FOOTNOTES:

Cantava in riva al fiumeTirse diLeonora,E rispondean le selve, e l'onde,onora.

Sometimes he disguised her name as l'Aurora, l'Aura, Onor, le onora,[129]

Dell' Onor simulacro e'l nome vostro.

To these the preceding Madrigal is a sort ofkey; or the better to conceal the true object of his adoration, he carried his apparent homage, and often his poetical gallantry, to the feet of other fair ladies. Lucretia d'Este, the elder sister of Leonora; Tarquinia Molza, a beauty and a poetess; and Lucretia Bendidio, another mostaccomplished woman, who numbered all the poets and literati of Ferrara in her train, frequently inspired him.

The mention of Lucretia Bendidio reminds me of an incident in Tasso's early life, which, besides being characteristic of his times and genius, is extremelyaproposto my present purpose and subject. In the days of his first enthusiasm for Lucretia, when he and Guarini were rivals for her favour, he undertook to maintain, publicly, fiftytheses, or difficult questions, in the "Science of Love." These "Conclusion! amorosi" may be found in the third volume of the great folio edition of his works; and some of them, it must be confessed, afforded matter for much amusing and edifying discussion; for instance,—"Amore esser più nell' amata che nell' amante," "that love exists rather in the person beloved than in the lover," which seems to involve a nice distinction in metaphysics; and "Nessuna amata essere, o poter essere ingrata,"—"that no woman truly beloved, is or can be ungrateful," which involves a mystery—and a truth. And the 48th, "Se più sipatisca, o non ricevendo alcun premio, o ricevendo minor del desiderio,"—"whether in love, it be harder to receive no recompense whatever, or less than we desire,"—a question so difficult to settle, and so depending on individual feeling, that it should have been put to the vote. Others prove, that whatever was the practice in those days, the received and philosophical theory of love was sublime enough; for instance, the 14th, "That the more love is regulated by reason, the more noble it is in its nature." (Agreed to, with exceptions, of which Tasso himself might furnish the most prominent.) That "compassion in our sex is never a sign of reciprocal affection, but on the contrary." (True, generally.) The 34th, "That the respect of the lover for her he loves increases the value and delight of every favour she grants him." (I think this must have passed undisputed, or by acclamation.)

The 38th of these curious propositions, "L'uomo in sua natura amar più intentamente e stabilmente che la donna,"—that "men by nature love more intensely and more permanentlythan women," was opposed by Signora Orsolina Cavaletta, a woman of singular accomplishments, and who displayed, in defence of her sex, so much wit and talent, such various learning, ingenuity, and eloquence, that the young disputant, perhaps placed in a dilemma between his honour and his gallantry, came very hardly off. This singular exhibition continued for three days, and was conducted with infinite solemnity, in presence of the Court and the Princesses; all the nobility and even the superior clergy of Ferrara crowded to witness it; and I doubt whether any lecture at the British Institution, on mathematics, or electricity, or geology, was ever listened to by our fair bas-bleus with half as much interest as Tasso's "Fifty Theses on Love" excited in Ferrara.

Several years after his first introduction to Leonora d'Este, and after some of the most impassioned and least ambiguous of his verses were written, the Court of Ferrara was embellished by the arrival of two of the most beautiful women in all Italy,—Leonora di Sanvitali, Countess of Scandiano, then a youthful bride, and her not lesslovely mother-in-law, Barbara, Countess of Sala. The Countess of Scandiano is theotherLeonorawho has puzzled all the biographers, from the open gallantry and avowed adoration with which Tasso has celebrated her; but in strains,—O how different from the sentiment, the veneration, the tenderness, and the mystery which breathe through his verses to Leonora d'Este! A third Leonora was said to exist in the person of the Countess's favourite attendant: but this is untrue. The name of Leonora's waiting-maid was Laura. Tasso has addressed several little poems to her; and there can be no doubt that she occasionally served as a blind to his real attachment for her mistress. The Countess of Scandiano's attendant was the fair Olympia, to whom is addressed that exquisitely graceful Canzone,

O con le Grazie elette, e con gli amori.

The Duchess of Ferrara's maid, the beautiful Livia d'Arco, and even her dwarf, are also immortalised in Tasso's verses, who poured forth his courtly gallantry with an exhaustless and splendidprodigality, fitting their praises to his lyre, as if it had never resounded to higher themes.

