Part 36 (1/2)

Against black Pagans, Turks, and Saracens, And toiled with works of war, retired himself To Italy, and there, at _Venice_, gave His body to that _pleasant_ country's earth, And his pure soul unto his captain, Christ, Under whose colours he had fought so long.

Before I left Venice, I had returned to you your late, and Mr.

Hobhouse's sheets of _Juan_. Don't wait for further answers from me, but address yours to Venice, as usual. I know nothing of my own movements; I may return there in a few days, or not for some time.

All this depends on circ.u.mstances. I left Mr. Hoppner very well....

My daughter Allegra was well too, and is growing pretty; her hair is growing darker, and her eyes are blue. Her temper and her ways, Mr.

Hoppner says, are like mine, as well as her features: she will make, in that case, a manageable young lady.

I have never heard anything of Ada, the little Electra of my Mycenae.... But there will come a day of reckoning, even if I should not live to see it.... What a long letter I have scribbled!

PS. Here, as in Greece, they strew flowers on the tombs. I saw a quant.i.ty of rose-leaves, and entire roses, scattered over the graves at Ferrara. It has the most pleasing effect you can imagine.

TO THE SAME

_In rebellious mood_

Bologna, 24 _Aug_. 1819.

I wrote to you by last post, enclosing a buffooning letter for publication, addressed to the buffoon Roberts, who has thought proper to tie a canister to his own tail. It was written off-hand, and in the midst of circ.u.mstances not very favourable to facetiousness, so that there may, perhaps, be more bitterness than enough for that sort of small acid punch:--you will tell me. Keep the _anonymous_, in any case: it helps what fun there may be. But if the matter grow serious about _Don Juan_, and you feel _yourself_ in a sc.r.a.pe, or _me_ either, _own that I am the author. I_ will never _shrink_, and if _you_ do, I can always answer you in the question of Guatimozin to his minister--each being on his own coals.

I wish that I had been in better spirits; but I am out of sorts, out of nerves, and now and then (I begin to fear) out of my senses. All this Italy has done for me, and not England: I defy all you, and your climate to boot, to make me mad. But if ever I do really become a Bedlamite, and wear a strait waistcoat, let me be brought back among you: your people will then be proper company.

I a.s.sure you what I here say and feel has nothing to do with England, either in a literary or personal point of view. All my present pleasures or plagues are as Italian as the opera. And, after all, they are but trifles; for all this arises from my 'Dama's' being in the country for three days (at Capofiume). But as I could never live but for one human being at a time (and, I a.s.sure you, _that one_ has never been _myself_, as you may know by the consequences, for the _selfish_ are _successful_ in life), I feel alone and unhappy.

I have sent for my daughter from Venice, and I ride daily, and walk in a garden, under a purple canopy of grapes, and sit by a fountain, and talk with the gardener of his tools, which seem greater than Adam's, and with his wife, and with his son's wife, who is the youngest of the party, and, I think, talks best of the three. Then I revisit the Campo Santo, and my old friend, the s.e.xton, has two--but _one_ the prettiest daughter imaginable; and I amuse myself with contrasting her beautiful and innocent face of fifteen with the skulls with which he has peopled several cells, and particularly with that of one skull, dated 1766, which was once covered (the tradition goes) by the most lovely features of Bologna--n.o.ble and rich. When I look at these, and at this girl--when I think of what _they were_, and what she must be--why then, my dear Murray, I won't shock you by saying what I think. It is little matter what becomes of us 'bearded men', but I don't like the notion of a beautiful woman's lasting less than a beautiful tree--than her own picture--her own shadow, which won't change so to the sun as her face to the mirror. I must leave off, for my head aches consumedly. I have never been quite well since the night of the representation of Alfieri's _Mirra_, a fortnight ago.

To PERCY BYSSHE Sh.e.l.lEY

_A trio of poets_

Ravenna, 26 _April_, 1821.

The child continues doing well, and the accounts are regular and favourable. It is gratifying to me that you and Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley do not disapprove of the step which I have taken, which is merely temporary.

I am very sorry to hear what you say of Keats--is it _actually_ true?

I did not think criticism had been so killing. Though I differ from you essentially in your estimate of his performances, I so much abhor all unnecessary pain, that I would rather he had been seated on the highest peak of Parna.s.sus than have perished in such a manner. Poor fellow! though with such inordinate self-love he would probably have not been very happy. I read the review of _Endymion_ in the _Quarterly_. It was severe,--but surely not so severe as many reviews in that and other journals upon others.

I recollect the effect on me of the _Edinburgh_ on my first poem; it was rage, and resistance, and redress--but not despondency nor despair. I grant that those are not amiable feelings; but, in this world of bustle and broil, and especially in the career of writing, a man should calculate upon his powers of _resistance_ before he goes into the arena.

Expect not life from pain nor danger free, Nor deem the doom of man reserved for thee.

You know my opinion of _that second-hand_ school of poetry. You also know my high opinion of your own poetry,--because it is of _no_ school. I read _Cenci_--but, besides that I think the _subject_ essentially _un_ dramatic, I am not an admirer of our old dramatists, _as models_. I deny that the English have hitherto had a drama at all.