Page images
PDF
EPUB
[ocr errors]

Manfred. A Dramatic Poem. By LORD BYRON. 8vo. Murray, London, 1817.

LORD BYRON has been elected by acclamation to the throne of poetical supremacy; nor are we disposed to question his title to the crown. There breathes over all his genius an air of kingly dignity; strength, vigour, energy, are his attributes; and he wields his faculties with a proud consciousness of their power, and a confident anticipation of their effect. Living poets perhaps there are, who have taken a wider range, but none who have achieved such complete, such perfect triumphs. In no great attempt has he ever failed; and, soon as he begins his flight, we feel that he is to soar upon unflagging wings-that when he has reached the black and tempestuous elevation of his favourite atmosphere, he will, eagle-like, sail on undisturbed through the heart of clouds, storms, and darkness.

To no poet was there ever given so awful a revelation of the passions of the human soul. He surveys, with a stern delight, that tumult and conflict of terrible thoughts from which other highly gifted and powerful minds have involuntarily recoiled; he calmly and fearlessly stands upon the brink of that abyss from which the soul would seem to shrink with horror; and he looks down upon, and listens to, the everlasting agitation of the howling waters. There are in his poetry feelings, thoughts, sentiments, and passions, that we at once recognise to be human, though we know not whence they come: they break upon us like the sudden flash of a returning dream,like some wild cry from another world. And even those whose lives have had little experience of the wilder passions, for a moment feel that an unknown region of their own souls has been revealed to them, and that there are indeed fearful mysteries in our human

nature.

[ocr errors]

When this dark and powerful spirit for a while withdraws from the contemplation of his own wild world, and condescends to look upon the ordinary shews and spectacles of life, he often seems unexpectedly to participate in the feelings and emotions of beings with whom it might be thought he could claim no kindred; and thus many passages are to be found in his

poetry, of the most irresistible and overpowering pathos, in which the depth of his sympathy with common sorrows and common sufferers, seems as profound as if his nature knew nothing more mournful than sighs and tears.

We have no intention of drawing Lord Byron's poetical character, and have been led, we know not how, into these very general and imperfect observations. But perhaps the little we have said may in some degree shew, why hitherto this great poet has dealt so seldom with the forms of the external world. He has so deeply looked into the soul of man, and so intensely sympathized with all the struggles there that he has had no feelings or passions to fling away on the mere earth he inhabits. But it is evident that the same powers, which he has so gloriously exerted upon man as their subject, would kindle up and enlighten, or darken and disturb, the features of external nature; and that, if he so willed it, his poetry, instead of being rife with wrath, despair, remorse, and all other agitating passions, might present an equally sublime assemblage of woods, glens, and mountains,-of lakes and rivers, cataracts and oceans. In the third canto of Childe Harold, accordingly, he has delivered up his soul to the impulses of Nature, and we have seen how that high communion has elevated and sublimed it. He instantly penetrated into her heart, as he had before into the heart of Man; and, in a few months of solitary wandering among the Alps, his soul became as deeply embued with her glory and magnificence, as if, from youth, he had dedicated himself to no other power, and had for ever devoutly worshipped at her altar. He leapt at once into the first rank of descriptive poets. He came into competition with Wordsworth upon his own ground, and with his own weapons; and in the first encounter he vanquished and overthrew him. His description of the stormy night among the Alps-of the blending-the mingling-the fusion of his own soul, with the raging elements around him,-is alone worth all the dull metaphysics of the Excursion, and shews that he might enlarge the limits of human consciousness regarding the operations of matter upon mind, as widely as he has enlarged them regarding the operations of mind upon itself.

In the very singular, and, we sus pect, very imperfect poem, of which we are about to give a short account, Lord Byron has pursued the same course as in the third canto of Childe Harold, and put out his strength upon the same objects. The action is laid among the mountains of the Alps the characters are all, more or less, formed and swayed by the operations of the magnificent scenery around them, and every page of the poem teems with imagery and passion, though, at the same time, the mind of the poet is often overborne, as it were, by the strength and novelty of its own conceptions; and thus the composition, as a whole, is liable to many and fatal objections.

