Nor with the clouds of sorrow drown the smile That can to man his brightest hours impart ! So pray'd I-prompted by the old man's tale : And Heaven assist me, that I may not fail! Chapter IV. WHEN I was nearly eighteen years of age, My father wish'd me sent to some profession; But I was ever tardy to engage In any calling-that delicious passion Still kept me near-although I fear'd detection The lovely object of my fond affection. O Mary was a heavenly light, that shone To wake the best affections of the breast To pure and holy feeling! and, to own The real truth, I was supremely blest, To meet the maid in many a scene I dream'd, When she seem'd kind-alas! she only seem'd! Then she indeed was folded to my breast, Then o'er my cheek her heart-warm breath was stealing, Then I was ecstasied while I confest That kept me blameless, 'mid the storms of passion, When bann'd delights might tempt me to transgression. But this was trifling with my precious time; 'Twas all unworthy of a youth like me; For, though I was no genius, I could rhyme; And this appear'd unto stupidity, And human ignorance, a gift of HeavenA wondrous gift-that not in vain was given. "I'll be a Soldier"-I my father said to, "And fight the battles of our noble King; I love the drum, the red-coat, and cock. ade too; And who can tell what honour I may bring Unto myself to all with me connected--Even to the land by which I'll be respected." "Fight for thy King! 'tis proper"-he replied "But, really, if thou long'st to live in story, Thou lack'st, I fear, both friends and cash to guide, In such a path, thy footsteps up to glory: The poor man's valour, like imprison'd air, The depth, the strength, the ardour of Escapes from notice to-the Lord knows my feeling; Then I was blest-and had that bliss been real, I-oh what misery! 'twas all ideal! And yet I was not idle altogether; My father, as I told thee, was a farmer; I was his deputy, in summer weather, To ply the task with many a moorland charmer; To ply the task among the new-mown clover, Where blessed hours oft bless the rural lover. I was his deputy-a faithless stay To keep them busy-I their labour thwarted; I lov'd to roll the girls among the hay; And they were happy things, and kindly hearted, And I was happy too-though often blush .where!" "Then I shall be a Parson"-"Nothing better; Thou art ambitious of a sacred rank; But thou art fond of folly-it were meeter That thou should'st study for a moontebank; There thou might'st thrive-it only needs grimaces, And thou can'st mimic all thy neighbours' faces. "But to be serious-could'st thou preach like Blair, Perchance thou couldst not keep thyself from starving ; The care of souls is not the patron's care; A church not always falls to the de serving; Both giddy-headed youths, and gray-hair'd sages, Bearing in hand unprofitable pages. "But had'st thou all the confidence of Murray Although it might be differently nam'd; Or Jeffrey's energy-though, by his hurry, The words are often miserably maim'd; Or Moncrieff's wisdom-though, if I well wot, He speaks as some one held him by the throat: "Or had'st thou all the legal lore of Cran stoun Although his words be sometimes cold as hail Or Cockburn's wit-though, like a wellworn gunstone, "Tis now and then, not always, doom'd to fail; Nay, had'st thou even-thou still might'st miss thy mark As sound a head, and sounder limbs than Clerk !" "Then I shall be a Doctor"-" Well, thou may'st; But in the country 'tis a shocking slavery; Just on thy pillow when thy head thou lay'st, A call may come, and it requires some bravery Even though the call be from a crying woman To face the tempest and the rugged com mon. litude, Was heard the rushing of the mountain stream, "Indeed, if thou could'st mangle like For all was fair and silent as a dream. Monro, Or tell, like Barclay, an amusing story, Thou think'st, perchance, thou then might'st easily go, And find the path of honour clear be fore ye; But that is doubtful-though thou might be clever, Or wore, like Hamilton, a three-cock'd beaver. "But wilt thou be a Farmer ?"-"Yes, I will, Though I must then associate with the sheep, And mortals very like-but I want skill To climb ambition's high and danger ous steep, And 'tis more wise the lowly stream to quaff at, Than tempt a fall, which brother fools might laugh at. "I love the innocence of rural life, Of hill and dale; I love the flow'ry trea sure; I lov'd that night, even for itself-but more For her who then was hanging on mine The lovely beings that before my sight Like angels mov'd-oh, Mary was so fair, She was my hope, my fear, my bliss, my care! And I was happy-for she took mine arm To guide her through the vales so calm and sweet, To where, like bird's nest shelter'd from the storm, Her father's home, so beautifully neat, Amid the silence of the moonshine, stood Within the shelter of its linden wood. Our steps were tardy, for our way was pleasant, Along