sides were immolated on the altar of despotism, | much elevation of soul as myself, took no other reand thus escaped from the galling yoke which op. pressed them. The place of their interment was easily recognised by its greater verdure, and by yielding more abundant crops than the barren and unproductive soil in its immediate vicinity. On this occasion, I reflected, with sorrow, that slaves seem everywhere only born to fertilize the soil on which they vegetate."-Vol. i. pp. 196, 197.

venge for my outrageous conduct, except preserving for several years two handkerchiefs stained with blood which had been bound round his head, and which he occasionally displayed to my view. It is necessary to be fully acquainted with the character and manners of the Piedmontese, in order to com. prehend the mixture of ferocity and generosity displayed on both sides in this affair. After this he meets with a beautiful ass at discover the cause of this violent transport of rage. "When at a more mature age, I endeavoured to Gottingen, and regrets that his indolence pre- I became convinced that the trivial circumstance vented him from availing himself of this which gave rise to it, was, so to speak, like the last excellent opportunity for writing some im- drop poured into a vessel ready to run over. My measurably facetious verses "upon this ren-irascible temper, which must have been rendered counter of a German and an Italian ass, in so still more irritable by solitude and perpetual idleness, required only the slightest impulse to cause it celebrated an university!" After a hasty exto burst forth. Besides, I never lifted a hand pedition to Spa, he again traverses Germany against a domestic, as that would have been putting and Holland, and returns to England in the them on a level with myself. Neither did I ever twenty-third year of his age; where he is employ a cane, nor any kind of weapon in order to speedily involved in some very distressing chastise them, though I frequently threw at them and discreditable adventures. He engages in any moveable that fell in my way, as many young an intrigue with an English lady of rank, and I dare to affirm that I would have approved, and people do, during the first ebullitions of anger; yet is challenged, and slightly wounded by her even esteemed the domestic who should on such husband. After this eclat, he consoles him- occasions have rendered me back the treatment he self with the thought of marrying the frail received, since I never punished them as a master, fair, with whom he is, as usual, most heroic- but only contended with them as one man with ally in love; when he discovers, to his infi- another."-Vol. i. pp. 244—246. nite horror and consternation, that, previous to her connection with him, she had been equally lavish of her favours to her husband's groom! whose jealous resentment had led him to watch and expose this new infidelity. After many struggles between shame, resentment, and unconquerable love, he at last tears himself from this sad sample of English virtue, and makes his way to Holland, bursting with grief and indignation; but without seeming to think that there was the slightest occasion for any degree of contrition or selfcondemnation. From Holland he goes to France, and from France to Spain-as idle, and more oppressed with himself than ever -buying and caressing Andalusian horses, and constantly ready to sink under the heavy burden of existence. At Madrid he has set down an extraordinary trait of the dangerous impetuosity of his temper. His faithful servant, in combing his hair one day, happened accidentally to give him pain by stretching one hair a little more than the rest, upon which, without saying a word, he first seized a candlestick, and felled him to the ground with a huge wound on his temple, and then drew his sword to despatch him, upon his offering to make some resistance. The sequel of the story is somewhat more creditable to his magnanimity, than this part of it is to his self-command.

At Lisbon he forms an acquaintance with a literary countryman of his own, and feels, for the first time of his life, a glow of admiration on perusing some passages of Italian poetry. From this he returns to Spain, and, after lounging over the whole of that kingdom, returns through France to Italy, and arrives at Turin in 1773. Here he endeavours to maintain the same unequal contest of dissipation against ennui and conscious folly, and falls furiously in love, for the third time, with a woman of more than doubtful reputation, ten years older than himself. Neither the intoxication of this passion, however, nor the daily exhibition of his twelve fine horses, could repress the shame and indignation which he felt at thus wasting his days in inglorious licentiousness; and his health was at last seriously affected by those compunctious visitings of his conscience. In 1774, while watching by his unworthy mistress in a fit of sickness, he sketched out a few scenes of a dramatic work in Italian, which was thrown aside and forgotten immediately on her recovery; and it was not till the year after, that, after many struggles, he formed the resolution of detaching himself from this degrading connection. The efforts which this cost him, and the means he adopted to ensure his own adherence to his resolution, appear al together wild and extravagant to our norther imaginations. In the first place, he had himself lashed with strong cords to his elbow chair, to prevent him from rushing into the presence of the syren; and, in the next place, he entirely cut off his hair, in order to make it impossible for him to appear with decency

