When these and more are heavy on thee, when | Smiles without mirth, and pastimes without pleasure, Youth without honour, age without respect, Meanness and weakness, and a sense of woe

'Gainst which thou wilt not strive, and dar'st not murmur, 2

Have made thee last and worst of peopled deserts,
Then, in the last gasp of thine agony,
Amidst thy many murders, think of mine!

Thou den of drunkards with the blood of princes! 3
Gehenna of the waters! thou sea Sodom!
Thus I devote thee to the infernal gods!
Thee and thy serpent seed!

Here the DOGE turns and addresses the Execu-
tioner.

Slave, do thine office! Strike as I struck the foe! Strike as I would Hare struck those tyrants! Strike deep as my curse! strike and but once!

The DOGE throws himself upon his knees, and as the Executioner raises his sword the scene closes.

SCENE IV.

The Piazza and Piazzetta of Saint Mark's. 8.- The people in crowds gathered round the grated gates of the Ducal Palace, which are shut.

First Citizen. I have gain'd the gate, and can discern the Ten,

Robed in their gowns of state, ranged round the Doge.

With no harangue idly proclaim'd aloud
To catch the worthless plaudit of the crowd;
No feeble boast, death's terrors to defy,
Yet still delaying, as afraid to die!""

We are surprised that Bishop Heber did not quote Andrew
Marvel's magnificent lines on Charles I.: --

"While round the armed bands
Did clap their bloody hands,

He nothing common did, or mean,
Upon that memorable scene;

But with his keener eye

The axe's edge did try;

Nor call'd the Gods with vulgar spight
To vindicate his helpless right,

But bow'd his comely head
Down, as upon a bed."]

[See APPENDIX: Marino Faliero, Note C.]

If the Doge's prophecy seem remarkable, look to the following, made by Alimanni two hundred and seventy years 0:- There is one very singular prophecy concerning Venice: If thou dost not change,' it says to that proud republic, thy liberty, which is already on the wing, will not reckon a century more than the thousandth year.' If we carry back the epocha of Venetian freedom to the establishment of the government under which the republic flourished, we shall fnd that the date of the election of the first Doge is 697; and If we add one century to a thousand, that is, eleven hundred years, we shall find the sense of the prediction to be literally this: Thy liberty will not last till 1797.' Recollect that

Venice ceased to be free in the year 1796, the fifth year of the French republic; and you will perceive, that there never was prediction more pointed, or more exactly followed by the event. You will, therefore, note as very remarkable the three lines of Alamanni addressed to Venice; which, however, no one has pointed out:

Se non cangi pensier, un secol solo Non conterà sopra 'l millesimo anno Tua libertà, che va fuggendo a volo.' Many prophecies have passed for such, and many men have been called prophets for much less."-GINGUENE',t. ix. p. 144. 3 Of the first fifty Doges, five abdicated-five were banished with their eyes put out -five were MASSACRED and nine deposed; so that nineteen out of fifty lost the throne by violence, besides two who fell in battle: this occurred long previous to the reign of Marino Faliero. One of his more immediate predecessors, Andrea Dandolo, died of vexation. Marino Faliero himself perished as related. Amongst his successors, Foscari, after seeing his son repeatedly tortured and banished, was deposed, and died of breaking a blood vessel, on hearing the bell of Saint Mark's toll for the election of his successor. Morosini was impeached for the loss of Candia; but this was previous to his dukedom, during which he conquered the Morea, and was styled the Peloponnesian. Faliero might truly say,

"Thou den of drunkards with the blood of princes!" 4" Un Capo de' Dieci" are the words of Sanuto's Chronicle. 3 [As a play, Marino Faliero is deficient in the attractive passions, in probability, and in depth and variety of interest;

