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as, for example, when the same idea takes a distinct colouring from the character of the borrower.. Thus Petrarch makes his mistress say to him in a vision—

'Non sperar più di vedermi in terra mai.'

Ariosto has almost copied this verse, which he has also put into the mouth of Angelica seen by Orlando in a dream, but has inserted a warmer expression than suited the Platonic feelings of his predecessor; the alteration is

'Non sperar più di gioirne in terra mai.'

In the same manner the distinct characters of Dante, Petrarch and Tasso are marked by an essential difference in a passage, otherwise unimportant, which is to be found in all three. Ugo Foscolo observes, in his essay on Petrarch,

The conflict of opposite purposes thrills in the heart of Petrarch, and battles in the brain of Dante.

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"Chè si e no nel cor dentro mi suona.' -Petrarch.
"Chè si e no nel capo mi tenzona.”—Dante.

Tasso has expressed it (continues Foscolo) with that dignity from which he never departs,

“In gran tempesta di pensieri ondeggia;" yet not only does this betray an imitation of the

66 magno curarum fluctuat æstu❞

of Virgil, but Tasso, by dreading the energy of the idiom si e no, lost (as he does too often) the graceful effect produced by ennobling a vulgar phrase.'-Essays on Petrarch.

We cite this passage, not only because it illustrates admirably our general notions of commentatorship, but because it is more especially appropriate to the immediate object of this review. As such we earnestly recommend it to the attention of Mr. Wiffen. An ordinary translator, nay most of our best artists, would probably, if engaged in a version of these poets, have rendered these passages in the same way. Yet how distinctively illustrative is each variety of the moral or poetical character of its author!

Unfortunately the reader will seek in vain in Mr. Wiffen's book for the critical notices, which we consider as indispensable in a work like the translation of the Gerusalemme. None of Tasso's imitations of ancient or modern poets are brought to light; no difficulties are explained, and, we have only six short notes appended to nine long cantos!

In reviewing the execution of the poetical part of Mr. Wiffen's task, we regretted that he did not adopt Tasso's own stanza in preference to that of Spenser. As an additional cause for such regret, we will give the three first of some dedicatory stanzas, written in Tasso's own metre, and addressed to the Duchess of Bedford, which

VOL. XXXIV. NO. LXVII.

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which will show how successful Mr. Wiffen is in the mechanical structure of the ottava rima. ·

1.

'Years have flown o'er since first my soul aspired
In song the sacred missal to repeat,

Which sainted Tasso writ with pen inspired-
Told is one rosary, and the task compleat:
And now, 'twixt hope and fear, with toil untired,
I cast the ambrosial relique at thy feet;
Not without faith that in thy goodness thou
Wilt deign one smile to my accomplished vow.
II.

Not in dim dungeons to the clank of chains,
Like sad Torquato's, have the hours been spent
Given to song; but in bright halls, where reigns
Uncumbered Freedom-with a mind unbent
By walks in woods, green dells, and pastoral plains,
To sound, far-off, of village merriment ;

Albeit, perchance, some springs where Tasso drew
His sweetest tones, have touched my spirit too.
III.

'O that as happier constellations bless

My studious life, my verses too could boast
Some happier graces (should I wish for less?)
To atone for charms unseized and splendours lost!
No! the bright rainbow marks the child's caress,
Who can but sorrow, as his fancy's crossed,
That e'er so beautiful a thing should rise

To elude his grasp, yet so enchant his eyes.'

These stanzas prove Mr. Wiffen's capability of well versifying Tasso, and yet more, of modernizing Fairfax; he has caught much of the Italian variety of rhythm, and avoided all the vulgar seductions of abrupt elision and smooth monotony of cadence.

Having thus returned from the incidental to the more immediate duties of a translator, it is but just to observe in conclusion that the exercise of these in the faithful mode in which we conceive they should be exercised, is especially difficult in rendering from the Greek, or from the Italian. To confine ourselves to the latter: it is a language so harmonious in itself, and possessed of so exquisite a prosody, that every thing may be simply related in its verse with dignity and effect; whereas the comparative poverty of sounds in our own tongue has led our poets and orators to the use of a figurative, and sometimes even to an unnatural, style of phraseology, which is the most opposed to that of Italian poetry. To attempt therefore to give the tint of the original is not always possible; but it is surely better to give no colouring at all than to give a false one; and we acquiesce

in the answer which the translator of Ariosto evidently anticipates to the following question: Would a real lover of Raphael prefer a copy of one of his pictures, which, though well painted, did not convey a true idea of his colouring, or a print of it carefully executed, which would give at least a faithful idea of the design?'

But it may be said, is the translator, working according to Mr. Wiffen's system, and not dealing in equivalents, to copy closely every line, however hard to bend into another language; is he to render every thing literally? We say, No: this would be a real infraction of the precept of Horace; one, by the way, of which our favourite Ben Jonson has occasionally been guilty, as in his version of vultus nimium lubricus aspici, to wit,' a face too slippery to behold.' What then is to be the guide, and how far is such an author to be literal or not? We answer again, he is to be as faithful an interpreter as the idiom and construction of his own language allow; and (as example is always clearer than precept) we will cite, as the model of translation best agreeing with our notions of what is fitting, a great statesman's extemporaneous version of Tacitus's comparison of eloquence to fire. Eloquentia, sicut flamma, materie alitur, motu excitatur, et urendo clarescit:'Somebody having cited this passage after dinner as impossible to be rendered into English, Mr. Pitt instantly disproved the assertion by repeating; It may be said of eloquence as of a flame, that it requires matter to feed, motion to excite it; and that it brightens as it burns.' The example is short, but sufficient. We have here a version of Tacitus which is spirited, and yet close enough to assist a boy in the lower school of Eton in the construction of his task. If any rule can be considered as absolute, we conceive that which we maintain, is without exception; and if there be foreign authors, ancient or modern, who cannot be subjected to it, we aver that they may be paraphrased, but cannot be translated. Such is that exquisite idiomatic poet Catullus among the Latins; and such is Aristophanes among the Greeks, of whom we have seen most brilliant and successful imitations and no translation.

