hundred principalities-the expenses of as many courts, each vying with its neighbour in ostentatious pageantry, could be defrayed only by taxes and contributions that drained the means of the people,-and the last spark of public spirit was quenched by the extinction of the national integrity. Napoleon gave her union-he made her again a country-he restored her finances-he re-created her martial spirit-he encouraged her agriculture-be re-edified her cities-he patronised her men of genius and science -and Italy was about to rise from her late nothingness when the success of the deliverers of Europe replunged her into her former insignificance and abjected

ness.

We have extended our observations to a length that forbids us to indulge our selves longer in speculations as to the future destinies of Italy. The author of the "Rambles" now claims our attention, and it is with the liveliest satisfaction that we proceed to lay before our readers a brief view of the contents of this elegant

volume.

The two first sections are occupied in discussing the comparative attractions of American and Italian scenery, the character of the modern Italians, and contain also some amusing speculations as to the government best adapted to restore them to respectability and happiness. We

extract the commencement of the first.

"To an American whose eve has been uniformly accustomed to the lakes, rivers, and forests of the new world, the general aspect of Italy, at first, is not striking, nor even pleasing. The magnificent features which nature has given to America, cast into the shade the comparatively diminutive beauties of Italian scenery. Vineyards and plantations of olives make but a poor figure when compared with the rich verdure of our interminable forests; and the Tyber and the Arno, though renowned in song, would shrink into rills by the side of the Hudson or the Potomac. He remembers with what an overflowing hand nature has poured out her riches on the soil of the new world; and he is unable to reconcile the general appearance of Tuscany and Romagna, with the idea of a country on which nature has bestowed her gifts with lavish profusion. He contrasts, too, the fallen magnificence and languid air of her cities with that increasing prosperity and promise of future greatness, that is every where visible in America.

"Whilst his mind is wholly occupied with this comparison, he is apt to overlook circumstances in the present condition of Italy, which endear her to the classic mind. He perhaps does not reflect how long this

soil has been trodden down by the foot of man,-how long it has yielded its annual tribute to the labours of the husbandman,how long it has been fatigued by the toils of glory-how often armies of barbarians, ing in their progress than Alpine blasts, have rushing from its mountains, and more witherswept over the surface of this fair peninsula. Every where it exhibits scars of human violence;-every object announces how long it has been the theatre of man's restless pas sions-every thing bears evidence of its complete subjection to his power. The moral and intellectual grandeur of Italy, like that of her architectural monuments, is mutilated and faded. Her civil and poli tical institutions are exhausted and decrepid, and are hastening to their extinction by a rapid declension. Yet in this land, where the works of art and human policy are bowed beneath the weight of years, nature is still as youthful as in the golden age, and, as if she delighted to display her creative energy and her imperishable dominion on the very spot where time has levelled the structures of art; the ruins of palaces and temples are dressed in the choicest offerings of Flora, and the twice blooming rose of Pæstum glows with undiminished magnificence, and smiles on the brow of beauty in the midst of scenes of decayed desolation.

"Reflections of this kind, when they have their full operation upon the mind, have a tendency to diminish the force of those early impressions which are apt to render an American insensible to the charms of this interesting country. His taste, without losing any of its discriminating power, becomes more vigorous and enlightened; a new species of beauty is unveiled to his perceptions, and a source of refined enjoy. ment opened as soon as he learns to subdue the influence of early habits and local associations.

“In America, the prodigal fertility of nature, and that colossal greatness by which she has distinguished the features of the new from those of the old continent, divert the attention from her more delicate and concealed charms. Untutored by art, she riots with a juvenile vigour, and plays her virgin fancies' uncontrolled. She is an artist who, negligent of lesser graces, astonishes even the dullest observer by a creative brilliancy. But there are in the scenery of Italy latent and refined beauties which only the eye of taste can discover.

"Our country is not picturesque. How often in attempting to delineate her inimitable form has the hand of the artist fallen in despair? This, in my opinion, constitutes the principal distinction between our transthe pencil, and those of a country whose atlantic scenes, which defy the imitation of natural beauties lie within a narrow compass, are heightened by classical and moral

* "Biferaque rosaria Pæsti.

associations, and have an appearance of being purposely arranged for the canvass.

