POE 
appears unnatural. The eagle contemplating its own 
wing on the dart which kills it, is evidently impoffible 
in fad:, and therefore little pleafing in fiction. Upon the 
whole, however, the Englifii Bards and Scotch Reviewers 
is one of the bell fatires in our language, and betrays good 
feelings, good fenfe, fade, and powers. 
The force of fatire difplayed in the “Sketch from Private 
Life” was feverely felt by all. It is impoffible to find any 
thing fo fevere in the bittereft inveCtives of Juvenal. But, 
as nothing could jullify the meannefs of the attack, fo no 
ikill could prevent the lownefs of the author’s foul from 
fhining through his verfe. The great force of the lines 
beginning “Skill’d by a touch to deepen fcandal’s tints,” 
is fpoilt by anallufion to perfonal deformity, by an attack 
on the miferies of age truly difgufting. It has alfo a 
poor and fecond-hand conceit of “ Nature’s journey¬ 
men” having made the objeft of the fatire. Again ; the 
dreadful imprecation of 
May the ftrong curfe of crufli’d affeftion light 
Back on thy bofom with reflected blight j 
And make thee, in thy leprofy of mind, 
As loathfome to thyfelf as to mankind— 
terminates in this nonfenfe: 
Till thy hard heart be calcined into duft. 
And thy foul wither in its hideous cruft. 
The higheft fame of Byron refts on his “ Childe 
Harold.” It is a poem which, with all its faults, mult 
Hand for ever; and deferves to take its rank with the 
great epics of Milton, Homer, Virgil, and the reft. Not 
that it is at all fimilar in conftruction to thefe works. 
On the contrary, it is as far removed from the epic as it is 
from every other model. It may be called a poem of 
reflections. The “ Childe,” travelling through various 
countries without a purpofe, and flying from miferable 
remembrances to the bright thoughts of poetical extacy, 
finds food for the molt fublime and beautiful contempla¬ 
tions in every thing he fees. The torrent, the Alps, the 
ltorm, the ocean, by turns infpire fuch feelings as never 
before glowed on the page of verfe. He pafles to Spain, 
then the fcene of the mighty conflict between England, 
Spain, and France, where 
Death rides upon the fulphury Siroc ; 
Red battle ftamps his foot, and nations feel the fliock ; 
defcribes the peninfular war in language that makes the 
fearfulleft heart beat with love of combat; beholds the 
“ Spanifh maiden aroufed,” and fmiling 
In Danger’sgorgon face, 
Thin the clofed ranks, and le^d in Glory’s fearful chafe. 
From the animated picture of combat and victory, he 
turns to mufe on the ufeleflhels of war. Gloomy and 
defponding, he fighs over and derides the folly of ambi¬ 
tion ; and feels war’s favourites to be worth no more than 
“ to fhine in worthlefs lays.” 
ParnalTus is the next fubjeCt of meditation. Elevated 
by the beauty and grandeur of its fcenery, the claffic re¬ 
collections of ages pour themfelves with a prefent reality 
over his foul. Defcription again flows from his pen at 
the witnefs of thole famous bull-fights which are the 
pride of Spanifh knights and their high-born dames. 
Reflections on Spain and on her fons dole the firft canto. 
In the fecond he leaves Spain; defcants on folitude, and 
on woman, &c. pafles to Greece, and defcribes, in the 
clear language of poetry and truth, the various nations 
of this claffic land: the Albanian, the Turk, the Suliote, 
Ali “ the man of war and woes,” alternately employ his 
pen. 
Harold next pafles over the ruins of the “Niobeof 
Nations,” Rome. Here the very infpiration of the 
inufes engrofles his foul. Every ftep, every ftone, the 
marbled column, the broken arch, the ruined wall, the 
lonely fepulchre, the fculptured urn; all thefe become 
the touchftones which light the etherial fires of his mind. 
Vol. XX. No. 14m 
TRY. 801 
He throws them on his pages mixed with all.the thought 
that claffic love gives or excites, with fpeculatipns on 
man and nature which take one far from ; this ’^world. 
But why fhould we indulge our lotV of this b^ 0 k in 
prattling in our poor words of excellences: ^.hich the 
higheft language would fail to give the flighted idea ? 
There are no poets in any age who have furpafTed the 
beautiful reflections of “ Childe Harold a poem which, 
though unconnected, and divelted of all narrative, is 
ftili fuch a one as we can never lay down incompletely 
read. His epifodes, as that on Florence ; on the author’s 
friend ; the addrefs to Ada ; the fong to his miftrefs ; his 
account of his own miferies ; on the world and on time ; 
mull be mentioned among the never-dying beauties of 
the work. Its verfe, the Spenferian ftanza, is often¬ 
times fweeter than that of its inventor ; and, when the 
force of the matter acquires the freedom of blank verfe, 
Byron no longer offends the ear by rhymes ; they are 
written for the eye, but the ear acknowledges them not. 
Thus he fkilfully unites the two grandeft fpecies of 
Engliffi compolition. 
The narrative poems of Byron are only inferior to his 
Childe Harold in grandeur; in all elfe they are equal, 
and perhaps their being narrative renders them more 
generally read than even that incomparable work. The 
Giaour, a very irregular fragment, managed with very 
little fkill or effeCt, contains fome expreffions of the 
intenfell feelings. The fimile of Greece to a corfe w hich 
is juft dead, anil therefore retains all of earthly beauty 
with a fomething beyond even that, is as fine as it is 
original. The character of the Giaour wants nothing 
but fome marks to diftinguifh him from the other heroes 
of Byron ; otherwife he is a magnificent conception ; 
his firft appearance has a ftriking effeCt. The defcription 
of HafTan’s deferted hall is one of the fined we know. It 
is defaced by a few affeCted verfes; but neverthelefs is 
full of genius. No fimile among the laboured ones of 
the ancients furpafles that of beauty to the Kaftimeer 
butterfly; it is fupported through a multitude of ana¬ 
logies, each clear and elegant. DireCVly contrafted with 
this beauty is the fublime fimile of 
The mind that broods o’er guilty woes, 
Is like the fcorpion girt by fire. 
Equal in force to this is the fierce fentiment, that 
Love itfelf could never pant 
For all that beauty fighs to grant. 
With half the fervour hate bellows 
Upon the laft embrace of foes, 
When grapplin'gin the fight they fold 
Thole arms which ne’er lhall lofe their hold. 
Friends meet to part; love laughs at faith ; 
True foes, once met, are join’d till death. 
The fatanic ftate of the Giaour, while in the mo- 
nailery, is truly appalling; and really it feents quite un- 
neceflary that, for merely running away with a Turkilh 
Have, and flaying her mailer in open fight, a man fhould 
give himfelf up to fuch utter deipair; but it lends the 
charaCler a force it would otherwife want. The love ex- 
prefled by this infidel is of that confuming kind which 
may be truly coniidered as the forte of our author. 
“The Prifoner of Chillon” is the moft pathetic piece 
that ever was compofed. The fterneft heart melts at its 
recital: and he muft want natural feeling who can refrain 
from tears at its firft perufal. It breaks on us when we 
are unprepared. The barren defcription, 
There are feven columns mafly and grey, 
Dim with a dull impriloned ray; 
And in each pillar there is a ring, 
And in each ring there is a chain - — 
brings us into a gloomy but by no means melting mood ; 
but foon the aged prifoner who defcribes if, is prefented 
before us in the thraldom of his youth, in all his woe, and 
with his two brothers by his fide. Oh ! that we had 
9 S words’: 