At a court festival given by the Duke Alphonso, in honour of his beautiful and illustrious visitors, the Countess of Sala appeared with her fine hair wreathed round her head in the form of a coronet, which with her grand style of beauty and majestic deportment, gave her the air of a Juno. The young Countess of Scandiano, on the other hand, enchanted by her Hebe-like graces, her smiles, and the unequalled beauty of a pouting underlip;—nothing was talked of at Ferrara but these braided tresses and this lovely lip; the poets and the young cavaliers were divided into parties on the occasion. Tasso has celebrated both with the same voluptuous elegance of style in which he described his Armida. To the Countess of Scandiano he wrote,

Quel labbro, che le rose han coloritoMolle si sporge, e tumidetto in fuore, &c.

To the Countess of Sala,

Barbara! maraviglia de' tempi nostri.

But the Countess of Scandiano was more especially the object of his public adoration. It was a poetical passion, openly professed; and flattering, as it appears, both to the lady and to her husband, without in any degree implicating either her discretion or that of Tasso. Compare his verses to this young Countess—thisperegrina Fenice,[130]as he fancifully styles her, who comes shining forth, notto be consumed, butto consume,—to the profound tenderness, the intense yet mournful feeling of some of the poems composed for the Princess d'Este, about the same time; when he must have daily contrasted the rich bloom, the smiling eyes, and sparkling graces of the youthful Countess, with the fading or faded beauty, the languid form, and pale cheek of his long-loved Leonora. See particularly the Sonnet

Tre gran Donne vid' io, &c.

"Three illustrious ladies did I behold,—I sung them all—one onlyI loved," &c. And another equally beautiful and significant,

Perchè 'n giovenil volto amor mi mostriTalor, DonnaReal, rose e ligustriOblio non pone in me, de' miei trilustriAffanni, o de miei spesi indarno inchiostri.E 'l cor, che s' invaghi degli onor vostriDa prima, e vostro fu poscia più lustriReserba, amo in sè forme più illustriChe perle e gemme, e bei coralli ed ostri.Queste egli in suono di sospir sì chiariFarebbe udir, che d' amorosa faceAccenderebbe i più gelati cori.Ma oltre suo costume è fatto avaroDe' vostri pregi, suoi dolci tesori,Che in se medesmo gli vagheggia etace!

Perchè 'n giovenil volto amor mi mostriTalor, DonnaReal, rose e ligustriOblio non pone in me, de' miei trilustriAffanni, o de miei spesi indarno inchiostri.

E 'l cor, che s' invaghi degli onor vostriDa prima, e vostro fu poscia più lustriReserba, amo in sè forme più illustriChe perle e gemme, e bei coralli ed ostri.

Queste egli in suono di sospir sì chiariFarebbe udir, che d' amorosa faceAccenderebbe i più gelati cori.

Ma oltre suo costume è fatto avaroDe' vostri pregi, suoi dolci tesori,Che in se medesmo gli vagheggia etace!

"Albeit in younger faces Love at timesMay show me where a fresher rose is set,Yet,RoyalLady, can I not forgetMy fifteen years of pain and useless rhymes.This heart, so touch'd by all thy beauty bright,After so many years is still thine own,And still retaineth forms more exquisiteThan pearls, or purple gems, or coral stone.All this my heart in soft sighs would make known,And thus with fire the coldest bosom fill,But that, unlike itself, that heart hath grownSo covetous of thy sweet charms, and thee,(Its secret treasures,) that it aye doth fleeInwards, and dwells upon them, and is still."[131]

Lastly, that most perfect Sonnet, so well known and so celebrated, that I should not insert it here, but that I am enabled to give, for the first time, a translation equally faithful to the sentiment and the poetry of the original.

Negli anni acerbi tuoi, purpurea rosaSembravi tu, ch' ai rai tepidi, all' oraNon apre 'l sen, ma nel suo verde ancoraVerginella s' asconde, e vergognosa.O più tosto parei (che mortal cosa,Non s' assomiglia a te) celeste Aurora,Che le campagne imperla, e i monti indora,Lucida in ciel sereno e rugiadosa.Or la men verde età nulla a te toglie;Ne te, benche negletta, in manto adornoGiovinetta beltà vince, o pareggia.Cosi più vago è 'l fior, poiché le foglieSpiega odorate: e 'l sol nel mezzo giornoViè-più, che nel mattin, luce e fiammeggia.