"I was shocked at the brutal excess of passion into which I had fallen. Though Elias was somewhat calmed, he still appeared to retain a certain degree of resentment; yet I was not disposed to display towards him the smallest distrust. Two hours after his wound was dressed I went to bed, leaving the door open, as usual, between my apart. ment and the chamber in which he slept; notwith-in any society! The first fifteen days, he standing the remonstrance of the Spaniards, who pointed out to me the absurdity of putting vengeance in the power of a man whom I had so much irritated. I said even aloud to Elias, who was alinclined, during the night; and that I justly merited such a fate. But this brave man, who possessed as

ready in bed, that he might kill me, if he was so

assures us, he spent entirely "in uttering the most frightful groans and lamentations," and the next in riding furiously through all the solitary places in the neighbourhood. At last, however, this frenzy of grief began to subside; and, most fortunately for the world and

the author, gave place to a passion for litera- | in verse. This was the case with Charles I., which ture, which absorbed the powers of this fiery I began to write in French prose, immediately after spirit during the greater part of his future ex- the middle of the third act, my heart and my hand finishing Philippe. When I had reached to about istence. The perusal of a wretched tragedy became so benumbed, that I found it impossible to on the story of Cleopatra, and the striking re- hold my pen. The same thing happened in regard semblance he thought he discovered between to Romeo and Juliet, the whole of which I nearly. his own case and that of Antony, first inspired expanded, though with much labour to myself, and him with the resolution of attempting a dra- at long intervals. On reperusing this sketch, I matic piece on the same subject; and, after found my enthusiasm so much lowered, that, transported with rage against myself, I could proceed no encountering the most extreme difficulty from further, but threw my work into the fire."-Vol. ii. his utter ignorance of poetical diction, and of pure Italian, he at last hammered out a tragedy, which was represented with tolerable success in 1775. From this moment his whole heart was devoted to dramatic poetry; and literary glory became the idol of his imagi

nation.

In entering upon this new and arduous career, he soon discovered that greater sacrifices were required of him than he had hitherto offered to any of the former objects of his idolatry. The defects of his education, and his long habits of indolence and inattention to every thing connected with letters, imposed upon him far more than the ordinary labour of a literary apprenticeship. Having never been accustomed to the use of the pure Tusan, and being obliged to speak French during so many years of travelling, he found himself shamefully deficient in the knowledge of that Jeautiful language, in which he proposed to enter his claims to immortality; and began, therefore, a course of the most careful and critical reading of the great authors who had

adorned it. Dante and Petrarca were his

great models of purity; and, next to them, Ariosto and Tasso; in which four writers, he gives it as his opinion, that there is to be found the perfection of every style, except that fitted for dramatic poetry-of which, he more than insinuates, that his own writings are the only existing example. In order to acquire a perfect knowledge and command of their divine language, he not only made many long visits to Tuscany, but absolutely

interdicted himself the use of

every other

sort of reading, and abjured for ever that French literature which he seems to have always regarded with a mixture of envy and disdain. To make amends for this, he went resolutely back to the rudiments of his Latin; and read over all the classics in that language with a most patient and laborious attention. He likewise committed to memory many thousand lines from the authors he proposed to imitate; and sought, with the greatest assiduity, the acquaintance of all the scholars and critics that came in his way,-pestering them with continual queries, and with requesting their opinion upon the infinite quantity of bad verses which he continued to compose by way of exercise. His two or three first tragedies he composed entirely in French prose; and afterwards translated, with infinite labour, into Italian verse.

"In this manner, without any other judge than my own feelings, I have only finished those, the sketches of which I had written with energy and enthusiasm; or, if I have finished any other, I have at least never taken the trouble to clothe them

pp.

48-51.

