Part 20 (1/2)

The hilt, too, hurts my hand

It may be asked why I dwell so particularly on the character of Sardanapalus It is admitted that he is the most heroic of voluptuaries, the most philosophical of the licentious The first he is undoubtedly, but he is not licentious; and in o tohis character upon principle It was a skilful stroke of art to do this; had it been otherwise, and had there been no affection shown for the Ionian slave, Sardanapalus would have engaged no sympathy It is not, however, with respect to the ability hich the character has been iined, nor to the poetry hich it is invested, that I have so particularly made it a subject of criticism; it was to point out how much in it Lord Byron has interwoven of his own best nature

At the tireat work, he was confessedly in the enjoyment of the happiest portion of his life

The Guiccioli was to him a Myrrha, but the Carbonari were around, and in the controversy, in which Sardanapalus is engaged, between the obligations of his royalty and his inclinations for pleasure, we have a vivid insight of the cogitation of the poet, whether to take a part in the hazardous activity which they were preparing, or to remain in the seclusion and festal repose of which he was then in possession

The assyrian is as much Lord Byron as Childe Harold was, and bears his lineaments in as clear a likeness, as a voluptuary unsated could do those of the emaciated victim of satiety Over the whole drama, and especially in soreat deal of fine but irrelevant poetry and moral reflection has been profusely spread; but were the piece adapted to the stage, these portions would of course be omitted, and the character denuded of them would then more fully justify the idea which I have formed of it, than it may perhaps to many readers do at present, hidden as it is, both in shape and contour, under an excess of ornament

That the character of Myrrha was also drawn from life, and that the Guiccioli was the model, I have no doubt She had, when most enchanted by her passion for Byron--at the very tiret; and he was too keen an observer, and of too jealous a nature, not to have e in her appearance, and her every h she iven expression to her sentiments, still such was her situation, that it could not but furnish hi of the Ionian slave Were the character of Myrrha scanned with this reference, while nothing could be discovered to detract froreat deal would be found to lessen thein person whom he has depicted in the drareatly similar, and in circumstances in which she could not but feel as Myrrha is supposed to have felt--and it ood fortune of that incident to a beautiful purpose

This, however, is not all that the tragedy possesses of the author

The character of Zarina is, perhaps, even still ly drawn from life There are many touches in the scene with her which he could not have i of his own domestic disasters The first sentiment she utters is truly conceived in the very frame and temper in which Byron must have wished his lady to think of hi THAT--

How , since we have met Which I have borne in hood of heart

The following delicate expression has reference to his having left his daughter with her s on the subject than anything he has expressed more ostentatiously elsewhere:

I wish'd to thank you, that you have not divided My heart from all that's left it now to love

And what Sardanapalus says of his children is not less applicable to Byron, and is true:

Deem not I have not done you justice: rather make them Resemble your own line, than their own sire; I trust them with you--to you

And when Zarina says,

They ne'er Shall know froht but what may honour Their father's memory,

he puts in her mouth only a sentiment which he knew, if his wife never expressed to hied in resolution to herself The whole of this scene is full of thepathos; and did the drae, indubitable evidence to me, that he has shadowed out in it himself his wife, and his mistress, this little intervieould prove a vast deal in confirenius was most in its element, it hen it dealt with his own sensibilities and circu speech, without a conviction that it ritten at Lady Byron:

My gentle, wrong'd Zarina!

I am the very slave of circumstance And impulse--borne aith every breath!

Misplaced upon the throne--misplaced in life