But there is a still more novel exhi

bition of Lord Byron's powers in this extraordinary drama. He has here burst into the world of spirits; and, in the wild delight with which the ele ments of nature seem to have inspired him, he has endeavoured to embody and call up before him their ministering agents, and to employ these wild Personifications, as he formerly employed the feelings and passions of man. We are not prepared to say, that, in this daring attempt, he has completely succeeded. We are inclined to think, that the plan he has conceived, and the principal Character which he has wished to delineate, would require a fuller developement than is here given to them; and accordingly, a sense of imperfection, incompleteness, and confusion, accompanies the mind throughout the perusal of the poem, owing either to some failure on the part of the poet, or to the inherent mystery of the subject. But though on that account it is difficult to comprehend distinctly the drift of the composition, and almost impossible to give any thing like a distinct account of it, it unquestionably exhibits many noble delineations of mountain scenery,many impressive and terrible pictures of passion, and many wild and awful visions of imaginary horror.

Manfred, whose strange and extraordinary sufferings pervade the whole drama, is a nobleman who has for many years led a solitary life in his castle among the Bernese Alps. From early youth he has been a wild misanthrope, and has so perplexed himself with his views of human nature, that he comes at last to have no fixed

principles of belief on any subject-to be perpetually haunted by a dread of the soul's mortality, and bewildered among dark and gloomy ideas concerning the existence of a First Cause. We cannot do better than let this mysterious personage speak for himself. In a conversation, which we find him holding by the side of a mountain-cataract, with the "Witch of the Alps," whom he raises up by a spell "beneath the arch of the sun-beam of the torrent," we find him thus speaking:

"Man. Well, though it torture me, 'tis but the same;

My Pang shall find a voice. From my
youth upwards

My spirit walk'd not with the souls of men,
Nor look'd upon the earth with human eyes;
The thirst of their ambition was not mine;
The aim of their existence was not mine;

My joys, my griefs, my passions, and my

[graphic]

powers,

Made me a stranger; though I wore the
form,

I had no sympathy with breathing flesh,
Nor midst the creatures of clay that guided
Was there but one who-but of her anon.
I said, with men, and with the thoughts of

me

men,

I held but slight communion; but instead,
My joy was in the Wilderness, to breathe
The difficult air of the iced mountain's top,
Where the birds dare not build, nor insect's
wing

Flit o'er the herbless granite; or to plunge
Into the torrent, and to roll along
On the swift whirl of the new-breaking wave
Of river, stream, or ocean, in their flow.
In these my early strength exulted; or
To follow through the night the moving

moon,

The stars and their developement; or catch
The dazzling lightnings till my eyes grew

dim;

Or to look, list'ning, on the scattered leaves,
While Autumn winds were at their evening

song.

These were my pastimes, and to be alone;
For if the beings, of whom I was one,
Hating to be so, cross'd me in my path,
I felt myself degraded back to them,
And was all clay again. And then I dived,
In my lone wanderings, to the caves of death,
Searching its cause in its effect; and drew
From wither'd bones, and sculls, and heap'd
up dust,

Conclusions most forbidden. Then I pass'd
The nights of years in sciences untaught,
Save in the old time; and with time and toil,
And terrible ordeal, and such penance
As in itself hath power upon the air,
And spirits that do compass air and earth,
Space and the peopled infinite, I made
Mine eyes familiar with Eternity."-

In another scene of the drama, where

a pious old abbot vainly endeavours to administer to his troubled spirit the consolations of religion, he still farther illustrates his own character.

"Man. Ay. Father! I have had those
earthly visions

And noble aspirations in my youth,
To make my own the mind of other men,
The enlightener of nations; and to rise
I knew not whither-it might be to fall;
But fall, even as the mountain-cataract,
Which having leapt from its more dazzling
height,

Even in the foaming strength of its abyss,
(Which cast up misty columns, that become
Clouds raining from the re-ascended skies,)
Lies low, but mighty still.But this is past,
My thoughts mistook themselves.
-And wherefore so?

Abbot.

Man. I could not tame my nature down;

for he

Must serve who fain would sway-and sooth and sue—

And watch all time-and pry into all place
And be a living lie-who would become
A mighty thing amongst the mean, and such
The mass are; I disdain to mingle with
A herd, though to be leader-and of wolves.
The lion is alone, and so am I.

Abbot. And why not live and act with other
men?

Man. Because my nature was averse from
life,

And yet not cruel; for I would not make
But find a desolation ;-like the wind,
The red-hot breath of the most lone Simoom,
Which dwells but in the desert, and sweeps
o'er

The barren sands which bear no shrubs to blast,

And revels o'er their wild and arid waves, And seeketh not, so that it is not sought, But being met is deadly; such hath been The course of my existence; but there came Things in my path which are no more."