Two or three years were passed in these nine or ten tragedies, at least, were in a conbewitching studies; and, during this time, siderable state of forwardness. In 1778, the

study of Machiavel revived all that early zeal for liberty which he had imbibed from the perusal of Plutarch; and he composed with great rapidity his two books of "La Tiranide;"

perhaps the most nervous and eloquent of all his prose compositions. About the same period, his poetical studies experienced a still more serious interruption, from the commencement of his attachment to the Countess of attachment that continued to soothe or to Albany, the wife of the late Pretender; an agitate all the remaining part of his existence. This lady, who was by birth a princess of the house of Stolberg, was then in her twentyfifth year, and resided with her ill-matched husband at Florence. Her beauty and accomplishments made, from the first, a pow Alfieri, guarded as it now was with the love erful impression on the inflammable heart of of his character, and the ardour of his admiof glory and of literature; and the loftiness in her, who had suffered for some time from ration, soon excited corresponding sentiments the ill temper and gross vices of her superannuated husband. Though the author takes the trouble to assure us that "their intimacy never exceeded the strictest limits of honour," it is not difficult to understand, that it should have aggravated the ill-humour of the old husband; which increased, it seems, so much, his society, and to take refuge with his brother, that the lady was at last forced to abandon the Cardinal York, at Rome. To this place Alfieri speedily followed her; and remained there, divided between love and study, for upwards of two years; when her holy guardian becoming scandalized at their intimacy, it was thought necessary for her reputation, that they should separate. The effects of this separation he has himself described in the following short, but eloquent passage.

"For two years I remained incapable of any kind of study whatever, so different was my pres

formed, was in the great gallery of Florence;-a circumstance which led him to signalize his admiration by an extraordinary act of gallantry. As they stopped to examine the picture of Charles XII. of Sweden, the Countess observed, that the singular uniform in which that prince is usually painted, appeared to her extremely becoming. Nothing more was said at the time; but, in two days after, Alfier appeared in the streets in the exact costume of that warlike sovereign,-to the utter consternation of all the peaceful inhabitants.

* His first introduction to her, we have been in

ent forlorn state from the happiness I enjoyed during my late residence in Rome:-there the Villa Strozzi near to the warm baths of Dioclesian, afforded me a delightful retreat, where I passed my mornings in study, only riding for an hour or two through the vast solitudes which, in the neighbourhood of Rome, invite to melancholy, meditation, and poetry. In the evening, I proceeded to the city, and found a relaxation from study in the society of her who constituted the charm of my existence; and, contented and happy, I returned to my solitude, never at a later hour than eleven o'clock. It was impossible to find, in the circuit of a great city, an abode more cheerful, more retired, or better suited to my taste, my character, and my pursuits. Delightful spot!-the remem brance of which I shall ever cherish, and which through life I shall long to revisit."-Vol. ii. pp. 121, 122.

prompted him to compose several odes on the subject of American independence, and seve ral miscellaneous productions of a similar character:-at last, in 1786, he is permitted to take up his permanent abode with his mistress, whom he rejoins at Alsace, and never afterwards abandons. In the course of the following year, they make a journey to Paris, with which he is nearly as much dissatisfied as on his former visit, and makes arrangements with Didot for printing his tragedies in a superb form. In 1788, however, he resolves upon making a complete edition of his whole works at Kehl; and submits, for the accommodation of his fair friend, to take up his

residence at Paris. There they receive intelligence of the death of her husband, which seems, however, to make no change in their way of life;-and there he continues busily employed in correcting his various works for publication, till the year 1790, when the first part of these memoirs closes with anticipations of misery from the progress of the revolution, and professions of devoted attachment to the companion whom time had only rendered more dear and respected.