Negli anni acerbi tuoi, purpurea rosaSembravi tu, ch' ai rai tepidi, all' oraNon apre 'l sen, ma nel suo verde ancoraVerginella s' asconde, e vergognosa.

O più tosto parei (che mortal cosa,Non s' assomiglia a te) celeste Aurora,Che le campagne imperla, e i monti indora,Lucida in ciel sereno e rugiadosa.

Or la men verde età nulla a te toglie;Ne te, benche negletta, in manto adornoGiovinetta beltà vince, o pareggia.

Cosi più vago è 'l fior, poiché le foglieSpiega odorate: e 'l sol nel mezzo giornoViè-più, che nel mattin, luce e fiammeggia.

"Thou, in thy unripe years, wast like the rose,Which shrinketh from the summer dawn, afraid,And with her green veil, like a bashful maid,Hideth her bosom sweet, and scarcely blows:Or rather,—(for what shape ever aroseFrom the dull earth like thee,) thou didst appearHeavenly Aurora, who, when skies are clear,Her dewy pearls o'er all the country sows.Time stealeth nought: thy rare and careless graceSurpasseth still the youthful bride when neatest,—Her wealth of dress, her budding blooming face,So is the full-blown rose for age the sweetest,So doth the mid-day sun outshine the morn,With rays more beautiful and brighter born!"[132]

Yet all this was too little. His minor lyrics, the unlaboured and spontaneous effusions of leisure, of fancy, of sentiment, would have been glory enough for any other poet, and fame enough for any other woman: but Tasso had founded his hopes of immortality on his great poem, The Jerusalem Delivered; and it was imperfect in his eyes unless Leonora were shrined in it. To convert the pale, gentle, elegant invalidinto a heroine, seemed impossible: she was no model for his lovely amazon, Clorinda; nor his exquisite sorceress, Armida; nor his love-sick Erminia: for her, therefore, and to her honour, and to the eternal memory of his love for her, he composed the episode in the second Canto, where we have her portrait at full length as Sophronia.

Vergine era fra lor, di gia maturaVerginità, d'alta pensieri e regi,D'alta Beltà; ma sua beltà non cura,O tanto sol quant' onestà sen fregi;E 'l suo pregio maggior che tra le muraD'angusta casa, asconde i suoi gran pregi:E da' vagheggiatori ella s'invola,Alle lodi, agli sguardi, inculta e sola.Non sai ben dir s'adorno, o se negletta,Se caso od arte, il bel volto compose,Di natura, d'amor, di cieli amici,Le negligenze sue sono artifici.Mirata da ciascun, passa, e non miraL'altera donna!

Non sai ben dir s'adorno, o se negletta,Se caso od arte, il bel volto compose,Di natura, d'amor, di cieli amici,Le negligenze sue sono artifici.

Mirata da ciascun, passa, e non miraL'altera donna!

Among them dwelt a noble maid, maturedIn loveliness, of thoughts serene and high,And loftiest beauty;—beauty which herselfEsteem'd not more than modesty might own.Within an humble dwelling did she hideHer peerless charms, and shunning lovers' eyes,From flattering words and glances, lived retired.Whether 'tis curious care, or sweet neglect,Or chance, or art, that have array'd her thus,One scarce can tell: for each unstudied graceHas been the work of Nature, heaven, and love.And thus admired by all, unheeding all,Forth steps the noble maid.

Whether 'tis curious care, or sweet neglect,Or chance, or art, that have array'd her thus,One scarce can tell: for each unstudied graceHas been the work of Nature, heaven, and love.

And thus admired by all, unheeding all,Forth steps the noble maid.

It is impossible to mistake, in this finished and exquisite portrait, the matured beauty, the negligent attire, and love of solitude which characterised Leonora: the resemblance was so perfect, as to be universally recognised and acknowledged. But is it not, as M. Ginguené remarks, equally certain that Tasso has pourtrayed himself as Olindo?

Ei che modesto è, com' essa è bella,Brama, assai, poco spera, nulla chiede!He, full of modesty and truth,Loved much, hoped little, and desired nought!