It is

and revolts throughout, by the extravagant disproportion which the injury bears to the unmeasured resentment with which it is pursued. As a poem, though it occasionally displays great force and elevation, it obviously wants both grace and facility. The diction is often heavy and cumbrous, and the versification without sweetness or elasticity. generally very verbose, and sometimes exceedingly dull. Altogether, it gives us the impression of a thing worked out against the grain, and not poured forth from the fulness of the heart or the fancy;-the ambitious and elaborate work of a powerful mind engaged with an unsuitable task - not the spontaneous effusion of an exuberant imagination, sporting in the fulness of its strength. Every thing is heightened and enforced with visible effort and design; and the noble author is often contented to be emphatic by dint of exaggeration, and eloquent by the common topics of declamation. Lord Byron is, undoubtedly, a poct of the very first order, and has talents to reach the very highest honours of the drama. But he must not again disdain love, and ambition, and jealousy; he must not substitute what is merely bizarre and extraordinary, for what is naturally and universally interesting, nor expect, by any exaggerations, so to rouse and rule our sympathies by the senseless anger of an old man, and the prudish proprieties of an untempted woman, as by the agency of the great and simple passions with which, in some of their degrees, all men are familiar, and by which alone the Dramatic Muse has hitherto wrought her miracles.- JEFFREY.

On the whole, the Doge of Venice is the effect of a powerful and cultivated mind. It has all the requisites of tragedy, sublimity, terror, and pathos-all but that without which the rest are unavailing, interest! With many detached passages which neither derogate from Lord Byron's former fame, nor would have derogated from the reputation of our best ancient tragedians, it is, as a whole, neither sustained nor impressive. The poet, except in the soliloquy of Lioni, scarcely ever seems to have written with his own thorough good liking. He may be suspected throughout to have had in his eye some other model than nature; and we rise from his work with the same feeling as if we had been reading a translation. For this want of interest the subject itself is, doubtless, in some measure to blame; though, if the same subject had been differently treated, we are inclined to believe a very different effect would have been produced. But for the constraint and stiffness of the poetry, we have nothing to blame but the apparent resolution of its author to set (at whatever risk) an example of classical correctness to his uncivilised countrymen, and rather to forego success than to succeed after the manner of Shakspeare. HEBER.]

[ Heaven and Earth" was written at Ravenna, in October, 1821. In forwarding it to Mr. Murray, in the following month, Lord Byron says-"Enclosed is a lyrical drama, entitled A Mystery.' You will find it pious enough, I trust

PART I.

SCENE I.

A woody and mountainous district near Mount Ararat. Time, Midnight.

Enter ANAH and AHOLIBAMAH. 2

Anah. OUR father sleeps: it is the hour when they Who love us are accustom'd to descend Through the deep clouds o'er rocky Ararat :How my heart beats!

at least some of the chorus might have been written by Sternhold and Hopkins themselves for that, and perhaps for melody. As it is longer, and more lyrical and Greek, than I intended at first, I have not divided it into acts, but called what I have sent Part First; as there is a suspension of the action, which may either close there without impropriety, or be continued in a way that I have in view. I wish the first part to be published before the second; because, if it don't succeed, it is better to stop there, than to go on in a fruitless experiment." Though without delay revised by Mr. Gifford, and printed, this First Part" was not published till 1822, when it appeared | in the second number of the "Liberal." The " Mystery" was never completed.]

