Judged by the cold blood of later times, Petrarch was an overenthusiastic admirer of ancient Rome and her glories. It was an exaggerated picture, perhaps (if that were possible), which he drew of her grandeur in his 'Africa,' written in Latin hexameters, where he paints with superb eloquence Scipio, Lælius, Masinissa, Ennius, and other great characters; ornamenting his poem with splendid descriptions and artificial orations. But by it he won his laureateship; and it was through the possession of this "exaggerated" zeal that he became the admirer and friend of Cola di Rienzo, and was inspired to write that immortal canzone which still kindles every true Italian heart, Spirto Gentil,' given at the end of this article in Major Macgregor's very good translation. That this sentiment was founded in loyal patriotism, as he understood it, would be sufficiently evinced, if we had nothing more, by the celebrated canzone Italia Mia,' which is here given in the almost perfect translation of Lady Dacre. Surely never has patriotic affection been clothed in warmer or more exquisite numbers.

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Without deciding whether it was a cause or a consequence of his "exaggerated" love and admiration of Roman antiquity, it is a fact that in familiarity with, and in abundance and elegance of writing in, the Latin tongue, he has not even been approached by any other modern. He left a very great number of works in Latin, both prose and verse, upon a very great variety of subjects, religious, political, philosophical; for the most part of no inherent interest to-day, and far too numerous to be even named here. Some of the more famous and curious will show their drift by their titles: 'De Remediis Utriusque Fortunæ (Concerning the Remedies for Either Fortune), developing the doctrine of the Stoics, that "Not the good things of life are truly good, nor the ills truly bad, but that the good consists in subduing the passions"; 'De Vita Solitaria' (On Solitude); 'De Ocio Religiosorum' (On the Soul-Rest of the Religious), written after his visit to his brother, who was a monk; 'Secretum' (Private), a confession to St. Augustine in the presence of personified Truth,—an important work for understanding the mind of Petrarch, and the true nature of his love for the lady Laura. There are many volumes of letters in Latin, sometimes in prose, sometimes in verse, often really a short treatise or oration: the 'Familiari' (To a Friend); Senili (To an Old Man), one of which is really a Latin translation of the story of Griselda in the 'Decameron'; 'Variæ' (Miscellanies); one, 'Ad Posteros' (To Posterity), brings his autobiography up to the year 1351. He says he had burned more than he preserved.

Petrarch differed from Dante in another aspect, which is twofold. Dante is often rough and sometimes imperfect in his numbers; but his invention is Homeric, and never sleeps. Petrarch's invention is

often dull; but the utmost refinement and perfection of poetic style, and the extreme finish of every line, are never absent.

Still another distinction between them, though each was marvelous in his own way, is that Dante is a universal poet, embracing in his matter the whole sphere of theology, science, and politics, as well as all places from the centre of the earth to the zenith of the highest heaven, and all times from the creation of the world to the final Judgment Day; whereas the only matter of Petrarch in his Italian poetry is the passion of human love, and this all centred about one beautiful woman. The Canzoniere,' on which his immortal fame depends, consist of more than three hundred sonnets, canzoni, sestine, dancing-songs, and pastorals, and with a half-dozen exceptions, chiefly patriotic. There is not one in which his love for Laura is not wrought in, either as foundation or ornament.

This might well enough be expected to produce an intolerable monotony; and theoretically, the more familiar one should become with them the more sensibly the monotony would be felt. Except in the work of an extraordinary genius, equipped with superlative art, this must undoubtedly hold good. But in fact, in the case of Petrarch the opposite is true. The character of monotony is not really there; and the more often one reads the "Rhymes," the less of monotony is felt, and the more particular and individual each sonnet and canzone is perceived to be. Of this curious paradox the poet Campbell has given a very ingenious and pretty explanation, as follows:

"This monotony," he says, "impresses the reader exactly in proportion to the slenderness of his acquaintance with the poet. Approaching the sonnets for the first time, they may probably appear to him as like to each other as the sheep of a flock; but when he has become familiar with them, he will perceive an interesting individuality in every sonnet, and will discriminate their individual character as precisely as the shepherd can distinguish every single sheep of his flock by its voice and its face.»

Yet again, Dante wrote his great poem in all the panoply of the poetic art, precisely anticipating immortality for himself and his work, with posterity distinctly in his view, -as he tells us over and over again in the 'Vita Nuova': while Petrarch calls his Italian poems 'Nuga' (Trifles), which he threw off, in the fugitive transports of his soul, for the eye of one dear lady, according to the varying moods of passion and the changing circumstances of life; of necessity leaving, under all their glittering poetic armor, here and there a vulnerable spot, through which the critics could shoot their querulous shafts, and have often done so. Among these the poet Campbellwhom we have just quoted, and who is as querulous as any-closes his criticisms on what he calls Petrarch's "affected refinements" and

"unnatural conceits" with refreshing frankness, saying: "If I could make out the strongest critical case against him, I should still have to answer this question,-How comes it that Petrarch's poetry, in spite of all these faults, has been the favorite of the world for five hundred years? So strong a regard for Petrarch is rooted in the mind of Italy, that his renown has grown up like an oak which has reached maturity amidst the storms of ages, and fears not decay from revolving centuries."