Ei che modesto è, com' essa è bella,Brama, assai, poco spera, nulla chiede!

He, full of modesty and truth,Loved much, hoped little, and desired nought!

Has he not in the verse

Ed o mia morte avventurosa appiena,

breathed forth all the smothered passion of his soul?—

Ed o mia morte avventurosa appiena!Oh fortunati miei dolci martiri!S'impetrerò che giunto seno a senoL'anima mia nella tuo bocca io spiri,E venendo tu meco a un tempo menoIn me fuor mandi gli ultimi sospiri!And O! how happy were my death! how blestThese tortures,—could I but the meed obtain,That breast to breast, and lip to lip, our soulsMight flee together, and our latest sighsMingle in death.

And O! how happy were my death! how blestThese tortures,—could I but the meed obtain,That breast to breast, and lip to lip, our soulsMight flee together, and our latest sighsMingle in death.

This episode is critically a defect in the poem: it seems to stand alone, unconnected in any way with the main action; he acknowledged this; but he absolutely, and obstinately, refused to alter it, or strike it out. He, who was in general amenable to criticism, even to a degree of weakness, willed that it should stand an everlasting monument of his tenderness, and of the virtues and the charms of her who inspired it:—and thus it has been.

A cruel, and, as I think, a most unjust imputation rests on the memory of the PrincessLeonora. She is accused of cold-heartedness, in suffering Tasso to remain so long imprisoned, without interceding in his favour, or even vouchsafing any reply to his affecting supplications for release, and for her mediation in his behalf. The excuse alledged by those who would fain excuse her,—"That she feared to compromise herself by any interference," is ten times worse than the accusation itself. But though there exists, I suppose, nowrittenproof that Leonora pleaded the cause of Tasso, or sought to mitigate his sufferings; neither is there any proof of the contrary. We know little, or rather nothing, of the private intrigues of Alphonso's palace: we have no "mémoires secrètes" of that day; no diaries kept by prying courtiers, to enlighten us on what passed in the recesses of the royal apartments: and upon mere negative presumption, shall we brand the character of a woman, who appears on every other occasion so blameless, so tender-hearted, and beneficent, with the imputation of such barbarous selfishness? for the honour of our sex, and human nature, I must believe it impossible.

In no other instance was the homage which Tasso loved to pay to high-born beauty repaid with ingratitude; all his life he seems to have been an object of affectionate interest to women. They, in his misery, stood not aloof, but ministered to him the oil and balm, which soothed his vexed and distempered spirit. The Countesses of Sala and Scandiano never forgot him. Lucretia Bendidio, who had married into the Marchiavelli family, sent him in his captivity all the consolation she could bestow, or he receive. The Duchess of Urbino (Lucretia d'Este,) was munificently kind to him. The young Princess of Mantua, she for whom he wrote his "Torrismondo," loaded him with courtesy and proofs of her regard. He was ill at the Court of Mantua, after his release from Ferrara; and her exertions to procure him a copy of Euripides, which he wished to consult, (an anecdote cited somewhere, as a proof of the rarity of the book at that time,) is also a proof of the interest and attention with which she regarded him. It happened when he was at the Court of the Duke of Urbino, that hehad to undergo a surgical operation; and the sister of the Duke, the young and beautiful Lavinia di Rovera, prepared the bandages, and applied them with her own fair and princely hands;—a little instance of affectionate interest, which Tasso has himself commemorated. If then we do not find Leonora publicly appearing as the benefactress of Tasso, and using her influence over her brother in his behalf, is it not a presumption that she was implicated in his punishment? What comfort or kindness she could have granted, must, under such circumstances, have been bestowed with infinite precaution; and, from gratitude and discretion, as carefully concealed. We know, that after the first year of his confinement, Tasso was removed to a less gloomy prison; and we know that Leonora died a few weeks afterwards; but what share she might have had in procuring this mitigation of his suffering, we do not know; nor how far the fate of Tasso might have affected her so as to hasten her own death. If we are to argue upon probabilities, without anypreponderating proof, in the name of womanhood and charity, let it be on the side of indulgence; let us not believe Leonora guilty, but upon such authority as never has been,—and I trust never can be produced.