2 ["It is impossible to suppose two poems more nearly diametrically opposite to each other in object and execution, than the Loves of the Angels' by Mr. Moore, and Heaven and Earth, a Mystery,' by Lord Byron. The first is all glitter and point, like a piece of Derbyshire spar; and the other is dark and massy, like a block of marble. In the one. angels harangue each other, like authors wishing to make a great public impression; in the other, they appear silent and majestic, even when their sou.s have been visited with human passions. In the one, the women whom the angels love, although beautiful and amiable, are blue-stockingsh and pedantic, and their sins proceed from curiosity and the love of knowledge. In the other, they are the gentle, or the daring, daughters of flesh and blood, dissolving in tenderness, or burning with passion for the Sons of the Morning In the one, we have sighs, tears, kisses, shiverings, thril lings, perfumes, feathered angels on beds of down, and all the transports of the honey-moon; in the other, silent looks of joy or despair, passion seen blending in vain union between the spirits of mortal and immortal, love shricking ca the wild shore of death, and all the thoughts that ever agitated human hearts dashed and distracted beneath the blackness and amidst the howling of commingled earth and heaven. The one is extremely pretty, and the other is something ter rible. The great power of this Mystery' is in its fearless and daring simplicity. Lord Byron faces at once all the grandeur of his sublime subject. He seeks for nothing, but it rises before him in its death-doomed magnificence. Man, or angel, or demon, the being who mourns, or laments, or exults, is driven to speak by his own soul. The angels deign not to use many words, even to their beautiful paramours, they scorn Noah and his sententious sons. The first scene is a woody and mountainous district, near Mount Ararat, and the time midnight. Mortal creatures, conscious of their own wickedness, have heard awful predictions | of the threatened flood, and all their lives are darkened with terror. But the sons of God have been dwellers in earth, and women's hearts have been stirred by the beauty of these celestial visitants. Anah and Aholibainah, two of

ani

From thy sphere ! Whatever star contain thy glory;

In the eternal depths of heaven

Albeit thou watchest with "the seven," 1 Though through space infinite and hoary Before thy bright wings worlds be driven, Yet hear!

Oh! think of her who holds thee dear!
And though she nothing is to thee,
Yet think that thou art all to her.
Thou canst not tell, and never be
Such pangs decreed to aught save me,
The bitterness of tears.
Eternity is in thine years,
Enborn, undying beauty in thine eyes;
With me thou canst not sympathise,

Except in love, and there thou must
Acknowledge that more loving dust
Ne'er wept beneath the skies.

Thou walk'st thy many worlds, thou seest The face of him who made thee great, As he hath made me of the least

Of those cast out from Eden's gate:

these angel-stricken maidens, come wandering along while others sleep, to pour forth their invocations to their demon lovers. They are of very different characters: Anah, soft, gentle, and submissive; Aholibainah, proud, impetuous, and

For thee, immortal essence as thou art!
Great is their love who love in sin and fear;

And such, I feel, are waging in my heart

A war unworthy: to an Adamite Forgive, my Seraph! that such thoughts appear, For sorrow is our element; Delight

An Eden kept afar from sight,

Though sometimes with our visions blent.
The hour is near

Which tells me we are not abandon'd quite. —
Appear! Appear!
Seraph!

My own Azaziel! be but here,

And leave the stars to their own light.

Thou rulest in the upper air —

Or warring with the spirits who may dare
Dispute with Him

Who made all empires, empire; or recalling Some wandering star, which shoots through the abyss,

Whose tenants dying, while their world is falling,

Share the dim destiny of clay in this;

Or joining with the inferior cherubim,
Thou deignest to partake their hymn.
Samiasa!

I call thee, I await thee, and I love thee.
Many may worship thee, that will I not:
If that thy spirit down to mine may move thee,
Descend and share my lot!

Though I be form'd of clay,

And thou of bearns

More bright than those of day
On Eden's streams,
Thine immortality cannot repay
With love more warm than mine
My love. There is a ray

In me, which, though forbidden yet to shine,
I feel was lighted at thy God's and thine.
It may be hidden long: death and decay
Our mother Eve bequeath'd us- but my heart
Defies it: though this life must pass away,
Is that a cause for thee and me to part?
Thou art immortal- so am I: I feel-
I feel my immortality o'ersweep
All pains, all tears, all time, all fears, and peal,
Like the eternal thunders of the deep,

Into my ears this truth-" Thou liv'st for ever!" But if it be in joy

I know not, nor would know;

That secret rests with the Almighty giver

Who folds in clouds the fonts of bliss and woe. But thee and me he never can destroy;

aspiring the one loving in fear, and the other in ambition. WILSON.]

The archangels, said to be seven in number, and to occupy the eighth rank in the celestial hierarchy.

