber are over; England has lost the land of the Troubadours, and gained the land of the Mogul: gained much besides, and, it may be, lost something too, since those old times. And Italy? There the Pope and the people are as much opposed to each other as during the strifes of Guelphs and Ghibellines; there, the dungeons of absolute and tyrannical power are still full; there French influence is as domineering as when it elected a Gascon Pontiff, and established him at Avignon; there, in short, things are very much in the same state in the days of Garibaldi, as in the days of Rienzi. Well might Dante exclaim, in the words of the translation now before us : "Alas! poor Italy, the home of woe, Ship without pilot, in an ocean wild."-Purg. c. 6. This it is which makes a translation of Dante particularly interesting at the present moment; and that now before us possesses some especial claims to attention. In the first place, it is a faithful reproduction, not only of the thoughts of the original, but also of the form in which it was actually written Vol. 62.-No. 303. 2 F namely, the celebrated and most complicated triple rhyme, seldom attempted, and seldomer succeeded in, by English writers. And surely a translation is not wholly a translation unless it give us, in some degree, the music as well as the thoughts of the original. Surely the utmost verbal accuracy fails to give any idea of the beauty of a poem, if the language be stiff, the phrases cumbersome. Can a rhymed poem be adequately represented by blank verse? Even if it may sometimes be so, yet, in this instance, we must doubt if the peculiarities of Dante's poem, its strange alternations of weird grotesqueness and lovely imagery, of bitter invective and thrilling pathos, of broadest farce and deepest tragedy, could ever be fitly rendered by the stately and even measure of English blank verse. It must be admitted that it is not easy, in any case, to transfuse the spirit of one language into another; and the great problem has always been, to reconcile faithfulness to the text with musical versification. With regard to the former, the translation now before us is said to have obtained the approbation of Dante's own countrymen; and, certainly, in all the peculiarly Dantesque passages, it is as literal as it is possible to be; at the same time, completely avoiding the slightest approach to the ludicrous. For example, the celebrated "I' credo ch' ei credette ch' io credesse," (which, by the way, has sometimes been spoilt in translation by a too anxious desire to avoid the resemblance to the conjugation of a verb) is fearlessly rendered thus: "In very truth, I think he thought I thought." Also: Inferno, c. 13, v. 25. "A piede a piè della stagliata rocca," is translated word for word : "On foot at foot of the sharp, rocky steep." Inferno, c. 17, v. 134. And many other instances might be given, in which even the punning play upon words, in which Dante so delighted, is perfectly kept. With regard to the other requisite, that of melodious versification, we may cite the description of the Angel in Purgatory: "Then came that lovely Being from afar, Clothed in white robes, and bearing on his brow Purgatorio, c. 12, vv. 88-90. "Il tremolar della mattutina stella," could scarcely have been more happily expressed. The description of the flowery Valley of Princes is also peculiarly melodious: "Silver, and gold, and newly-fallen snow; If placed anear the leaves and blooms that vie Nor was there only every lovely hue; Purgatorio, c. 7, vv. 73-83. Some examples of a totally different kind of power are to be found in the fourth canto of the Inferno, where Dante meets the Shades of the great and good Heathen, and in the twelfth canto of the Purgatorio, where he describes the rock-hewn sculptures illustrative of the evils of pride. But perhaps, on the whole, one of the best passages is the following description of the Terrestrial Paradise : "Eager to roam the forest-depths divine I linger'd not, but through the flowery bloom, And then the leaves which, ever trembling, thrill, Where fell the shadow of the holy hill. Yet not thereby so far did they depart From the sweet calmness of this sunny clime, That the small birds should cease them from their art; Behest from Eolus. My footsteps bore And lo! my path was ended where a flood |