[ocr errors]

But besides the anguish and pertur. bation produced by his fatal scepticism in regard to earth and heaven, vice and virtue, man and God,Manfred's soul has been stained by one secret and dreadful sin, and is bowed down by the weight of blood. It requires to read the drama with more than ordinary attention, to discover the full import of those broken, short, and dark expressions, by which he half confesses, and half conceals, even from himself, the perpetration of this inexpiable guilt. In a conversation with a chamois-hunter, in his Alpine cottage, he thus suddenly breaks out :

"Man. Away, away! there's blood upon

the brim!

Will it then never-never sink in the earth? C, Hun. What dost thou mean? thy senses wander from thee.

[blocks in formation]

I saw-and could not staunch it."

From these, and several other passages, it seems that Manfred had conceived a mad and insane passion for his sister, named Astartè, and that she had, in consequence of their mutual guilt, committed suicide. This is the terrible catastrophe which for ever haunts his soul-drives him into the mountainwilderness-and, finally, by the poignancy of unendurable anguish, forces

*See Sketch of a Tradition related by a Monk in Switzerland,' page 270.

him to seek intercourse with the Prince of the Air, witches, demons, destinies, spirits, and all the tribes of immaterial existences. From them he tries to discover those secrets into which his reason cannot penetrate. He commands them to tell him the mystery of the grave. The only being he ever loved has by his means been destroyed. Is all her beauty gone for ever-annihilated-and with it has her spirit faded into nonentity? or is she lost, miserably lost, and suffering the punishment brought on her by his own sin? We believe, that by carrying in the mind a knowledge of this one horrid event and along with that, those ideas of Manfred's character, which, by the extracts we have given, better than any words of our own, the reader may be enabled to acquire the conduct of the drama, though certainly imperfectly and obscurely managed, may be understood, as well as its chief end and object.

At the opening of the drama, we find Manfred alone, at midnight, in a Gothic gallery of his castle, in possession of a mighty spell, by which he can master the seven spirits of Earth, Ocean, Air, Night, the Mountains, the Winds, and the Star of his nativity. These spirits all appear before him, and tell him their names and employment. The Mountain Spirit thus speaks:

"Mont Blanc is the monarch of mountains,

They crowned him long ago
On a throne of rocks, in a robe of clouds,
With a diadem of snow.

Around his waist are forests braced,

The Avalanche in his hand;
But ere it fall, that thundering ball
Must pause for my command.
The Glacier's cold and restless mass
Moves onward day by day;
But I am he who bids it pass,
Or with its ice delay.

I am the spirit of the place,

Could make the mountain bow And quiver to its caverned base

And what with me wouldst Thou ?"

The Storm Spirit says, with equal

[blocks in formation]

language of his supernatural beings, which is, upon the whole, very wild and spirit-like. From these Powers he requests that they will wring out, from the hidden realms, forgetfulness and self-oblivion. This, we find, is beyond their power. He then says,

"I hear

Your voices, sweet and melancholy sounds,
As music on the waters-and I see
The steady aspect of a clear large star,
But nothing more."

The spirit of this star (the star of his nativity) appears in the shape of a beautiful female figure; and Manfred exclaims,

"Oh God! if it be thus, and Thou Art not a madness and a mockery, I yet might be most happy-I will clasp thee,

And we again will be-[The figure vanishes.] My heart is crushed.

[Manfred falls senseless."

A voice is then heard singing an incantation and a curse,-stanzas which were published in the noble Lord's last volume, and full of a wild and unearthly energy.

In the second scene, Manfred is standing alone on a cliff on the mighty mountain Jungfrau, at sunrise; and this is part of his morning soliloquy.

"Man. My mother earth! And thou fresh-breaking Day, and you, ye Mountains,

Why are ye beautiful? I cannot love ye.
And thou, the bright eye of the universe,
That openest over all, and unto all

Art a delight thou shin'st not on my heart.
And you, ye Crags, upon whose extreme

edge

I stand, and on the torrent's brink beneath
Behold the tall pines dwindled as to shrubs
In dizziness of distance; when a leap,
A stir, a motion, even a breath, would bring
My breast upon its rocky bosom's bed
To rest for ever-wherefore do I pause?
I feel the impulse-yet I do not plunge;
I see the peril-yet do not recede;
And my brain reels and yet my foot is
firm.

