Hot from the hands promiscuously applied, Το press the hand so press'd by none but thine; To gaze upon that eye which never met Another's ardent look without regret ; Voluptuous Waltz! and dare I thus blaspheme? Thy bard forgot thy praises were his theme. Terpsichore, forgive !-at every ball My wife now waltzes - and my daughters shall; Will wear as green a bough for him as me)— THE GIAOUR; A FRAGMENT OF A TURKISH TALE.(1) "One fatal remembrance-one sorrow that throws MOORE (1) [The "Giaour" was published in May 1813, and abundantly sus tained the impression created by the two first cantos of Childe Harold. It is obvious that in this, the first of his romantic narratives, Lord Byron's versification reflects the admiration he always avowed for Mr. Coleridge's "Christabel," - the irregular rhythm of which had already been adopted in the "Lay of the Last Minstrel." The fragmentary style of the composition was suggested by the then new and popular "Columbus" of Mr. Rogers. As to the subject, it was not merely by recent travel that the author had familiarized himself with Turkish history. "Old Knolles," he said at Missolonghi, a few weeks before his death, "was one of the first books that gave me pleasure when a child; and I believe it had much influence on my future wishes to visit the Levant, and gave, perhaps, the oriental colouring which is observed in my poetry." In the margin of his copy of Mr. D'Israeli's essay on "The Literary Character," we find the following note:-"Knolles, Cantemir, De Tott, Lady M. W. Montague, Hawkins's translation from Mignot's History of the Turks, the Arabian Nights. All travels or histories, or books upon the East, I could meet with, I had read, as well as Ricaut, before I was ten years old.” — E.] |