"A gentleman, for whose judgment and taste I have the highest esteem, told me at Messina, that he could not overcome his dislike to the naked and exposed appear ance of Sicily and Calabria, which convinces me how difficult it is for an American to resist the influence of associations formed at a period of life when the sensibilities are unworn, and the heart and the imagination peculiarly susceptible of impressions from external objects. The land of Sicily and Calabria, composed as it is for the greater part of lava, wears, at a distance, an appearance of sterility. But this illusion is corrected upon examining more narrowly the properties of the soil and the rich variety of plants and flowers it spontaneously produces. A drapery more luxuriant would be prejudicial to its beauty; extensive forests would obstruct the view of the outline of the distant mountains, or conceal the surface of a country grace; fully diversified by hills and valleys, and dressed by the hand.of cultivation. Poussin and Claude Lorraine might here have studied the theory of their art, so harmoniously combined are all its features, and so happily blended are the colours of the sea, the land and the sky, to please the eye and enchant the imagination. Having doubled the southmost point of Calabria, the country of Theocritus presents itself before you. The cerulean waves that encircle it appear still to be the favourite haunt of seagods and syrens, and its enchanting shores still seem to echo with the complaints of the despairing Galatea. The dark luxuriant foliage of the orange, intermixed with the pale verdure of the olive, and the large flowering aloe, which displays its broad leaves upon the summits of the nearest hills, form the principal features of the Sicilian shores, while opposite, Calabria stretches to the foot of the snowy Appenines its rich fields and vineyards, gay with country houses and villages. Contrasted with these scenes of delicious repose, is the busy city of Messina, its port crowded with Levant ships, and its mixed population diversified

with Moorish and Asiatic costumes, collected in groups on the quay, or basking in the sun, and as is the custom of the south, alternately relapsing from a state of vigorous exertion into a state of unmanly indolence."

In this delicious region

Far from the winters of the west, By every gale and season blest, nature appears arrayed in all the charms with which poets have invested the fabled elysium. The landscape is usually marked by features of the softest beauty-graceful, delicate, and undulating;

-scenes

where gods might rove, And woman charm, and man deserve her love, open upon the eyes of the traveller in varied and ever delightful succession;the flower of Venus is in perpetual bloom, and her star burns with a warmer and steadier lustre on the land of her reputed offspring-the land of Eneas and of Virgil—than elsewhere it deigns to shed. Flowers of the richest dyes-fruits of unrivalled flavour-the vine, the orange, the purple-flowering clematis, the olive, and the everlasting aloe,-decorate the surface of the soil;-the ruins of antique grandeur-the shrines of paganism, and the palaces of patricians-glitter in the rays of an unclouded sun, or shine with mellowed brilliancy in the beams of his sister luminary. And then the climateso soft, so pure, that to live, to breathe, in it is a pleasure-an inappreciable luxury! Every thing, in short, exists here in perfection but him for whom all this profusion of nature's choicest gifts has been poured forth:

All, save the spirit of man, is divine,

and the favour of heaven, so lavishly extended to the soil, seems to have been withdrawn from its inhabitants.

The author's concluding remarks ou the landscape of Italy and America are written with great eloquence and enthu siasm; and show a warmth of patriotic feeling that cannot fail to recommend him to the approbation of his countrymen.

"Yet I would not be understood in this comparison of Italy with America, to give the preference to the former. Independently of the sacred attachment which must indissolubly bind the heart of every American to the moral and political institutions of his own country, it possesses attractions which "To those who have navigated the Medi- cannot be diminished by the longest resiterranean, it is perhaps unnecessary to remark, dence in the most favoured climes of Euhow much deeper and more vivid its colours rope. His moral principles severe and pure, are than those of the ocean. In the neigh-his taste unvitiated by artificial refinebourhood of Sicily I have seen it of a deep violet colour, and have frequently remarked the same appearance in the Adriatic. Hence, Virgil's mare purpureum,' lord Byron's purple of ocean,' expressions, the beauty and propriety of which, are not easily understood by an inhabitant of the north of Europe.