There is a power upon me which withholds
If it be life to wear within myself
And makes it my fatality to live;
This barrenness of spirit, and to be
My own soul's sepulchre, for I have ceased
To justify my deeds unto myself-
The last infirmity of evil. Ay,
Thou winged and cloud-cleaving minister,
[An eagle passes.
Whose happy flight is highest into heaven,
Well may'st thou swoop so near me-I
should be

Thy prey, and gorge thine eaglets; thou art gone

[blocks in formation]

A conflict of its elements, and breathe
The breath of degradation and of pride,
Contending with low wants and lofty will,
Till our mortality predominates,

And men are what they name not to themselves,

And trust not to each other. Hark! the note, [The shepherd's pipe in the distance is heard.] The natural music of the mountain reed For here the patriarchal days are not A pastoral fable-pipes in the liberal air, Mixed with the sweet bells of the sauntering herd;

My soul would drink those echoes.-Oh,

that I were

The viewless spirit of a lovely sound,
A living voice, a breathing harmony,
A bodiless enjoyment-born and dying
With the blest tone which made me !"

He is then, when standing on the toppling cliff, seized with an irresistible desire to fling himself over, but a chamois-hunter very opportunely comes in, and by force prevents him from effecting his purpose. This intervention is, we think, altogether absurd. They descend from the cliff quietly together; and so the scene, very dully and unnaturally, comes to a conclusion. It has been remarked of suicides, that if they are hindered from committing the crime in the very mode which they have determined upon, the strong desire of death may continue upon them, and yet the miserable beings have no power to adopt a different scheme of destruction. If, therefore, Manfred had been suddenly forced away from cliff and precipice, we can suppose that he might, in another scene, have forborne his suicidal intentions; but it seems most unnatural, that he shall continue to descend cautiously the very rocks over which he had a moment before determined to fling himself, accept of assistance from the chamois-hunter, and exhibit every symptom of a person afraid of losing his footing, and tumbling down the crags. Besides, Manfred was not an ordinary character; and this extreme irresolution, after he had worked him. self up to frenzy, is wholly inconsist ent with his nature.

VOL. I.

The first scene of the second act is in the chamois-hunter's cottage, and with the exception of the few lines formerly quoted,' and some others, it incredibly dull and spiritless; and the is very unlike Lord Byron, for it is ehamois-hunter, contrary to truth, nature, and reason, is a heavy, stupid, elderly man, without any conversational talents. The following lines, however, may redeem even a worse scene than this. Manfred speaks. "Think'st thou existence doth depend on time ?

It doth: but actions are our epochs. Mine Have made my days and nights imperishable,

Endless, and all alike, as sands on the shore, Innumerable atoms; and one desert, Barren and cold, on which the wild waves break,

But nothing rests, save carcases and wrecks, Rocks, and the salt-surf weeds of bitterness."

Scene second gives us Manfred's first interview with the Witch of the Alps, and he pours out his soul to her in a strain of very wild and impassioned poetry. Her appearance is described in a style different from the rest of the poem, and nothing can be more beautiful.

"Man. Beautiful Spirit! with thy hair of light

And dazzling eyes of glory, in whose form The charms of Earth's least-mortal daughters grow

To an unearthly stature, in an essence of purer elements; while the hues of youth

Carnation'd like a sleeping infant's cheek, Rock'd by the beating of her mother's heart, Or the rose-tints which summer's twilight leaves

Upon the lofty glacier's virgin snow, The blush of earth embracing with her heaven

The beauties of the sunbow which bends Tinge thy celestial aspect, and make tame

o'er thee.

Beautiful Spirit! in thy calm clear brow,
Wherein is glass'd serenity of soul,
Which of itself shows immortality,
I read that thou wilt pardon to a son
Of Earth, whom the abstruser powers permit
At times to commune with them-if that he
Avail him of his spells-to call thee thus,
And gaze on thee a moment."

The Witch, however, cannot do any thing for him, and is commanded to vanish, and the scene ends with a soliloquy. In this he says

"I have one resource

Still in my science-I can call the dead, And ask them what it is we dread to be; The sternest answer can but be the grave, And that is nothing-if they answer not." " 2 P

« PreviousContinue »