sion of such a principle as fidelity to Titus, by this base and infatuated passion for Vitellia, that our sympathies for the throes and agonies of Sextus's hesitation is arrested, and we think only of the outrage which is about to be offered to the hero of the piece.

We are in this state of mind when Annio enters bringing intelligence that Tito and Berenice have parted; a change is thus created in Vitellia’s prospects, and her determinations change with them. Her lover is dismissed with a caution not to proceed in the execution of his treacherous plot until he shall be farther instructed. Again our contemptuous derision falls on the tool of the vain and treacherous Vitellia, and entirely weakens the effect of the soliloquy which follows; and which, but for the effect of the preceding scene, might be felt and admired from the melancholy desperation which it expresses. As it is, we are quite indifferent to his sorrow, and so pass hastily on to the opening of the fifth scene, which introduces us to the Emperor taking part in a pageant, which for the poetry of its conception, and the admirable propriety of its description, stands in the chronicles of the drama well nigh unrivalled. The scene opens on the Temple of Jupiter Stator, before which the senate is met for the purpose of receiving the annual tribute of the subject provinces. Titus descends from the capitol to listen to a proposal for investing him with divine honours and for assigning the treasures of the day to the erection of a pile at the base of which the Tiber itself may offer to him homage. We are sorely tempted to transcribe the whole of that incomparable address in which the hero rejects the enthusiastic wishes of his people. It is without an equal in any drama which has come before us, and the heart stays its beating and the eye grows dim with the ardour of applause which it excites. “Oh vero eroe,

,” bursts from us in anticipation of Annio's eager cry; and we feel with Publio

Quanto di te Minori
Tutti i premi

Son mai tutte lodi.” It is in this oration that Titus first makes us acquainted with the conformity of his mind to the power of his eloquence. It is with this address that he begins to play his part in the drama, and with what a blaze of royal virtue is he instantly surrounded ! With what a noble and brave independence does he oppose the presumptuous enthusiasm that would have ranked a human sovereign with the powers of heaven! with what an exquisite tenderness is the appeal invested which follows his refusal of the proffered honour, and soothes the feelings of the multitude !

“Piu tenero-piu caro

Nome che quel di padre

Per me non v'è." And with what a dignified humility is the bearing of the heathen Emperor sunk in the philosophy which declares-

“ I sommi Dei

Quanto imitar mi piace

Abborrisco simular." The scene closes with the shout of applause which accepts the proposal of Cæsar to assign the tribute from the provinces to the relief of those citizens whom a late eruption of Vesuvius had driven from their homes, and Titus is left alone with Sesto and Annio. Then follows the offer of the imperial crown to Servilia; after which comes scene seventh, containing a beautiful and perfectly Italian dialogue, in which Annio fulfils his mission, by announcing to his own betrothed bride that she is chosen to fill the high dignity of wife to Cæsar.

The great charm of the Clemenza di Tito, the point in which it leaves all competition behind, is the absolute concentration of interest which attaches to it. There is no little inferior underplot to divert the mind from the consideration of Tito's wrongs and Tito's clemency. Every minute ramification in the tale is but one of the threads on which hang the whole movement of the interest, towards which we are conducted by a little train of excitement in perfect keeping with the main action, of which we are not for one moment suffered to lose sight. Even the loves of Annio and Servilia are not to be looked upon merely as an episode. The honour conferred by Titus on the latter was necessary to kindle to its utmost rage the passionate jealousy of Vitellia, and serves to display, in one beautiful and touching scene, the magnanimous condescension of Titus when the gentle sister of his friend flings herself upon his justice and confesses herself betrothed to Annio. Hear the words with which the address of the trembling maiden is answered by the hero whom she was rejecting :

“Grazie, o Numi del ciel. Pure una volta

Senza larve sul viso

Mirai la verita." But let us hasten into the presence of Vitellia, who is discovered by her lover chased into frenzy by the preference shown to Servilia. The whirlwind of insulted vanity is not to be allayed but by the sacrifice of that which fate has denied her to enjoy, and it is thus her fury vents itself on the first appearance of her infatuated tool

“ Che rechi ? Il Campidoglio

E acceso ? è incenerito?