The supplementary part bears date in May 1803-but a few months prior to the death of the author, and brings down his history, though in a more summary manner, to that period. He seems to have lived in much uneasiness and fear in Paris, after the commencement of the revolution; from all approbation, or even toleration of which tragic farce, as he terms it, he exculpates himself with much earnestness and solemnity; but, having vested the greater part of his fortune in that country, he could not conveniently abandon it. In 1791, he and his companion made a short visit to England, with which he was less pleased than on any former occasion,

Previously to this time, his extreme love of independence, and his desire to be constantly with the mistress of his affections, had induced him to take the very romantic step of resigning his whole property to his sister; reserving to himself merely an annuity of 14,000 livres, or little more than 500l. As this transference was made with the sanction of the King, who was very well pleased, on the whole, to get rid of so republican a subject, it was understood, upon both sides, as a tacit compact of expatriation; so that, upon his removal from Rome, he had no house or fixed residence to repair to. In this desolate and unsettled state, his passion for horses revived with additional fury; and he undertook a voyage to England, for the sole purpose of purchasing a number of those noble animals; and devoted eight months "to the study of noble heads, fine necks, and well-turned buttocks, without once opening a book or pursuing any literary avocation." In London, he purchased fourteen horses,-in relation to the number of his tragedies!—and this whimsical relation frequently presenting itself to his-the damp giving him a disposition to gout, imagination, he would say to himself with a smile-"Thou hast gained a horse by each tragedy!"-Truly the noble author must have been far gone in love, when he gave way to such innocent deliration.-He conducted his fourteen friends, however, with much judgment across the Alps; and gained great glory and notoriety at Sienna, from their daily procession through the streets, and the feats of dexterity he exhibited in riding and driving

them.

and the late hours interfering with his habits of study. The most remarkable incident in this journey, occurred at its termination. As he was passing along the quay at Dover, on his way to the packet-boat, he caught a glimpse of the bewitching woman on whose account he had suffered so much, in his former visit to this country nearly twenty years before! She still looked beautiful, he says, and bestowed on him one of those enchanting smiles which convinced him that he was recognised. Unable to control his emotion, he rushed instantly aboard-hid himself below

In the mean time, he had printed twelve of his tragedies; and imbibed a sovereign contempt for such of his countrymen as pre--and did not venture to look up till he was tended to find them harsh, obscure, or affect- landed on the opposite shore. From Calais edly sententious. In 1784, after an absence he addressed a letter to her of kind inquiry of more than two years, he rejoined his mis- and offers of service; and received an answer tress at Baden in Alsace; and, during a stay which, on account of the singular tone of canof two months with her, sketched out three dour and magnanimity which it exhibits, he new tragedies. On his return to Italy, he has subjoined in the appendix. It is untook up his abode for a short time at Pisa,-doubtedly a very remarkable production, and where, in a fit of indignation at the faults of shows both a strength of mind and a kindness Pliny's Panegyric on Trajan, he composed in of disposition which seem worthy of a nappier five days that animated and eloquent piece fortune. of the same name, which alone, of all his works have fallen into our hands, has left on our minds the impression of ardent and flowing eloquence. His rage for liberty likewise

In the end of 1792, the increasing fury of the revolution rendered Paris no longer a place of safety for foreigners of high birth; and Alfieri and his countess with some difficulty

it appears, that he was carried off by an inflammatory or gouty attack in his bowels, which put a period to his existence after a few days' illness, in the month of October 1803. We have since learned, that the publication of his posthumous works, which had been begun by the Countess of Albany at Milan, has been stopped by the French government; and that several of the manuscripts have, by the same authority, been committed to the flames.

We have not a great deal to add to this copious and extraordinary narrative. Many of the peculiarities of Alfieri may be safely referred to the accident of his birth, and the errors of his education. His ennui, arrogance, and dissipation, are not very unlike those of many spoiled youths of condition; nor is there any thing very extraordinary in his subsequent application to study, or the turn of his first political opinions. The peculiar nature of his pursuits, and the character of his literary productions, afford more curious matter for speculation.

