In all the eventful history of Columbus, no incident gives a thinking man so exalted an idea of his character, as that alluded to in the sonnet. The constancy of his determination still to hold on, in spite equally of the urgent entreaties and mutinous threats of all his followers, (who even suggested the extremity of throwing him overboard,) was truly heroic : and when land at last appeared, and the toil-worn voyagers fell down to worship him as their deliverer, the picture of true greatness was complete. Whether or not Columbus was the first discoverer of the Western continent has been much questioned: Martin Behem of Nuremberg distinctly claims the priority, while Americus Vesputius has boldly thieved the laurels of another, and called that great country by his own name. It would appear that Behem discovered the Brazils in 1484: that Columbus visited the main land in 1498; and that Americus named it after himself in 1507. One praise, at any rate, is due to Columbus above the rest; he reached the new world by the mere force of his mind: he was indebted to no accidental current or friendly storm; but he set forth scientifically to work out a geographical problem, and triumphantly proved the theory invented by his genius.— sun. With respect to the new world, it should be added, that there had from remote antiquity existed a tradition, of which both Plato and Aristotle were aware, that some great and powerful nations lived and flourished in the regions of the setting These, from their architectural remains are now known to have been the ancient inhabitants of Mexico, and Peru, and it is remarkable that many customs, as that of embalming, building pyramids, the use of hieroglyphics, the shape of drinking vessels, &c., are common both to those old occidentals, and to the great and ingenious Egyptians. It appears to the writer very possible, that some Phoenician navigators may in very early times have got accidentally into the influence of a fortunate monsoon, and so have been wafted to America: and this idea would account as well for the original colonization of that continent, as for the excellence in art, and coincidences in language, (for example the name of God, Jehao,) known to have existed among those who have been falsely called the Aborigines of the far West. This notion is far more probable than that the rude Esquimaux by descending to the tropics became quickly metamorphosed into the courtly Peruvian, or that the civilized sons of Europe and Asia would be at the pains to foot it over "thrilling regions of thickribbed ice" in the desperate hope of coming some distant morrow 66 to fresh fields and pastures fair." Albeit Horace (whose works, like those of our Shakspeare are of universal application,) maligns Ocean as "dissociabilis," it has ever been the main road for human enterprise; and however the infidel, rejecting Moses, may demand separate creations for America and Australia, we can point to the winds and the waves, and tell him without controversy, "All men are brethren.” Surrounded by the appliances of modern navigation, we are but incompetent judges either of the courage of Columbus, or of the dangers that he dared. The barks in which he ventured across the trackless deep were little better than river barges, and his trembling crews looked to him alone for skill, encouragement, and pilotage. They rejoiced in nothing so much as contrary winds, in that they were thereby hindered from placing greater distance between themselves and Spain, and dreaded nothing more than their arrival at what they imagined to be the desert sandyedge, or precipitous rocky-rim of the ocean,—the world's end. But Columbus was born to succeed: and though royal jealousy stripped him of power and wealth, and envy has been fierce against his fame, with more justice than an Ennius he may boast Volito vivu' per ora virûm; with more truth than regarded a Voltaire, his self-made epitaph should run, "Mon esprit est partout," and the New World for a memorial," Mon cœur est ici." RAFFAELLE. Ho!-thou that hither com'st, in gorgeous stole An intellectual world of wonder springs : Raffaelle, thine all too perishable art Fades from the time-stain'd walls; but not so fade Our memories of thy skill;-those laurels start Afresh for ever: walk thou in their shade. To Raffaelle Sanzio, of Urbino, is usually conceded the palm among painters. He was well brought up to his art under various masters, owing to the judicious discernment of his abilities by his father, John Sanzio. His chief works consist of numerous frescoes of subjects scriptural and allegorical which decorate the stanzas of the Vatican, many inimitable portraits of Madonnas, saints, and celebrated characters, (amongst whom are conspicuous the unhappy Beatrice Cenci, and the lovely Fornarina,) the " Transfiguration," which, though unfinished is accounted the great masterpiece of painting, and those splendid patterns for tapestry, known as the Cartoons, the major part of which are now at Hampton Court. In fact, so numberless are the works attributed to this artist, that when we consider the few years he laboured, and the multiplicity of his other engagements, we shall see reason to conclude, that many of them were executed by his talented Roman school of pupils: for example, there exist severally, in Florence, Vienna, Darmstadt, Paris, and London, counterpart pictures of a St. John in the desert; and they are all so excellent, and so similar, that no one of them has yet been decided |