POE 
Myrrha’s fpeech at a window is full of the divined 
poetical thoughts. It is too long for tranfcription. In 
the parting, too, with the queen, a mod beautiful fimile 
occurs. Sardanapalus tells her of his efteeni for her 
virtue, though he has not loved her. He fays that none 
Ere valued more thy virtues, though he knew not 
To profit by them ; as the miner lights 
Upon a vein of virgin ore, difcovering 
That which avails him nothing. He hath found it 5 
But ’tis not his, but fonie fuperior’s, who 
Placed him to dig, but not divide the wealth 
Which fparkles at his feet; nor dare he lift 
Nor poife it, but mud grovel on, upturning 
The fullen earth. 
Byron has fome indances of coincidence with other 
writers, which are accidental; but there is one in this 
play he mud have known. Arbaces fays, “ The night is 
come.” Beleus replies, “But not gone.”—Vide Julius 
Caefar. 
In the “Two Fofcari” we are prefented with a very 
bad kind of Brutus in the father, a female differing from 
Angiclina only in being fomewhat abufive, and in the 
younger Fofcari we have a very curious perfonage. This 
hero is banifhed from Venice, but choofes rather to return 
to his native city, and brave repeated tortures, than re¬ 
main quiet abroad. It is often more difficult to believe 
plays founded on faft than mere works of fidtion. For in 
hiftory we fee nothing but the bare fail, without the par¬ 
ticular motives; and hence an adlion feems often capri¬ 
cious or unnatural, which, if its caufes were known, 
would be found confonant with natural paffions. This 
applies drongly to the young Fofcari. We know that 
he really did undergo torments for returning home ; and 
in afledtion for fome lady, defire to fee his relatives or 
friends, or in fome other tie of that nature, we lhould fee 
fufficient reafon for luch a return in an unquiet fpirit. 
TRY. 805 
V 
But the reafon Byron intimates is a mere love of the 
fernery of Venice; for he hates the government and patri¬ 
cians of that city, and defpifes the plebeians. He is a 
married man, whofe wife might of courfe have fled to 
him. Still he comes back ; and the reafon he gives for 
the rafh ftep, is alone to look out on the city, and inhale 
his native air. The play contains worfe dialogues than 
any in Faliero, and much fewer beauties to redeem them. 
Lord Byron introduced into England thofe highly— 
amufing narrative poems fo much efteemed in Italy, 
which, uniting all ftyles, are gay, licentious, witty, often 
fatirical and caultic, occafionally pathetic, or even ferious; 
indeed pleafing all by their endlefs variety. Of thefe, rhe 
fprightly “ Beppo” was the belt, “Don Juan” the more 
extenfive. The latter work began with much wit and 
many beauties ; but at length became too grofs for mo- 
deft people to read, and too foolifn to attraft the attention 
even of the more depraved. We could extradt from it 
many ftanzas of abfolute nonfenfe; nor is there, in the 
bright flaffies that occafionally irradiate its dulnefs, much 
that the author has not faid before in his higher works. 
“ Mazeppo” was the firft inftance of a manifeft falling 
off in his narrative pieces ; and indeed his later produc¬ 
tions of this kind are very inferior. The “ Ifland” has 
fome fine pafl'ages ; and fome forcible fpeeches are found 
in “Werner;” but neither one nor the other have en¬ 
hanced the fame of the author. 
In this fketch of thehiftory of poetry it may be remarked, 
that many refpeftable authors have efcaped our notice ; 
and that, in the department of modern poetry efpecially, 
we have omitted fome names that might fairly rank with 
thofe we have inferted. But it was neceftary to flop 
fomewhere. The gradations of poetical talent are almoft 
infenfible; and therefore we deemed the leaft invidious 
plan would be to notice only fuch as decided and com¬ 
mon and popular favour had recommended to our more 
particular attention. W. G. J. 
