the poet about the "exemplaria Græca:" Nocturna versate manu, versate diurna. His quotations are numerous and appropriate; but facility in quoting is scanty proof of classical learning. The man who devotes himself in honest earnestness to the cultivation of an intimacy with the great and gifted of other days-who has a heart to seek, and a mind to appreciate their friendship-who can think with their thoughts, and feel as they felt-who will not deem the hour misspent when his fancy lingers amidst the breathless listeners of the forum, or hovers round the Academic retreat of poetry and wisdom-who will not stay to watch the running sand, when he holds beneath his eye the page which genius has filled, and time hallowed-such a man will betray the employment of his leisure hours by tokens widely different. It will flow in the stream of his language, and smooth without weakening the current of his eloquence. It will show itself in his taste and judgment, and forbid the flight of fancy to sink into coldness and bombast. It will check the wandering tongue, and pour the rushing stream with more rapid force along its natural channel. Original power, indeed, this learning cannot confer; without considerable power it cannot be even acquired-but it will sharpen and improve. The iron is ground in vain upon the stone to which the steel owes its polished edge. And whilst it enables us to feel and value the merits of contemporary writers, it will prevent the danger of being misled by those false meteors "whose light but leads astray." In these remarks upon the value of ancient literature, we mean of course to embrace the luminaries who have flung the radiance of their genius over the domains of our native language. To undervalue them would betray an absurdity of taste, as gross as that which unfortunately prompts the ignorant of the present day to decry the importance of knowledge which they do not comprehend. We advocate neither the theoretical antiquarian, nor the servile copyist who can sacrifice his individual endearments on the shrine of the ancient giants. We have simply shown our reasons for dissenting from what we consider an unfortunate prejudice, which has probably had more effect than is generally supposed in causing the mediocrity so perceptible in most of our modern writers. We have, however, wandered so far from the ambitious little gentleman of whom we were speaking, that we must borrow a little of his own abruptness, and get back as best we may. The change in policy which now seems likely to be adopted will soon reduce Mr. Shiel from the eminence on which he stands. If he were once seated in the House of Commons, his inflated style and theatrical arts would be feeble aids in buoying him up, or keeping his name afloat on the tide of popular favor. The breath of party has raised him; he has been an indefatigable champion of a body which sent from its own ranks few who could take a leading part in public and passionate discussions. Called into consequence by the Association, he has endeavored to gain distinction by a forwardness in violence which O'Connell feels to be unnecessary. Mr. Shiel is always struggling for the mastery; and perhaps the very consciousness of his own deficiencies hurries him beyond the limits of moderation. He would be a disagreeable antagonist for a friendly match at the foils. But he should remember that bitterness is not strength; neither can ribaldry pass by the name of sarcasm. He is the author of several tragedies, which have been consigned to the tomb of the Capulets sooner than might have been anticipated. There were many of the scenes far from deficient in force and pathos; and the language rolied on in a stream of magnificence, well suited for the purposes of declamation. They are less disfigured by bombast than most of his speeches, and are, on the whole, very favorable specimens of his abilities. Yet they are not of that class which we would place under our pillow, or sit eagerly down to peruse for the second time. We remember the manager of a country theatre complaining that the whole rage of fashion was for comedies and farces, and that people seemed to have lost all taste for the tragedies of Shakspeare and Otway and Shielthat is, as was sarcastically remarked on the occasion, Otus, Ephialtes, and Tom Thumb ! pragmatical and overweening; and that to his opinions more than to his talents he was indebted for his elevation. Mr. Peel retorted-he spoke of fustian, and I talked of calico: he touched on Covent Garden, and I referred to Manchester: he alluded to Evadne,' and I glanced at spinningjennies." There is a good deal of point in this. "Evadne" is one of Mr. Shiel's deceased tragedies it is unnecessary to explain the allusions. to the Right Hon. Secretary. We have now done with Messrs.. O'Connell and Shiel. The only other speaker in the Association who deserves notice is Mr. Lawless. He is a good declaimer, possesses much fluency, and delivers himself with considerable animation. He is perfectly at home when addressing an assembly of the forty-shilling freeholders, with whom he is a great favorite. When the committees of Parliament were examining witnesses on the state of Ireland, Mr. Peel pressed the poor poet very hard about an anecdote which he had related in one of his speeches to the Association, accusing the Irish government of an action at once dishonorable and impolitic: Mr. Shiel was compelled to confess that he had sacrificed the truth for the sake of "rhetorical effect." It will readily be presumed that he returned home But his influence in the Asnot much prejudiced in favor of the sociation is rather small; for he wants minister. When he next addressed prudence in steering his course. When the Association, he thus alluded to an O'Connell and Shiel are in a rage, Mr. attack made on him in the House of Lawless is downright mad. Hence, Commons. "The sarcasms of the in all his disputes with the leader, he Home Secretary were not wholly un- has been uniformly worsted, even provoked; for I had ventured to inti- when he had common sense on his mate that his language was bald, his side. It is not, however, necessary reasoning disingenuous, his manner to pursue this subject farther. MONTECO-AN ITALIAN STORY. IN TWO PARTS.