Alexandria gazette & daily advertiser. [volume] (Alexandria [Va.]) 1817-1822, 1818-07-30
ALEXANDRIA:
THURSDAY MORNING, JULY 80.
ron THE GAZETTE.
a Critical Essay on the Fourth Canso Of
Chal1s HGrolds Pilgrimage.


listers. who were well fitted to perceive
and TO celebrate her glcrics. vi these,
two have already joined the worthies, oyer
whose monument Of fame they had plant
ed a new laurel. The progressed the third
the minstrel piIgrimAis once more stay.
ed, that he may commit to lasting record
The memory OF his rambles. Bet the lustre
of his scallop is dimmed by toll; care has
furowed his brow and relaxed his strength.
His harp retains its melodious pathos; but
the tones are melancholy, and its chores
seldom vibrate to the notes OF gladness or
of heroism.'
In considering the last performance OF the
grea, magician of modern song, the analyst
will find it difficult 10 bring to the survey
that dispassionate judg .nent without which
praise is velueless and criticism unmean-
ing. But the sorrows and genius OF an au-
thor, who is in every view the greatest phe-
nomenon Of our day, so forcibly claim the
svmpathiesof The observer, that an examina-
ton, :professedly intellectual, of his wrI-
t;ngs, should be offered with hesitaney and
received With distrust. or his talents, or
of his rhythmical merit, there is now but
one opinion. Triumphant over the fatal
facility of the octosyllabick verse;" the
cumbrous uniformity of the Spenserian
stanza, and the monotonous ce'ura Of the
heroic metre, he has, in the first, OVERCOME
rivalry, and, in the two last, thrown down
gauntlet which the bard of Fairies and the
English Homer might be dithdent 10 raise.
The calamties and faults Of his private
character are, perhaps, imputable to pride,
deceived confidence, and sensibility tor
turing by its excess.
From this momentary bu, painful glance
at the biography Of suffering genius, let US
now turn TO view its last, but not least no.
norable exercise.
The present canto is preceded by an ad-
dress to Mr.. Hobhouse. In this the author
has manifested his mastery over prose
style, not SO laudable for correctness, as for
harmony, vivacity and strength.
Childe Harold, after lately sojourning in
regions where few classical objects gave
relief TO the sameness Of his tour, at length
reaches
The fair cline where every season smiles,
| which is at once the death-bed Of glory,
and the cradle Of art. He is in ltaly-lta-
", the vestiges of whose vanished great
ness curiosity will long linger to contem-
plate, and whose fame peesy and eloquence
have exhausted their stores to augment
! His narrative map Of this interesting corn-
try is by no means geographical. and a fu-
ture D'Anville would be perplexed in de-
lineating chart of it ser mente auctor's,"
as was done in regard to Homerick Greece.
The poet seems not so frequently to de-
scribe from present observation, nor to re-
cord the impressions it impaired to him, as
in the two earlier cantos. Probably the Sc
rlusion which is known to have marked his
residence at Venice, was used in emtody-
ing the recollections of his journey. 1t
cannot then be expected that their cohe-
renee should be local. The imaginary ira
weller is introduced to the reader at Venice,
where after adverting TO the illustrious ara
! of her history, he INDUCES train OF re-
Elections naturally excited by her present
contrasted debasement. OF these, the fol-
| lowing is, perhaps, equal to The rest:
"Before St. Mark still glow his steeds of
| brass,
| Their gilded collars glitterng in the sun;
But is not Doria' menace come to pass?
! Are they not bridled? Venice, lost and won,
Her thirteen hundred years of freedom
/ done,
Sinks, like sea-weed, into whence she
rose
Better be whelm'd beneath the waves, and
Even in distinctions depth, her foreign
foes,
From whom submission wrings an infamous
repose.' StanSd Is.
He now proceeds to Friuli, Of which the
principal interest appears 10 be the sur
rounding scenery. Passing through Arqua,
| memorable for containing the tomb of Pc
! trarca, and for suggesting to Lord Byron
some beautiful stanzas, he is next seen at
Ferrara. This city is YET dearer 10 memo
~ than the former, as in one of lis converts
Ariosto lies buried, and in its hospital OF St.
! Anne, Tasso was immured as maniac