the shore, where nothing seem'd awake; Now, o'er our heads, burst from his perch, the pheasant; And now the sand-lark rustled from the brake, And now the owlet, from the hollow oak, With fearful hoop, the soothing silence broke. We reach'd a bower within the hawthorn shade, arms, In all the beauty of unplighted charms. "God bless thee, Mary! thou'st a tender heart, And ne'er may he, who its affection shares, Thus leave thee comfortless to weep apart, And fall a victim to heart-rending cares! Rear'd by a maiden that had lately But, oh, he who is worthy to receive Thy kind affections-thee he could not leave! died; Upon the seat I spread my shepherd-plaid, And we sat down-and Mary sat and sigh'd, To think of her who rear'd that shadowy bower, Return'd not, to receive the plighted hand; Hope would arise and though she was To hear that he was withering in his tomb Hope would arise, that he might still return, And cheer the spirit he had left to mourn. "Twas all in vain-year follow'd year away, Andstill she wander'd in her lonely path, That path they wander'd oft at close of day, That now to her was like the vale of death. At last she died-and her afflicted breast Found in the grave a deep and dreamless rest. That brought to Rachel's bower-whose sufferings prove The death-strong ardour of a woman's love! We reach'd her father's cottage, and we parted, But not before her glowing lips I prest; For when we met, we both were single hearted, And lovers were, though never tongue confest. That night-I never shall forget that night— Bright as it was, it now appears more bright. (To be continued.) So far back as our Number for August 1817, we recorded our decided opinion of the utter worthlessness of Mr Hoole's spiritless translations from the great poets of Italy; and while we gave honour due to the fine old version of the Jerusalem Delivered by Fairfax, we admitted the propriety of our having a more faithful, more modern, and less unequal translation, of this admirable poem. Since that period, there have appeared two competitors for the honour of transplanting the noble Epic of Tasso into the teeming garden of English poetry-Mr J. H. Hunt, and Mr Wiffen, the author of the specimen before us. Highly as we are disposed to think of the talents of both these gentlemen, and conscious as we are of theindisputable merits of their several translations, we must freely confess, that we do not think either of them at all worthy of the appellation of the "Tasso of the North." They have, nevertheless, done a considerable deal towards the naturalising of this beautiful poem amongst us, and we owe them our thanks for their labours. It is indeed cheering and delightful, to those who have been toiling over the level and barren desart which Mr Hoole has spread, in dreary distance, before them, to find some traces of the rich verdure, and to catch glimpses, at least, of the golden light which adorn and illuminate the splendid scenes which Tasso has conjured up for the admiration of all time. Persons who read translations of Tasso, and prefer those which give them least trouble by their modern garb, will now have at least a better idea of the characteristics of his genius, than they could have from the noisy dullness and dreary platitude which pall ed upon their palates, in perusing the cuckoo strains of the tasteless rhymster; and while their hearts grow warm over the love of Tancred, and the death of Clarinda-while they dream on the beauty of Erminia, as she blows in her enchanting retirement, "making a sunshine in the shady place," and inhale "the young breath of passionate thought," which is spread like an atmosphere over the delicious gardens of Armida; they will not be so much disposed to wonder at the enthusiastic pride with which every Italian breathes the name of Tasso, and the never-ceasing delight with which he dwells on the beauties of this noblest production of his muse. However Fairfax may have failed in presenting us with an exact likeness of his great original, there is no doubt that he has poured forth, from the rich treasures of his mind, some of the tenderest and loftiest strains of poetry of which the English tongue can boast; and, while we admit the manifold faults and imperfections of his translation, we feel assured, that it has taken its place among the works of the illustrious poets, of the brightest era of our literature; and must confess, that we have but faint hopes of seeing any new version that will display equal beauty, power, and pathos, with the finest passages of this venerable poet. Wherever he deviated from Tasso, in those stanzas of fresh and luxurious description, or of fairy and dreamlike beauty of imagery, which throw so great a charm over the Jerusalem, it was always in the addition of some new grace, some flower of brighter hue or sweeter perfume, which shed a still more deep-felt beauty over the original; and, while