About two years after the completion of the Jerusalem Delivered, and four years after the first representation of the Aminta;—when all Europe rung with the poet's fame, Tasso fled from the Court of Ferrara, in a fit of distraction. His frenzy was caused partly by religious horrors and scruples; partly by the petty but accumulated injuries which malignity and tyranny had heaped upon him; partly by a long-indulged and hopeless passion; and with these, other moral and physical causes combined. He fled, to hide himself and his sorrows in the arms of his sister Cornelia. The brother and sister had not met since their childish years; and Tasso, wild with misery, forlorn, and penniless, knew not what reception he was to meetwith. When arrived within a league of his birthplace, Sorrento,[133]he changed clothes with a shepherd, and in this disguise appeared before his sister, as one sent with tidings of her brother's misfortunes. The recital, we may believe, was not coldly given. Cornelia, who appears to have inherited with the personal beauty, the sensibility and strong domestic affections of her mother, Portia,[134]was so violently agitated by the eloquence of the feigned messenger, that she fainted away; and Tasso was obliged to hasten the denouement by discovering himself. In the same moment he was clasped in her affectionate arms, and bathed with her tears. How often, when I have stood on my balcony at Naples, have I looked towards the white buildings of Sorrento, glittering afar upon the distant promontory, and thought upon this scene! and felt, how that which is alreadysurpassingly beautiful to the eye, may be hallowed to the imagination by such remembrances as these!

Tasso resided with his sister for three years, the object of her unwearied and tender attention. It was on his return to Ferrara, (recalled, as Manso says, by the tenor of Leonora's letters[135]) that he was imprisoned as a lunatic at St. Anne's. They show to travellers the cell in which he was confined. Over the entrance of the gallery leading to it, is written up in large letters, "Ingresso alla Prigione di Torquato Tasso," as if to blazon, in the eye of the stranger, what is at once the renown and disgrace of that fallen city. The cell itself is small, dark and low. The abhorred grate,

Marring the sun-beams with its hideous shade,

is a semicircular window, strongly cross-barred with iron; it looks into a court-yard, so built up, if I remember rightly, that the noon-day sun could scarce reach it. Even without the hallowed associations connected with the spot, it would have chilled and saddened me. With them, the very air had a suffocating weight; and the colddark walls, and low-bowed roof, struck a shivering awe through the blood. Upon the plaster outside the grated window, I observed several names written in pencil; among the rest, those of Byron and Rogers. I must observe here, that the "Lament of Tasso" is, in fact, a cento taken from Tasso's minor poems. Almost every sentiment there expressed, may be found in the Italian; but the soul of the poet has been transfused with such a glowing impulse into its new mould, it never seems to have been adapted to another; the precious metal is the same, only the impress is different, and it has been stamped by a kindred and a master spirit. Lord Byron says,

Yes, Leonora! it shall be our fateTo be entwined for ever; but too late!

Tasso had said, that his name and that of Leonora should be united and soar to fame together.

"Ella à miei versi, ed ioCircondava al suo nome altere piume,E l'un per l'altro andò volando a prova;"

—and a long list of corresponding passages and sentiments might easily be pointed out.

The inscription on the door of Tasso's cell,lies, I believe, like many other inscriptions. Tasso wasnotconfined in this cell for seven years; but here it was that he addressed that affecting Canzone to Leonora and her sister Lucrezia, which begins "Figlie di Renata,"—"daughters of Renée!" Thus in the very commencement, by this delicate and tender apostrophe, bespeaking their compassion, by awakening the remembrance of their mother, like him so long a wretched prisoner. He reminds them of the years he spent at their side—"their noble servant and their dear companion,"

Gli anni miei tra voi spese,—Qual son,—qual fui,—che chiedo—ove mi trovo![136]

He was, after the first year, removed to a larger cell, with better accommodations. Here he made a collection of his smaller poems lately written, and dedicated them to the two Princesses. But Leonora was no longer in a state to be charmed by the verses, or flattered or touched by the admiringdevotion of her lover,—her poet,—her faithful servant: she was dying. A slow and cureless disease preyed on her delicate frame, and she expired in the second year of Tasso's imprisonment. When the news of her danger was brought to him, he requested his friend Pignarola to kiss her hand in his name, and ask her whether there was any thing which, in his sad state, he could do for her ease or pleasure? We do not know how this tender message was received or answered; but it was too late. Leonora died in February 1581, after lingering from the November previous.