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ART. II.—1. Histoire de l'Homme au Masque de Fer, accompagnée des Pièces authentiques et de Fac-simile. Par J. Delort. Paris.

1825.

2. The True History of the State-Prisoner commonly called The Iron Mask;' extracted from Documents in the French Archives. By the Hon. George Agar Ellis. London. 1826. THE debt of gratitude to a discoverer of historical truth is often more readily acknowledged than faithfully paid. Extorta voluptas'! is the secret murmur of the many against

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those

those who remove cherished doubts and specious errors; and no work was ever more calculated to excite such inward repinings than M. Delort's treatise on the celebrated anecdote of the Man in the Iron Mask. By a research well directed and pursued under favourable auspices, he has divested this strange incident of obscurity and exaggeration, and, at the same time, destroyed the far greater part of its romantic effect.

Voltaire, who first gave the fact a place in history, delivered it, as rumour had conveyed it to him, inaccurately, and with embellishments well fitted to encourage wild surmises. It was, according to his narrative, some months after the death of Cardinal Mazarin, that an unknown prisoner, young and of noble appearance, distinguished stature, and great beauty of person, was sent in profound secrecy to an island on the coast of Provence. The unfortunate wore, while travelling, a mask, so contrived by means of steel springs, that he could take his meals without uncovering his face, a peremptory order having been given, that, if he disclosed his features, he should be instantly put to death. The minister, Louvois, paid him a visit, and spoke to him standing, and with an attention which implied respect. It was said that, during this period of his confinement, he one day traced some words with a knife on a silver plate and threw it from a window looking to the sea a fisherman brought it to the governor of the island, who, when he had ascertained by a rigid examination that the man could not read, dismissed him, with the remark, that he was very lucky in his ignorance. In 1690, St. Mars, who had been governor of Pignerol, was appointed to command the Bastille, and under his care the mysterious captive was transferred to Paris, masked as before. In the Bastille he was lodged as commodiously as the nature of the place allowed; his table was excellent, all his requests were complied with, and the governor seldom sat down in his presence. He played the guitar and had a passion for lace and fine linen. The physician, who frequently. attended him, inspected his tongue but never saw his face. The very tone of his voice was said to inspire interest; no complaint ever escaped him, nor did he attempt, even by a hint, to make himself known. He died in 1703, and was interred, at night, in the burying-ground of St. Paul. So great was the importance ascribed to this dark event, that M. de Chamillart (the unfortunate war-minister and successor of Louvois) was importuned even on his death-bed, by his son-in-law, the Maréchal de la Feuillade, to unfold the mystery; but he replied that it was the secret of the state, which he had sworn never to reveal.

It is unnecessary now to examine the various conjectures that were grounded on these and other circumstances which disclosed themselves,

themselves, or were invented, as the story obtained celebrity.* The masked prisoner was from time to time pronounced to have been Fouquet, the disgraced minister of finance; a nameless person acquainted with Fouquet's secrets; an Armenian patriarch; Louis, Comte de Vermandois, son of Louis the Fourteenth, by Mademoiselle de la Vallière; and the redoubted duc de Beaufort, nicknamed, in the days of the Fronde, Le Roi des Halles. It is true, that the Comte de Vermandois was believed by his mother to have died in the camp before Dixmude, in 1683, and that his father had caused him to be, ostensibly at least, interred at Arras; it is also true that Beaufort was apparently slain and beheaded by the Turks at the siege of Candia; but, on the other hand, the unknown captive was named, in the register of his burial, Marchiali, which word, by a transposition of the letters, might be read Hic Amiral, evidently pointing out either Beaufort or Vermandois, both of whom were admirals of France! On grounds not less solid, it has been supposed, that the mysterious prisoner was James, Duke of Monmouth, whom the Londoners imagined they had seen executed on Tower-hill, in 1685.

But the most favoured hypothesis was that which made Marchiali a son of Anne, mother of Louis the Fourteenth. It was at one time boldly advanced that the prisoner was a twin brother of that monarch, brought into the world clandestinely a few hours after him, and concealed for reasons that are not strikingly cogent. A more plausible supposition was, that the queen had at some earlier period produced an illegitimate son, who, being born in wedlock, and senior to the acknowledged prince, might have disputed the succession, and was, therefore, to be buried in captivity. The adulterous father was, by some romantic persons, conceived to have been the duke of Buckingham; more feasible suspicions rested on Mazarin. Voltaire, who supposed himself better informed upon the subject than in truth he was, appears to have favoured this last opinion,† and it is openly maintained in a supplementary note on the Dictionnaire Philosophique, perhaps written, but at least known and uncontradicted by him.‡ The ingenious essay of Gibbons tends to nearly the same conclusion, but he refers Queen Anne's frailty to the period of her widowhood. The name, Marchiali, was made serviceable to these latter theories, as indicating an Italian father, and the pri

A work published in the beginning of the French revolution, entitled La Bastille dévoilée, contains (in vol. iii. livraison 9.) au ample digest of all that had, up to that time, been known, fancied, or fabled, on the present subject.

+ See the Dictionnaire Philosophique-Tit. Ana, Anecdotes. Euvres de Voltaire, tom. xxxvii. Ed. 1784. And Supplément au Siècle de Louis XIV. ibid. t. xxvii.

Euvres, t. lxx. p. 485.

Miscellaneous Works, 8vo. 1814. vol. v.

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