P O G 
PO'FIG, a town of Bohemia, in the circle ofBoleflaw: 
ten miles north-weft of Jung-Buntzel. 
PO'GAH, a town of Hindooftan, in Bahar: fifty-feven 
miles fouth-fouth-weft of Patna. Lat. 24. 53. N. Ion. 84. 
45. E. 
PO'GAR, a town of Ruffia, in the government of Nov¬ 
gorod Sieverfkoi : twenty miles north of Novgorod Siev- 
erfkoi. Lat. 52. 18. N. Ion. 33. 14. E. 
POGATO'VA, a town of Ruffia, in the government 
of Archangel: ninety-two miles fouth-eaft of Oneg. 
POGE (Cape), the north-eaft point of Chabaquiddick 
ifland, near Martha’s Vineyard, Maflachufetts. From 
Holmes’s Hole to this cape, the courfe is fouth-eaft by 
eaft 3§ leagues. Lat. 41. 25. N. Ion. 70. 22. W. 
PO'GEN, a town of Bavaria, on a river of the fame 
name, which foon after runs into the Danube: fix miles 
eaft of Straubing. 
POGGE , f. in ichthyology. See Cottus cataphrac- 
tus, vol. v. p. 267, 8. 
POGGET'TO, a walled town of Italy, in Piedmont, 
province of Nice. Population 2500. 
POG'GIO, a town of Italy, in the department of the 
Mincio : twenty miles fouth-eaft of Mantua.—Alfo, a 
town of Italy, in the department of the Lower Po : feven 
miles eaft of Cento.—A town of Italy, feven miles weft 
of Genoa ; and another fifteen miles fouth-weft of Genoa. 
—-A town of Tufcany, called Villa Imperiale, where the 
late grand duke had a palace: eight miles /outh-eaft of 
Florence. 
POG'GIO BON'ZI, a fmall but populous town of Italy, 
in Tufcany : twenty-eight miles fouth-eaft of Florence. 
POG'GIOBR ACCIOLI'NI, one of the early promoters 
of literature in Italy, was born in 1380 at Terranuova, in 
Vol. XX. No. 1411. 
P O G 
the Florentine territory. His father, Guccio Bracciolini, 
was a notary by profellion ; but, on account of the era- 
barraffment of his circumftances, was obliged to fly from 
his creditors. Poggio (who derived his name from his 
maternal grandfather) was educated at the public lciiooi 
of Florence, where he learned Latin under the direction 
of John of Ravenna, and Greek under that of Manuel 
Chryfoloras. After completing his education, he went 
to Rome, where pope Boniface IX. gave him the office of 
writer of the apoftolical letters. That pontiff dying in 
1404, Poggio was continued in his port by his fuccelfor. 
Innocent VII. In the following confufions of the papal 
court he feveral times changed his abode, but he retained 
his fituation as apoftolic feribe. When John XXII. in 
1414, convoked a general council at Conftance, Poggio ac¬ 
companied him thither, inverted with the confidential 
office of fecretary. The pontiff foon incurred a depofi- 
tion well merited by his vices, and his houfehold was 
difperfed; but Poggio remained at Conftance, where for 
a time he ftudied the Hebrew language under a converted 
Jew. Biblical enquiries were, however, little to his tafte; 
and he relieved the anxieties he felt from difappointed 
hopes of advancement, by a journey to the baths of Ba¬ 
den, of which he has left a lively and entertaining de- 
feription. 
On his return to Conftance, he witneffed the trial and 
execution of the reformer Jerome of Prague ; and the ac¬ 
count he has given of the defence and fuffering of that in¬ 
jured man fufficiently proves that he regarded with a phi- 
lofophical fpirit the corruptions and cruelties of the Ro- 
mifli clergy. “He flood undaunted and intrepid,” fays 
Poggio; “ not merely contemning, but, like another Cato, 
longing for, death. He was a man worthy to be had in 
9T everlafting 