6

ments,-yet delicately alive to the nobler and finer impulses of the soul,-the young American, under the bright skies of Italy, and encompassed by the dazzling achievements of art, often sickens at the depravity and misery of man, and languishes for his

328

Rambles in Italy.

native home. His imagination presents to
him its untrodden wilds,-its waste fertility,
as an image of man unsophisticated by artifi-
cial society. He contrasts the youthful go-
vernments of America, which have grown
up unfashioned by the hand of hoary-head-
ed prejudice, with those of Italy, fabricated
by despotism and superstition. If America
can boast no stately palaces, no monuments
of ancient grandeur, she is exempt from the
miseries which follow in the train of arbi-
trary power. If no ancient fortresses, no
ruined convents, crown the tops of its hills,
or frown upon the summits of its mountains,
it is because the peaceful vales beneath have
never owned the sway of feudal or monastic
tyrants. These are inestimable blessings,
and incomparably of more value than that
empty but fatal splendour for which the
price of liberty and happiness must be paid.
Some facts alluded to in the ensuing pages
will, I flatter myself, place in a strong light
the happy condition of this country, com-
pared with that of others, and show

"What makes the nations smile,
Improves their soil, and gives them double suns;
And why they pine beneath the brightest skies,
In nature's richest lap.

"America affords a great diversity of soil and climate, and in certain situations we may enjoy gales as pure, and skies as fair as those of Italy. In proportion, too, as the national taste becomes refined, and as a love for picturesque embellishment increases, the classical beauties of the latter will be gradually transplanted to our soil, and its own grand features, which no art can improve, be intermixed with scenes as soft and as delicate as those of the Alban Lake. The saffron tints of our autumnal skies resemble those of the country I have been describing, and our moon only wants ancient ruins to adorn, to make her the same enchantress of the night she is in Italy.

"The following is an extract from Mr. Brackenridge's Views of Louisiana. One would suppose he was describing the climate of Italy. I confess, that to me, nature never wore an aspect so lovely as on the lonely plains of the west. From their dry and unsheltered surface no damp and unwholesome vapours rise to lessen the elasticity of the air, or dim the brilliant blue of the heavens. So transparent is the atmosphere, that a slight smoke can be discerned at the distance of many miles, which curiously exercises the caution and sagacity of the fearful savage, ever on the watch to destroy or avoid destruction. And then that sublime immensity which surrounds us. The sea in motion is a

sublime object, but not to be compared to the varied scenes that here present themselves, and over which the body as well as the imagination is free to expatiate. The beams of the sun ap peared to me to have less fierceness, or perhaps this is owing to the cool breezes which continually fan the air, bringing upon their wings the odours of myriads of Rowers,'

"I am also ready to subscribe to the opinion, that much of the interest which Italy excites, arises from adventitious causes. As it has been for many ages the theatre of great events, its rivers, its mountains and lakes, possess, independently of their natural beauty, a mighty influence over the imagination. A mind pregnant with the stores of classic literature, derives from the contemplation of these objects enjoyments which cannot be imparted to a person destitute of the rudiments of a liberal education. It is, therefore, unfair to compare with it a country, the events of whose history are yet too few and recent to afford a America, stimulus to the imagination. which yet affords few materials for epic and dramatic poetry, sinks by comparison with a country embellished by the charms of fiction, and which is constantly soliciting the attention by the power of those moral associations it awakes in the heart. The impressions produced by her wild beauties and unborrowed charms, are faint by comparison, with the emotions felt in traversing ground ennobled by illustrious events, and heightened by the magical colouring of poetry and tradition. Yet it cannot be denied that objects, in themselves incapable of affording any intellectual pleasure, oftentimes acquire an undue ascendant over the mind by the power of association; and I am apt to believe, in comparing Italy with other countries, the enthusiasm of the scholar has lent a brilliant colouring to this region of classical events, which has sometimes betrayed him into incautious and exaggerated encomiums. I have often been astonished at the powerful impressions I have received from objects, which, had I met them in any other country, I perhaps should have regarded with indifference. Surely, I have frequently exclaimed to myself, these woods, hills and streams which I now behold with feelings that overpower me, yield in beauty and sublimity to our trans-atlantic scenery. From what cause, then, do they derive their extraordinary influence over the imagination?-From their connexion with some of the most eventful periods of time. Here, at every step, we tread on the ruins of a mighty empire! A fractured column, a dilapida ted wall,-a broken architrave, often produces the most powerful excitement in the imagination, by bringing before it personages and events whose history has left a deep and permanent impression on the sensibilities of childhood. The dazzling exploits of valour,-the heroical sacrifices made to love of country,-to conjugal affection,-to parental duty,-to filial piety,the high and pleasing examples of moral and intellectual excellence,-heightened by the eloquence of the historian, and the fancy of the poet, are identified with names that one hears daily pronounced by the common people of Italy. Je demandois l'autre jour,' says Corinne, a une pauvre femme que je rencontrai, ou elle demeurait? Ale