Thus perished, of a premature decay, the woman who had been for seventeen years the idol of a poet's imagination—the worship of a poet's heart; she who was not unworthy of being enshrined in the rich tracery-work of sweet thoughts and bright fancies she had herself suggested. The love of Tasso for the Princess Leonora might have appeared, in his own time, something like the "desire of the night-moth for the star;" but what is itnow? what was itthenin the eyes of her whom he adored? How far was it permitted, encouraged, repaid in secret? This we cannotknow; and perhaps had we lived at the time,—in the very Court, and looked daily into her own soft eyes, practised to conceal,—we had been no wiser. Yet one more observation.

When Leonora died, all the poets of Ferrara pressed forward with the usual tribute of elegy and eulogium; but the voice of Tasso was not heard among the rest. He alone flung no garland on the bier of her, whose living brow he had wreathed with the brightest flowers of song. This is adduced by Serassi as a proof that he had never loved her. Ginguené himself can only account for it, by the presumption that he was piqued by that coldness and neglect, which I have shown was merely supposititious. Strange reasoning! as if Tasso, while his heart bled over his loss, in his solitary cell, could have deigned to join this crowd of courtly mourners! as if, under such circumstances, in such a moment, the greatness of his grief could have burst forth in any terms that must not have exposed himself to fresh rigours, and the fame, at least the discretion, of her he had loved, to suspicion! No! nothing remained to him but silence;—and he was silent.

FOOTNOTES:[120]See the Rinaldo, c. 8.[121]——From my very birthMy soul was drunk with love, &c.lament of tasso.[122]Rose, che l' arte invidiosa mira. &c.[123]Alteremente umileTe chiudi ne' tuoi cari alti soggiorni.[124]The daughter of Louis XII. She was closely imprisoned during twelve years, on suspicion of favouring the early reformers.[125]Ganymede.[126]Sonnet 37.[127]Sonnet 29.[128]I am told the original idea is in Plato; prettier, however, than either, was the speech of a modern lover, whose mistress was gazing pensively on a star: "Ne la regardez pas tant, chère amie!—je ne puis pas te la donner!"[129]The Canzono which is, I believe, esteemed the finest of those addressed to Leonora,Mentre ch' a venerar muovon le gente,concludes with this play upon her name—Costeile onoracol bel nome sante.She does themhonourby her sacred name.[130]"Foreign Phœnix."[131]Translated by a friend.[132]Translated by a friend.[133]Near Naples: thus, in his pathetic Canzone on himself,—Sassel la gloriosa alma SirenaAppresso il cui sepolcro, ebbi la cuna![134]The wife of Bernardo Tasso. See an account of her in Black's Life of Tasso.[135]Manso, Vita di T. Tasso.[136]Part of this Canzone has been elegantly translated by Mr. Wiffen in his Life of Tasso, p. 83.

[120]See the Rinaldo, c. 8.

[121]——From my very birthMy soul was drunk with love, &c.lament of tasso.

[121]

——From my very birthMy soul was drunk with love, &c.lament of tasso.

[122]Rose, che l' arte invidiosa mira. &c.

[122]

Rose, che l' arte invidiosa mira. &c.

[123]Alteremente umileTe chiudi ne' tuoi cari alti soggiorni.

[123]

Alteremente umileTe chiudi ne' tuoi cari alti soggiorni.

[124]The daughter of Louis XII. She was closely imprisoned during twelve years, on suspicion of favouring the early reformers.

[125]Ganymede.

[126]Sonnet 37.

[127]Sonnet 29.

[128]I am told the original idea is in Plato; prettier, however, than either, was the speech of a modern lover, whose mistress was gazing pensively on a star: "Ne la regardez pas tant, chère amie!—je ne puis pas te la donner!"

[129]The Canzono which is, I believe, esteemed the finest of those addressed to Leonora,Mentre ch' a venerar muovon le gente,concludes with this play upon her name—Costeile onoracol bel nome sante.She does themhonourby her sacred name.

[129]The Canzono which is, I believe, esteemed the finest of those addressed to Leonora,

Mentre ch' a venerar muovon le gente,

concludes with this play upon her name—

Costeile onoracol bel nome sante.She does themhonourby her sacred name.