Lentulo dove sta ? Tito e punito?" And when Sextus, reminding her of her own command, “ Il sospendere il colpo,” ventures a remonstrance on this sudden and unjustifiable resolve, she answers him in a burst of magnificent declamation which thrills us with horror. She tempts him first with the prospect and the possession of that hand which leads him on; and then, in the precipitance of her fury, exclaims

"Non basta? Ascolta
E dubita se puoi. Sappi che amai
Tito finor; che se rimane in vita
Se può pentir; ch' io ritornar potrei

Non mi fido di me, forse ad amarlo." This is too much for human feeling to endure. Blinded by passion as Sextus is, we cannot reconcile to our notions of humanity his tolerance of a spectacle so revolting as Vitellia's heart laid bare in its naked

We are utterly repelled by it, and we conclude, while she yet speaks, that Sextus must be repelled also. But it is not so: Sextus leaves the presence of his mistress, the pledged murderer of his friend, without so much as a remonstrance to indicate his abhorrence of the act.

of glory We have now arrived at the stir and bustle of the plot. The treason goes on under the fostering care of Sextus, whose heart fails him, however, at the very mornent when the fruits of his devices have begun to show themselves. He relents, and would fain dissolve the conspiracy just as Titus falls into the hands of those who seek his life. The Emperor is stabbed, Sextus having faintly interposed to save him, and the weight of his friend's murder hangs upon the wretched man's conscience. Meanwhile Vitellia receives at one and the same moment intelligence of her own accession to the purple, and of the success of the terrible plot which places it beyond her reach. Pudelio informs her both of Servilia’s magnanimous rejection of Titus, and of the supposed death of the emperor. She is maddened with rage, and, seeking out Sextus, loads him with reproaches because he has accomplished her wishes too faithfully: The wretched pair are thus circumstanced when Annio enters. He hastens to assure Sextus that his friend is not dead, that the wound which he had received in the scuffle is not even dangerous, that Lentulus, who had put on the imperial robes, has been slain by his own wife, who, in the confusion of the moment, mistook him for Titus; and then suddenly discovers, in the man to whom he is addressing himself, the leader in this foul and most unnatural conspiracy. Annio, horrified though he be, cannot divest himself entirely of ancient predilections. He resolves to save Sextus ; and, with this view, changes garments with him, in order that he may pass with the less risk into the Emperor's presence. He is not aware that the robe which he puts on bears upon its shoulder the stain of the assassin ; but the fact was so; and out of that circumstance arises scene

of no ordinary interest. While these things are going on elsewhere, Titus and Servilia meet; and the Emperor, stung to the heart by the ingratitude of Rome, gives utterance to a hurst of sorrow which is quite overpowering :

“ Tito l'odio di Roma ! Eterni Dei

Io, che spesi per lei

Tutti i miei di.'' Nothing can exceed the splendour of this speech, which is still in progress when Sextus presents himself—that his whole soul may be harrowed up by the display of a tender and uncompromising confidence, of which he knows that he is unworthy. He is on the point of disclosing all : but just at this moment Vitellia, his evil genius, interposes, and the lips which had begun to move are rendered mute. Just then Annio comes in arrayed in the bloody garment of Sextus, and is instantly seized amid the execrations of all who regard him as the assassin. A strange and well-managed scene follows. Sextus endeavours to free the innocent, or at least halts and falters in his iniquities. Vitellia unblushingly strives to fix on Annio the guilt which is her own. Her machinations prove successful. Annio is arrested as the culprit, while Sextus, won over by her blandishments, engages to secure his own and her safety by flight. He will not go, however, till he has engaged his mistress to undertake for the safety of his friend ; and she promises everything

“A tutti i Numi il giuro

I lo defendero." But scarce are the words uttered ere Publius rushes in, and the whole face of affairs is changed. He states that Lentulus yet lives, that he has disclosed all, and that Sextus is the real author of the conspiracy of the capitol. The miserable culprit is seized, and our anticipations of the result are all at fault again.

The second act closes admirably. With it ends the career of crime which Sextus has been running, while Vitellia's last hope of escape from detection and disgrace is overthrown. The skein of their destiny is involved beyond the power of mortal unravelling, and the doom of both seems inevitable. Yet is there one arm capable of saving—one heart so great as to desire their preservation; and to the operations of these we turn from the horrors which we have hitherto been pursuing, with an intensity of delight which may be felt, but which defies description. The whole of the third act is replete with a melancholy and unflagging interest. First, we have delineated the unshaken confidence of Tito in the honour of his friend; next, the gradual but long-resisted conviction that the confidence has been misplaced ; then the agony of disappointment, displaying itself in the desperate hope that Sextus may yet, by some means or another, exoneraie himself of the guilt; and, last of all, in the seventh scene, that colloquy, unrivalled in power, in which Titus endeavours to elicit from the fallen Sextus the motives of a treason to him so inexplicable.