-PART II.* In the mean time Monteco descend- reaching upwards, to drop into the ed the winding staircase, till it brought prison whatever was not too large to him upon a level with the surface of pass the orifice; and it was thus that the canal. He then moved forward the provisions of the miserable caprapidly through the labyrinth of vaults tive were daily introduced. As Monwhich supported his palace. After teco drew near, he heard his daughter opening more than one iron gate, singing, with feeble and lingering which cut off all communication with notes. the neighborhood of her prison, various passages of great length, and all in complete darkness, except where the lamp he held illumined them, conducted him, at last, within sight of a low and massy door. A narrow slit above enabled a tall man, by He heard her, however, but for an instant. So soon as he had gained that point at which the light could pierce the loop-hole, so as to inform the prisoner that some one was approaching, the song ended in groan. Even Monteco paused for a moment at the door, and his hand mov * See page 49. a She "This is trifling. Do as I command; and you shall have freedom, wealth, honor, and pleasure. Disobey me, and this cell shall remain your dungeon till it becomes your tomb." "I have often prayed to God that it were so already.” ed slowly to unfasten the bar which "A wound-a wound-oh, that confined it. He entered the dungeon, you would bestow upon me a mortal but the maiden was not there. one!" had passed from its outer to its inner division, and was kneeling before a rude stone figure of the Virgin, which stood in a corner of the cell. This image had become very dear and holy to her, as the only symbol of comfort contained in her narrow dwelling. A small grated window, in this division of the prison, threw for a few hours of the day a faint beam upon the form of the Madonna. She had so long ceased to hope, that she did not even look round when she heard the grating of the door; and when she recognised her father's footsteps, she pressed closer to the wall, and buried her head in her hands. Yes; I doubt not you would willingly escape from performing your filial duties, by escaping at the same time from life. But mark me-what will be your doom hereafter if you die without the rites of the church ?" "Oh God!" said the terrified girl, "will you permit him to kill both soul and body ?” Monteco replied, without hesitation, "What," said Monteco, "you will though with something of a subdued not deign to look upon me?" The complying girl turned her head for an instant; but, dazzled with the light, and terrified at her father's presence, again averted her face. That glance startled her parent, and he was silent, till, recovering herself with an effort, she leaned against the wall, looked at him, and endeavored to stand up; but she was too feeble, and she fell with her face upon the stones. Monteco lifted her with one strong grasp, and seated her on a stone bench, built into the wall close to where he stood. She regained her senses in a few seconds, and her gaze wandered round the dungeon, til at last she fixed her eyes upon his face, when she sank slowly upon her knees, and, clinging to his cloak, shrieked with all the strength of her faint voice, "O! Father, Father, save me." He again raised her; but he this time continued to support the form which trembled so violently as almost to escape from his hand. He watched her shrunk and pallid face, while he said, "Foolish and disobedient girl, for that purpose I am come hither. I have visited thee only that I may save thee from those consequences of thy own madness, which, if it continue, must as inevitably follow as the blood flows from a wound.” sneer," God himself hath commanded you to honor your father. Think you he will fail to punish your rebellion ?" "Alas! Alas! what shall I do, holy Mother!" she proceeded, looking at the image of the Virgin, "save me from sin !" "Nothing can save you from sin, and from misery, unless you marry Marco Soradino." "Never," she replied, while her father hastily grasped at his dagger, and she fell for the third time to the ground. But he returned the half-drawn weapon to its sheath, and listened to her while she said, "Father you may do with me what you will. The blow that would at one destroy-but for that I may not hope ;-the rack that would crush my limbs, the imprisonment from the very air of heaven, which will achieve what it has already half accomplished, the overthrow of my reason-any thing that you will you may subject me to, for you can ; and not on me be the responsibility: but in wedding the wretch Soradino, I should bring down guilt and pollution on my own soul. I should swear love, where there is abhorrence; respect, where there is disgust; fidelity to one whose touch would be contamination; and obedience to him whose every word and thought is evil. motion, and almost breath, and debarred me from communion with my kind, till my own words sound strange in my ears, and I scarce know what are my own thoughts; but I have one feeling as strong as on the day I was shut into this prison-it is loathing for the name of Soradino. He shall never have my hand till it is that of a maniac or a corpse." Your cruelty has denied me light and I have been told, that my birth cost my mother her life. Oh! if she were now living, how would her unstained conscience and matron purity have been outraged by the attempt to force her only child into the arms of a ruffian and a debauchee. Nay, must you not believe that at this moment her holy spirit can see through the gloom of this dungeon, and pierce into the recesses of that heart which was a sworn offering to her, but