[130]"Foreign Phœnix."

[131]Translated by a friend.

[132]Translated by a friend.

[133]Near Naples: thus, in his pathetic Canzone on himself,—Sassel la gloriosa alma SirenaAppresso il cui sepolcro, ebbi la cuna!

[133]Near Naples: thus, in his pathetic Canzone on himself,—

Sassel la gloriosa alma SirenaAppresso il cui sepolcro, ebbi la cuna!

[134]The wife of Bernardo Tasso. See an account of her in Black's Life of Tasso.

[135]Manso, Vita di T. Tasso.

[136]Part of this Canzone has been elegantly translated by Mr. Wiffen in his Life of Tasso, p. 83.

The Marquis Manso of Naples, who in his early youth had entertained Tasso in his palace, had cherished and honoured him when that great but unhappy man was wandering, brain-struck with misery, from one court to another,—was, in his old age, the host and admirer of Milton; thus, by a singular good fortune, allying his name to two of the most illustrious of earth's diviner sons: while theirs, linked together by the recollection of this common friend, follow each other in our memory by a natural transition. We can think of them as pressing, though at an interval of many years, the same friendly hand,and gracing the same hospitable board with "colloquy sublime." Tasso, from the romance of his story, and his personal character, is the most interesting of the two; yet Milton, besides standing highest in the scale of moral dignity, sits nearest to our hearts as an Englishman, whose genius, speaking through our native accents, strikes upon our sense,

Like the large utterance of the early gods.

We rise from reading Johnson's Biography of Milton, either with the most painful and indignant feeling of the malignity of the critic,[137]or with an impression of Milton's character, as false as it is odious. Of moral inconsistency and weakness, blended with splendid genius, we have proofs lamentable and numerous enough: to be obliged to regard the mighty father of English verse,—him "who rode sublime upon the seraph wings of ecstasy,"—him, whose harmonious soulwas tuned to the music of the spheres, though when struck in evil times, and by an adverse hand, it sent forth a crash of discord,—him, who has left us the most exquisite pictures of tenderness and beauty—to think of such a being as a petty domestic tyrant, a coarse-minded fanatic, stern and unfeeling in all the relations of life, were enough to confound all our ideas of moral fitness. When we figure to ourselves the author of Rasselas trampling over the ashes of Milton, lending his mighty powers to degrade the majestic, to disfigure the beautiful, and to darken the glorious, it is with the same feeling of concentrated disgust with which we recall the violation of the poet's grave, some years ago, when vulgar savages defaced and carried off his sacred and venerable remains piece-meal.[138]Let us for a moment imagine our Milton descendingto earth to assert his injured fame, and confronted with his great biographer—

Look here upon this picture, and on this—

The one, like his own Adam, with fair large front and hyacinthine locks, serene and blooming as his own Eden; in all the dignified graces which temperance and self-conquest lend to youth,[139]in all the purity of his stainless mind, radiant like another Moses, with the reflected glories of the Empyreum,—and then look upon the other!—But it is an awful thing for little people, to meddle with great and sacred names; and so leaving the Hippopotamus of literature in his den—proceed we.

It relieves the heart from an oppressive contradiction to behold Milton, such as he is represented by his other biographers, and such as undoubtedly he really was. It is well known,that in his youth, and even at a late age, he had an uncommonly fine person, almost to effeminacy; and was as gracefully endowed in form and manners, as he was highly and holily gifted in mind. His natural mildness, cheerfulness, and courtesy, are commemorated by all who knew him, or lived near his time.[140]He whom Johnson accuses of a "Turkish contempt of females, as inferior beings," and whom he represents in a light so ungentle and gloomy, that we cannot imagine him under the influence of beauty, was early touched by the softest passions, and during his whole life peculiarly sensible to the charm of female society: witness his successive marriages, and his friendship and intercourse with Lady Margaret Ley, and the all-accomplished Countess of Ranelagh, who supplied to him, as he says, the place ofevery friend:[141]—witness, too, a thousand most lovely and glorious passages scattered through his works, which women may quote with triumph, as proofs that we had no small influence over the imagination of our great epic poet. What but the most reverential and lofty feeling of the graces and virtues proper to our sex, could have embodied such an exquisite vision as the Lady in Comus? or created his delightful Eve? on whom, "as on a queen, a pomp of winning graces waited still."