effected their escape from it, and established themselves, with a diminished income, at his beloved Florence. Here, with his usual impetuosity, he gave vent to his anti-revolutionary feelings, by composing an apology for Louis XVI., and a short satirical view of the French excesses, which he entitled "The Antigallican." He then took to acting his own plays; and, for two or three years, this new passion seduced him in a good degree from literature. In 1795, however, he tried his hand in some satirical productions; and began, with much zeal, to reperuse and translate various passages from the Latin classics. Latin naturally led to Greek; and, in the forty-ninth year of his age, he set seriously to the study of this language. Two whole years did this ardent genius dedicate to solitary drudgery, without being able to master the subject he had undertaken. At last, by dint of perseverance and incredible labour, he began to understand a little of the easier authors; and, by the time he had completed his fiftieth year, succeeded in interpreting a considerable part of Herodotus, Thucydides, and Homer. In reflecting on the peculiar misery which The perusal of Sophocles, in the following Alfieri and some other eminent persons are year, impelled him to compose his last trage-recorded to have endured, while their minds dy of Alceste in 1798. In the end of this were withheld from any worthy occupation, year, the progress of the French armies threat- we have sometimes been tempted to conened to violate the tranquillity of his Tuscan clude, that to suffer deeply from ennui is an retreat! and, in the spring following, upon indication of superior intellect; and that it is the occupation of Florence, he and his friend only to minds destined for higher attainments retired to a small habitation in the country. that the want of an object is a source of real From this asylum, however, they returned so affliction. Upon a little reflection, however, precipitately on the retreat of the enemy, we are disposed to doubt of the soundness of that they were surprised by them on their this opinion; and really cannot permit all the second invasion of Tuscany in 1800; but had shallow coxcombs who languish under the more to suffer, it appears, from the importu- burden of existence, to take themselves, on nate civility, than from the outrages of the our authority, for spell-bound geniuses. The conquerors. The French general, it seems, most powerful stream, indeed, will stagnate was a man of letters, and made several at- the most deeply, and will burst out to more tempts to be introduced to Alfieri. When wild devastation when obstructed in its peaceevasion became impossible, the latter made ful course; but the weakly current is, upon the following haughty but guarded reply to the whole, most liable to obstruction; and will his warlike admirer:mantle and rot at least as dismally as its betters. The innumerable blockheads, in short, who betake themselves to suicide, dramdrinking, or dozing in dirty nightcaps, will not allow us to suppose that there is any real connection between ennui and talent; or that fellows who are fit for nothing but mending shoes, may not be very miserable if they are unfortunately raised above their proper occupation.

"If the general, in his official capacity, commands his presence, Victor Alfieri, who never resists constituted authority of any kind, will immediately hasten to obey the order; but if, on the contrary, he requests an interview only as a private individual, Alfieri begs leave to observe, that being of a very retired turn of mind, he wishes not to form any new acquaintance; and therefore entreats the French general to hold him excused."-Vol. ii. pp. 286, 287.

Under these disastrous circumstances, he was suddenly seized with the desire of signalizing himself in a new field of exertion; and sketched out no fewer than six comedies at once, which were nearly finished before the end of 1802. His health, during this year, was considerably weakened by repeated attacks of irregular gout and inflammatory affections; and the memoir concludes with the description of a collar and medal which he had invented, as the badge of "the order of Homer," which, in his late sprung ardour for Greek literature, he had founded and endowed.

Annexed to this record is a sort of postscript, addressed, by his friend the Abbé Caluso, to the Countess of Albany; from which

If it does frequently happen that extraordinary and vigorous exertions are found to follow this heavy slumber of the faculties, the phenomenon, we think, may be explained without giving any countenance to the supposition, that vigorous faculties are most liable to such an obscuration. In the first place, the relief and delight of exertion must act with more than usual force upon a mind which has suffered from the want of it; and will be apt to be pushed further than in cases where the exertion has been more regular. The chief cause, however, of the signal success which has sometimes attended those who have been rescued from ennui, we really believe to be their ignorance of the difficulties they have

impression of his general character; nor have we been able to find, in the whole of these confessions, a single trait of kindness of heart, or generous philanthropy, to place in the bal ance against so many indications of selfish

indeed, of a firm, elevated, and manly spirit; but small appearance of any thing gentle, or even, in a moral sense, of any thing very respectable. In his admiration, in short, of the worthies of antiquity, he appears to have copied their harshness and indelicacy at least as faithfully as their loftiness of character; and, at the same time, to have combined with it all the licentiousness and presumption of a modern Italian noble.