which you have hardened against her daughter with plates of steel, as if you dreaded that I would raise my feeble hand against your life." "Now, by heaven, by the memory of my sires, that malignant spirit shall be broken. The Roman Father had the power of life and death over his children and for them the Turk hath still the narrow rack, and the deep sea. If there be privations that can wear, or torments that can crush obstinacy, thou shalt wed the man I have chosen." He turned to leave the dungeon; and his departing form was clearly defined to the eyes of his daughter by its interception of the light of the lamp he carried,-a mournful emblem of that paternal interference which deprived her life of all its natural illumination. He was stooping under the low portal, when she threw herself towards him with all her remaining energy, and exclaimed-"O! my father, I have sinned against heaven." -He turned his head, and interrupted her-"Will you then at last return to your obedience? Do you perceive the necessity as well as the duty of wedding the bridegroom I have chosen ?" "Hear me," she cried in accents of piercing yet broken supplication, "hear me before you again depart. A prisoner who never sees the sun has little means or inclination to keep count of time; yet if I remember right, it must now be nearly four months since I last saw you. Why, when God was perhaps prompting you to relent, and to depart from the commission of this great wrong, why did some evil spirit put into my heart to answer you, my father, with words of defiance and almost of scorn. Rather I will implore you, by the faith of Christ, and by the memory of my mother, to abstain from urging me into this hateful prostitution. 13 ATHENEUM, VOL. 1, 3d series. Monteco did not attempt to interrupt her; but nearly the only touch of human feeling which he displayed during the whole of this agonizing interview, was the almost unconscious action by which he drew his cloak over his breast so as to hide the cuirass. For he had thought it necessary to place a mantle on his shoulders when entering, but for a quarter of an hour, the vaults in which his child had been imprisoned for a year. Isabel went on with an impassioned and almost frenzied vehemence, to which her physical strength but ill responded: "Alas! when as an infant I climbed your knees," and again she embraced his knees as she spoke, "when you seemed almost pleased that my little hands should play with your chains of honor, and well-won badges, if some wizard had predicted to you that while yet scarce more than a child, I should be grovelling at your feet on the floor of a dungeon, to entreat with a voice worn and hoarse, by many months of sighs and lamentations, for the enjoyment of the common air, for the preservation of my life, for that choice in the bestowal of my person, which is granted to the poorest fisherman's daughter in Venice, to the rudest herdswoman of the mountains,-if this had been foretold you when I was an infant by your side,— would you not have obtained from the Tribunals, that the lying prophet should be scourged and branded for defaming a noble of the Republic?" Monteco now broke in with that cold, yet wrathful tone, which is of all the best fitted, when uttered by the stronger party, at once to silence complaint, and defy remonstrance. He did not say one word to his attendant of the result of his visit; but, accomplished dissembler as he was, his confidant readily perceived some unwonted perturbation of the lip, and some "Fool!" said he, "how long shall additional compression of the brows. this raving last?" For The Noble merely said: "Take care Nay speak to me not, my Father," replied the maiden, "in that fierce and bitter accent. O! will you not relent for an instant, and give me but one glance of the earth and the heaven, and that dear balcony with all my flowers, where I used to sit with Lorenzo, and watch for the return of your gondola from the council? Grant me to see my poor brother but an hour, and indeed, indeed, Father, I will not ask for more. It is very hard for me to die so young in the darkness and damp of this prison. I used to be so happy when you let me run as I pleased, from my chamber into the shade of the veranda, and again to my lute and my embroidery. But since I have been shut up here, my heart has grown cold, and my brain has learned to whirl round from week to week, giddy, and sick, and weary, and burning." She raised herself feebly from her knees, and half ventured to embrace him, and to approach her face to his, while she sobbed out, "can you not see, dear, dear Father, how my poor cheeks are shrunk in? and I am sure they must be as withered as dead rose-leaves. But unless you are kind to your poor Isabel, I shall never see a rose again." The father did not attempt to re-bling him to think with vigor and turn her caress; he stood firm as a granite column, while he said with a calm and determined utterance "Isabel, it is for you to yield, and not for me. You shall see the sun rise this morning over the Adriatic, on the one condition, that you wed Mark Soradino." Her eyes closed before he spoke the detested name, and while he pronounced it, she fainted, and fell backwards. He made no attempt to support her; but withdrew and left her in complete darkness. He then carefully and deliberately fastened the door, and regained his chamber. Monteco found Pietro on his post. clearness of his present situation. Pietro, half-determined to revolt from his master, half-retained in awe of his predominant spirit, drew, as usual, a pallet across the door-way which opened between Monteco's chamber and the ante-room, and stretched himself upon it. Wine, fatigue, and watching were omnipotent, and he was speedily in a deep sleep. Meantime Sidney and Lorenzo had made their preparations; and at three in the morning they set out for the Monteco Palace. The night was fortunately dark. They made their boatman, whom they knew they could so far |