All higher knowledge in her presence fallsDegraded; wisdom, in discourse with her,Loses discountenanc'd, and like folly shows;Authority and reason on her wait,As one intended first, not after madeOccasionally; and to consummate all,Greatness of mind and nobleness their seat,Build in her loveliest, and create an aweAbout her, as a guard angelic plac'd.

And this is the being whom a lady-author calls a "great overgrown baby, with nothing torecommend her but her submission, and her fine hair!"[142]—two things, be it observed, among the most graceful of our feminine attributes, mental and exterior. The poet who conceived and wrote this description, most assuredly had not a "Turkish contempt" for the female character.

Milton was in love, as he tells us himself, at nineteen; but the object cannot even be guessed at. He has celebrated this boyish passion very beautifully in one of his Latin elegies. One of the passages in this poem, in which he compares the effect produced on him by the first momentary view of his mistress, followed by her immediate absence to the Theban Œclides,[143]swallowed up by the abyss which opens beneath him, and gazing back upon the parting light of day, is admired for its classic sublimity and appropriate beauty.

There is a tradition mentioned by all his biographers, that while Milton was a student at Cambridge, an Italian lady of rank, who was travelling in England, found him sleeping one dayunder the shade of a tree, and, struck with his beauty, wrote with her pencil on a slip of paper, the pretty madrigal of Guarini, which Menage translated for Madame de Sevigné, "Occhi, stelle mortali," and leaving it in his hand, pursued her journey. This fair unknown is said to have been the cause of Milton's travels into Italy; but the story rests on no authority: and it is clear, that the "foreign fair" to whom the Sonnets are addressed, was neither imaginary nor unknown. During his stay at Rome, he was received with particular distinction by the Cardinal Barberini, the nephew of the reigning Pope, and at his palace had frequent opportunities of hearing Leonora Baroni, the finest singer in Italy. She was the daughter of Adriana of Mantua, surnamed, for her beauty, La Bella Adriana, and the best singer and player on the lute of her time. Leonora inherited her mother's extraordinary talent for music, and conquered all hearts by the inexpressible charm of her voice and style. She was also a poetess, frequently composing the words of her own songs. Though not a regular beauty, she had brillianteyes, and a captivating countenance and manner. Count Fulvio Testi, in a Sonnet addressed to her, celebrates the union of so many charms:

Tra il concento e 'l fulgor, dubbio è se siaL'udir più dolce, o il rimirar più caro.Deh fammi cieco, o fammi sordo, amore!

M. Maugars, himself a musician, who saw and heard Leonora at Rome, praises her talents generally, and adds, that she was no coquette; that she sang with confidence, but with modesty; that there was nothing in her manners that could be censured; that the effect she produced on those who heard her, was owing, not only to the wonderful rapidity and delicacy of her execution, but to the care with which she gave the exact sense and proper expression of the words she sang. He tells us, that on one occasion, shefavouredhim by singing with her mother and her sister, each accompanying herself on a different instrument (in those days pianos were not, and Leonora's favourite instrument was the Theorbo, on which she excelled). This little concert so enraptured our musician, that, to use his own words, he forgot his mortality, "et crut être dejà parmiles anges, jouissant des contentemens des bienheureux."

It is no wonder that the charms and talents which exalted this prosaic Frenchman almost into a poet, should turn the heads of poets themselves. The verses addressed to Leonora were collected into a volume, and published under the title of "Applausi poetici alle glorie della Signora Leonora Baroni."—"Poetical eulogies to the glory of Signora Leonora Baroni." A similar homage had been paid to her mother, Adriana, who reckoned Tasso among her panegyrists. This may seem too high a distinction for a species of talent, which, however admirable, can leave behind no durable monument, and therefore can claim no interest with posterity. Yet is it just, that those whom heaven has enriched with the gift of melody, and who have cultivated that delicious faculty to its height, until with angel-skill they can suspend the dominion of pain in aching hearts,[144]—thatsuch should ravish with delight a whole generation, and then perish from the earth, they and their memory, with the pleasure they bestowed, and gratitude be voiceless and tuneless in their praise? The gift of song is fleeting as that of beauty; but while the painter fixes on his canvas

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