Can anything be more touchingly simple or beautiful than the appeal of Titus ? -“ Ah Sesto è dunque vero ?' Dunque vuoi la mia morte? Se Tito Augusto hai potuto obbliar, di Tito amico come non ti sovvenne?” Can the agony be exceeded of Sextus's reply ?—“Ah Tito! ah mio clementissimo prence! non più, non più.” This is quite sublime, and our interest has reached the utmost height to which it can attain, without positive suffering, when Titus makes the last tender and affectionate call upon the delinquent for his confidence

“Odimi, O Sesto
Siam soli; il tuo sovrano
Non e presente. Apri il tuo core a Tito
Confidate all'amico : io ti prometto

Che Augusto nol saprà" We know nothing, in any language, more affecting than this. Our sympathy for both is indeed stretched to the uttermost, and the climax is one not only of surpassing interest, but of admirable dramatic effect; for the injuries of the noble Titus are scarcely more exciting than the situation of Sexto, despite of his crimes and his weakness. There is something horrible in the alternative proposed to him of betraying the woman whom he loves with such guilty devotion, or of standing before the friend whom he worships as a monster of gratuitous and unqualified treachery. What appeal can lie from the gloomy despair of these words—« Ch'io merito la morte, e ch'io la bramo ?" Titus can find none, so he departs in anger and bitter sorrow.

Our attention is now confined to the movements of the hero, whom we follow into the solitude of his privacy. There we may listen to the yearning of his affection, to the pleading of his mercy, to the stern, rigorous demand of his imperial justice, and sympathise with each emotion of his elevated and princely nature as it arises. That is a fine soliloquy, full of natural and beautiful feeling which closes with the triumph of his clemency

“ Viva l'amico
Benche in fedele; e se accusarmi il mondo
Vuol pur di qualche errore

M'accusi di pietà, non di rigore." The decision is worthy of him who makes it, but it remains a secret, and Annio and Servilia are importunate with the newly-elected Empress to sue for the pardon of her former lover. There is, however, no redeeming point in the character of Vitellia—not even the spirit of daring which, in the breast of woman as well as of man, proves often the attendant upon crime. She will not sacrifice her new-born hopes— her dawning visions of future glory—to redeem from death the wretched man whom her love had led on to his ruin. Her only care is to ascertain how far she may have been implicated in the last interview between the friends, and the ground of her regret that the disclosure came not from her own lip is that

“ Confessar l'errore
Sempre in bocca d'un reo che la detesta

Scema d' orror la colpa." There is no generous burst of self-accusation anywhere—no appeal to Cæsar that he would throw the punishment where it was due—no spontaneous inter position between the unhappy lover and the destiny to which she has led him. The following are the words of a cowardly nature, bold enough to plunge into crime, but too mean to stand against its adverse current :

“ Non ha coraggio, Nè a parlar, nè a tacere,

Nè a restar, nè a fuggir.” The single act which might yet have linked Vitellia to the chain of our sympathies is withheld, and it is not till the very moment which she believes to be the last of Sexto’s existence, when the imperial train has entered the arena, and the doom of the prisoner is to be pronounced, that the confession which Annius and Servilia have extorted from her is poured furth. Just as Titus lifts up his voice to proclaim clemency to one criminal, the guilt of another is revealed to him. When he is about to set his friend and confidant free from the merited punishment of death, his betrothed bride steps forward and avows herself beyond the pale of his magnanimity. What a depth of wounded affection is conveyed in these words !

“ E quanti mai

Quanti siete a tradirmi ?" But the clemency of Titus is not to be arrested or controlled by human interference. He listens to the tale of complicated treason and injustice, and in the majesty of his greatness replies—

“ Vediamo
Se pià costante sia,
L' altrui perfidia o la clemenza mia,
Tutto so

tutti assolvo-e tutto oblio." The weak and faithless Sexto, the treacherous and guilty Vitellia, are pardoned, embraced, and dismissed to the enjoyment of their undeserved happiness, while Titus, the noble avd generous, is left to the solitary majesty of his unapproachable virtue.