this is done, with matchless grace, in many parts of his version, to the honour of Fairfax be it spoken, that he has interwoven these additions with so much of the taste and skill of a true poet, that they never once strike us as incongruous or uncharacteristic; but, on the contrary, his best passages seem to give us back the real beauties of Tasso, only heightened in their colours by the pencil of a still higher artist. The great fault, on the other hand, which we have to find with the modern translators, is, that while they are either unable or unwilling to give us the simple beauties of Tasso, they, instead of adding fresh grace to the original, either weaken its effect by the dilution of mere words, or dis tort its simplicity by improper and uncharacteristic additions. Of the two new translators, Mr Hunt is the more faithful to the meaning of the original; but he is too apt to eke out his verses with those faded flowers of speech which have languished in the pages of every rhymster for the last hundred years, and which shed an air of feebleness and insipidity over the thoughts they are intended to adorn. He often transmutes whole pages of the fresh and delicate beauties of Tasso, into those vague generalities and pointless pleonasms which leave no "buttress nor coigne of vantage" for the heart or imagination to make their "pendent bed and procreant cradle ;" and heaps up usque ad nauseam, those common-place figures which are at the finger ends of every school-boy, and of which even magazine versifiers have of late years been ashamed. The reason of all this is sufficiently plain, namely, that Mr Hunt, though a person of considerable talents and accomplishments, is himself no poet. He does not look on the face of nature, nor probe the heart of man with the same fine eye and delicate touch that a real poet does. He does not perceive the fleeting graces, the lovely forms, and glancing lights, which flash upon that "inward eye," which constitutes the privilege and the bliss of the true sons of song. The forms of the visible universe, and the deeds and darings of men, do not make the same impression on his mind that they did on that of Tasso; and it is therefore impossible that he should give them the same, or even a kindred expression. How can we give adequate language to feelings which we have not? "Say, cans't thou paint a sunbeam to the blind, Or make him feel a shadow with his mind ?" In reading Mr Hunt's verses, therefore, we are not seldom tempted to express our astonishment at the total want of interest we feel, in the fine chivalrous incidents and scenes of the Jerusalem Delivered; and at the flat, stale, and unprofitable aspect which presents itself to our eye, instead of the animating stir of the well-fought field-the gleam of bright armour-the curvetting of steeds and waving of plumes-the magical grace and beauty of the damsels-the deepening gloom of forests, and the enchanting solitudes of hills and groves, which we have naturally associated with chivalrous times; and the only account of our disappointment is, that these visions have not risen up in their glowing colours to Mr Hunt's eye; and, therefore, all he could do was, to give us in English what Tasso had said in Italian, but without the fine touches and infelt spirit which give its true and distinguishing charm to the original. The story of Mr Hunt is the same-the proper names are the same-the incidents are the same, and come in the same order; there are many of the Italian words rendered by their corresponding words in English; but the soul which bound the whole togetherwhich shed its own beauty over every part-and breathed the spirit of life into their "disjecta membra," has fled. "We start, for soul is wanting there." If our readers should think we are too severe on Mr Hunt, let them remember, that we leave him the full benefit of the praises of the Quarterly Review, which will doubtless enable him to look down with contempt on our strictures; and, if they have any doubt of the justice of our remarks, let them turn to the numerous quotations from Mr Hunt's work, which load the pages of the aforenamed Review, and “taste the music of that vision pale !" We have no wish to give pain, but we see no good reason to restrain ourselves in the expression of our genuine sentiments, and allow a work to go forth as a real picture of a great poet, which presents a lifeless, bloodless face, instead of a countenance full of living expression, and kindled with the enthusiasm of genius. Mr Wiffen is a disciple of that amiable class of Sectarians, whose gentle, yet undaunted efforts for the good of mankind, and whose cultivation of all the purest and simplest feelings of humanity, entitle them to the deepest gratitude, from every lover of his species. We, as all others must be, are rejoiced to see, that their strenuous exertions in the cause of philanthropy are now likely to gain |