after gazing, for a few moments, in silence, upon that glorious site,—"What a place to work for!"

In one of the poems contained in this volume* allusion is made to an evening not easily forgotten, when Chantrey and myself were taken by Canova to the Borghese Palace, for the purpose of showing us, by the light of a taper his favourite mode of exhibiting that

In

Borghese, called the Venere Vincitrice. Chantrey's eagerness to point out some grace or effect that peculiarly struck him, he snatched the light out of Canova's hand; and to this circumstance the following passage of the poem referred to was meant to allude:

When he, thy peer in art and fame,
Hung o'er the marble with delight†;
And, while his ling'ring hand would steal

O'er every grace the taper's rays,

* See page 344.

A slight alteration here has rendered these verses more true to the actual fact than they were in their original form.

Gave thee, with all the gen'rous zeal
Such master-spirits only feel,

That best of fame-a rival's praise.

One of the days that still linger most pleasantly in my memory, and which, I trust, neither Lady Calcott nor Mr. Eastlake have quite forgotten, was that of our visit together to the Palatine Mount, when, as we sauntered about that picturesque spot, enjoying the varied views of Rome which it commands, they made me, for the first time, acquainted with Guidi's spirited Ode on the Arcadians, in which there is poetry enough to make amends for all the nonsense of his rhyming brethren. Truly and

grandly does he exclaim,

"Indomita e superba ancor è Roma
Benchè si veggià col gran busto a terra;

Son piene di splendor le sue ruine,

E il gran cenere suo si mostra eterno."

With Canova, while sitting to Jackson for a portrait ordered by Chantrey, I had more than once some interesting conversation,—or,

rather, listened while he spoke, — respecting the political state of Europe at that period, and those "bricconi," as he styled them, the sovereigns of the Holy Alliance; and, before I left Rome, he kindly presented to me a set of engravings from some of his finest statues, together with a copy of the beautifully printed collection of Poems, which a Roman poet named Missirini had written in praise of his different" Marmi

When Lord John Russell and myself parted, at Milan, it was agreed between us, that after a short visit to Rome, and (if practicable within the allowed time) to Naples, I was to rejoin him at Genoa, and from thence accompany him to England. But the early period for which Parliament was summoned, that year, owing to the violent proceedings at Manchester, rendered

it

necessary for Lord John to hasten his return to England. I was, therefore, most fortunate, under such circumstances, in being permitted by my friends Chantrey and Jackson to join in

their journey homeward; through which lucky arrangement, the same precious privilege I had enjoyed, at Rome, of hearing the opinions of such practised judges, on all the great works of art I saw in their company, was afterwards continued to me through the various collections we visited together, at Florence, Bologna, Modena, Parma, Milan, and Turin.

To some of those pictures and statues that most took my fancy, during my tour, allusions will be found in a few of the poems contained in this volume. But the great pleasure I derived from these and many other such works arose far more from the poetical nature of their subjects than from any judgment I had learned to form of their real merit as works of art,

a line of lore in which, notwithstanding my course of schooling, I remained, I fear, unenlightened to the last. For all that was lost upon me, however, in the halls of Art, I was more than consoled in the cheap picturegallery of Nature; and a glorious sunset I

witnessed in ascending the Simplon is still remembered by me with a depth and freshness of feeling which no one work of art I saw in the galleries of Italy has left behind.

I have now a few words to devote to a somewhat kindred subject with which a poem or two contained in the following pages are closely connected.* In my Preface to the First Volume of this collection, I briefly noticed the taste for Private Theatrical Performances which prevailed during the latter half of the last century among the higher ranks in Ireland. This taste continued for nearly twenty years to survive the epoch of the Union, and in the performances of the Private Theatre of Kilkenny gave forth its last, as well as, perhaps, brightest flashes. The life and soul of this institution was our manager, the late Mr. Richard Power, a gentleman who could boast a larger circle of attached friends, and through a life more free from shadow or alloy,

* See pages 353. 356.