to encounter, and that inexperience which makes them venture on undertakings which more prudent calculators would decline. We have already noticed, more than once, the effect of early study and familiarity with the best models in repressing emulation by de-ness and violence. There are proofs enough, spair; and have endeavoured, upon this principle, to explain why so many original authors have been in a great degree without education. Now, a youth spent in lassitude and dissipation leads necessarily to a manhood of ignorance and inexperience; and has all the advantages, as well as the inconveniences, of such a situation. If any inward feeling of strength, ambition, or other extraordinary impulse, therefore, prompt such a person to attempt any thing arduous, it is likely that he We have been somewhat perplexed with will go about it with all that rash and vehe- his politics. After speaking as we have seen, ment courage which results from unconscious- of the mild government of the kings of Sarness of the obstacles that are to be overcome; dinia,—after adding that, "when he had read and it is needless to say how often success is Plutarch and visited England, he felt the most ensured by this confident and fortunate auda- unsurmountable repugnance at marrying, or city. Thus Alfieri, in the outset of his literary having his children born at Turin,"-after recareer, ran his head against dramatic poetry, cording that a monarch is a master, and a almost before he knew what was meant either subject a slave,—and "that he shed tears of by poetry or the drama; and dashed out a mingled grief and rage at having been born tragedy while but imperfectly acquainted in such a state as Piedmont ;"-after all this with the language in which he was writing, after giving up his estates to escape from and utterly ignorant either of the rules that had been delivered, or the models which had been created by the genius of his great predecessors. Had he been trained up from his early youth in fearful veneration for these rules and these models, it is certain that he would have resisted the impulse which led him to place himself, with so little preparation, within their danger; and most probable that he would never have thought himself qualified to answer the test they required of him. In giving way, however, to this propensity, with all the thoughtless freedom and vehemence which had characterised his other indulgences, he found himself suddenly embarked in an unexpected undertaking, and in sight of unexpected distinction. The success he had obtained with so little knowledge of the subject, tempted him to acquire what was wanting to deserve it; and justified hopes and stimulated exertions which earlier reflection would, in all probability, have for ever pre-writings and his conduct, might well have

vented.

this bondage, and after writing his books on the Tiranide, and his odes on American liberty, we really were prepared to find him taking the popular side, at the outset at least of the French Revolution, and exulting in the downfal of one of those hateful despotisms, against the whole system of which he had previously inveighed with no extraordinary moderation. Instead of this, however, we find him abusing the revolutionists, and extolling their opponents with all the zeal of a professed antijacobin,-writing an eulogium on the dethroned monarch like Mr. Pybus, and an Antigallican like Peter Porcupine. Now, we are certainly very far from saying, that a true friend of liberty might not exe crate the proceedings of the French revolu tionists; but a professed hater of royalty might have felt more indulgence for the new republic; such a crazy zealot for liberty, as Alfieri showed himself in Italy, both by his

been carried away by that promise of emanThe morality of Alfieri seems to have been cipation to France, which deluded sounder at least as relaxed as that of the degenerate heads than his in all the countries of Europe. nobles, whom in all other things he professed There are two keys, we think, in the work to reprobate and despise. He confesses, with- before us, to this apparent inconsistency. out the slightest appearance of contrition, that Alfieri, with all his abhorrence of tyrants, his general intercourse with women was pro-was, in his heart, a great lover of aristocracy; fligate in the extreme; and has detailed the and, he had a great spite and antipathy at particulars of three several intrigues with the French nation, collectively and individmarried women, without once appearing to ually. imagine that they could require any apology or expiation. On the contrary, while recording the deplorable consequences of one of them, he observes, with great composure, that it was distressing to him to contemplate a degradation, of which he had, "though innocently," been the occasion. The general arrogance of his manners, too, and the occasional brutality of his conduct towards his inferiors, are far from giving us an amiable

Though professedly a republican, it is easy to see, that the republic he wanted was one on the Roman model,-where there were Patricians as well as Plebeians, and where a man of great talents had even a good chance of being one day appointed Dictator. He did not admire kings indeed, because he did not happen to be born one, and because they were the only beings to whom he was born inferior: but he had the utmost veneration