This answer is very true. But the question returns, "From what extraordinary particulars has arisen this overtopping regard for Petrarch's poetry in the mind of Italy?" We confidently answer, first, from the "melting melody" of his verse; in which, taking into account the quantity he has left, he easily surpasses all others who have used that harmonious speech. Secondly, that he has treated the tenderest sentiment of universal humanity not only far more copiously, in the mere number of touching lines, than any other Italian poet, but with a marvelous absence of repetition he goes ever on and on with his delicious numbers, drawing ever new similitudes and pictures, which are continually bringing silent thoughts of sweetness to the reader's mind. Finally, there is in his handiwork a tone all his own, an unwonted and peculiar way of expressing the sentiment of love; not sensual, not conventional, not over-metaphysical, but natural and truly human: in still other words, while clothed with a purity fit for the most virtuous and modest lady's ear, his lines, radiant with beauty and of bewitching melody, yet breathe a tenderness, a sincerity, a manliness, not surpassed by Tibullus, or any of the most objectionable of the famous old classic pagans.

It is this quality, so bewitching in the original, of Petrarch's Italian poetry,- subtle and evanescent as the fragrance of a rose,-in which perhaps lies the greatest difference of all between the two supreme poets of Italy, and renders the stanzas of Petrarch the despair of every translator into a foreign tongue. Not only are the unparalleled melodies of his delicious numbers impossible to be carried over into other measures and other sounds, but the sweet images, as ethereal as the fleecy clouds of June, are shy of another zone.

No English poet has attempted a complete translation of Petrarch's Italian poetry. Such translations as exist are fragmentary, by different hands, and of very unequal merit. We have selected the most celebrated morsels, and in the translations which seemed to bring to us the most successfully that which Petrarch has given to those who are native to the language and the scenery of Italy.

DF. Bingham

«ITALIA MIA, BENCHÈ 'L PARLAR SIA INDARNO »

TO THE PRINCES OF ITALY, EXHORTING THEM TO SET HER FREE

O

MY own Italy! though words are vain

The mortal wounds to close,

Unnumbered, that thy beauteous bosom stain,

Yet may it soothe my pain

To sigh forth Tiber's woes,

And Arno's wrongs, as on Po's saddened shore
Sorrowing I wander, and my numbers pour.
Ruler of heaven! By the all-pitying love
That could thy Godhead move

To dwell a lowly sojourner on earth,

Turn, Lord! on this thy chosen land thine eye:
See, God of Charity!

From what light cause this cruel war has birth;
And the hard hearts by savage discord steeled,
Thou, Father! from on high,

Touch by my humble voice, that stubborn wrath may yield!

Ye, to whose sovereign hands the fates confide

Of this fair land the reins,—

(This land for which no pity wrings your breast,)Why does the stranger's sword her plains invest? That her green fields be dyed,

Hope ye, with blood from the Barbarians' veins?

Beguiled by error weak,

Ye see not, though to pierce so deep ye boast,
Who love or faith in venal bosoms seek:

When thronged your standards most,
Ye are encompassed most by hostile bands.
Oh, hideous deluge gathered in strange lands,
That rushing down amain

O'erwhelms our every native lovely plain!

Alas! if our own hands

Have thus our weal betrayed, who shall our cause sustain?

Well did kind Nature, guardian of our State,
Rear her rude Alpine heights,

A lofty rampart against German hate:
But blind ambition, seeking his own ill,
With ever restless will,

To the pure gales contagion foul invites;
Within the same strait fold

The gentle flocks and wolves relentless throng,
Where still meek innocence must suffer wrong:
And these-oh, shame avowed!-

Are of the lawless hordes no tie can hold;

Fame tells how Marius's sword

Erewhile their bosoms gored,

Nor has Time's hand aught blurred the record proud! When they who, thirsting, stooped to quaff the flood, With the cool waters mixed, drank of a comrade's blood!

Great Cæsar's name I pass, who o'er our plains

Poured forth the ensanguined tide,

Drawn by our own good swords from out their veins;
But now-nor know I what ill stars preside —

Heaven holds this land in hate!

To you the thanks, whose hands control her helm!
You, whose rash feuds despoil

Of all the beauteous earth the fairest realm!
Are ye impelled by judgment, crime, or fate,
To oppress the desolate?

From broken fortunes and from humble toil
The hard-earned dole to wring,

While from afar ye bring

Dealers in blood, bartering their souls for hire?
In truth's great cause I sing,

Nor hatred nor disdain my earnest lay inspire.

Nor mark ye yet, confirmed by proof on proof,
Bavaria's perfidy,

Who strikes in mockery, keeping death aloof?
(Shame, worse than aught of loss, in honor's eye!)
While ye, with honest rage, devoted pour
Your inmost bosom's gore! —

Yet give one hour to thought,

And ye shall own how little he can hold
Another's glory dear, who sets his own at naught.
O Latin blood of old!

Arise, and wrest from obloquy thy fame,
Nor bow before a name

Of hollow sound, whose power no laws enforce!
For if barbarians rude

Have higher minds subdued,

Ours! ours the crime!- Not such wise Nature's course.

Ah! is not this the soil my foot first pressed?
And here, in cradled rest,