Change us he may, but not o'erwhelm; we are
Of as eternal essence, and must war
With him if he will war with us: with thee

I can share all things, even immortal sorrow; For thou hast ventured to share life with me, And shall I shrink from thine eternity?

No! though the serpent's sting should pierce me thorough,

And thou thyself wert like the serpent, coil
Around me still and I will smile.

And curse thee not; but hold

Thee in as warm a fold

As--but descend, and prove

For being happy,

Deprived of that which makes my misery.

Irad. I take thy taunt as part of thy distemper, And would not feel as thou dost for more shekels Than all our father's herds would bring, if weigh'd Against the metal of the sons of Cain

The yellow dust they try to barter with us,
As if such useless and discolour'd trash,

The refuse of the earth, could be received
For milk, and wool, and flesh, and fruits, and all
Our flocks and wilderness afford. Go, Japhet,
Sigh to the stars, as wolves howl to the moon-
I must back to my rest.

extravagance is dictated by passion. His muse, even in her riddles and digressions, has a sybil-like, prophetic fury. JEFFREY.]

3 [This is one of those bitter, taunting sarcasms that escape from Lord Byron's pen, in spite of himself. Japhet is afterwards introduced alone, in a mountainous cave; and his soliloquy, bemoaning his own fate, and the approaching destruction of mankind, is interrupted by a laugh of demons rejoicing over the event. This scene is terrific. — JEFFRRY.]

And nights inexorable to sweet sleep,

Shem. To the tents of the father of the sisters? Noah. No; to the cavern of the Caucasus. [Exeunt NOAH and SHEM.

SCENE III.

The mountains.—A cavern, and the rocks of Caucasus. Japh. (solus). Ye wilds, that look eternal; and thou cave,

Which seem'st unfathomable; and ye mountains,
So varied and so terrible in beauty;

Here, in your rugged majesty of rocks

And toppling trees that twine their roots with stone In perpendicular places, where the foot

Of man would tremble, could he reach them Ye look eternal! Yet, in a few days,

—yes,

The untrodden forest, only broken by

The sweeping tempest through its groaning boughs;
Such is the sullen or the fitful state

Of my mind overworn. The earth's grown wicked,
And many signs and portents have proclaim'd
A change at hand, and an o'erwhelming doom
To perishable beings. Oh, my Anah !
When the dread hour denounced shall open wide
The fountains of the deep, how mightest thou
Have lain within this bosom, folded from
The elements; this bosom, which in vain
Hath beat for thee, and then will beat more vainly,
While thine -Oh, God! at least remit to her
Thy wrath! for she is pure amidst the failing
As a star in the clouds, which cannot quench,
Although they obscure it for an hour. My Anah!
How would I have adored thee, but thou wouldst
not;

And still would I redeem thee-see thee live
When ocean is earth's grave, and, unopposed
By rock or shallow, the leviathan,

Lord of the shoreless sea and watery world,
Shall wonder at his boundlessness of realm.

Enter NOAH and SHEM.

[Exit JAPHET.

He went forth,

Noah. Where is thy brother Japhet?
Shem.
According to his wont, to meet with Irad,
He said; but, as I fear, to bend his steps
Towards Anah's tents, round which he hovers nightly,
Like a dove round and round its pillaged nest;
Or else he walks the wild up to the cavern
Which opens to the heart of Ararat.

Noah. What doth he there? It is an evil spot
Upon an earth all evil; for things worse
Than even wicked men resort there : he
Still loves this daughter of a fated race,
Although he could not wed her if she loved him,
And that she doth not. Oh, the unhappy hearts
Of men! that one of my blood, knowing well
The destiny and evil of these days,

And that the hour approacheth, should indulge
In such forbidden yearnings! Lead the way;
He must be sought for!
Shem.

I will seek Japhet.

Noah.

Go not forward, father:

Do not fear for me:

All evil things are powerless on the man Selected by Jehovah. - Let us on.

Before the mass of waters; and yon cave,
Which seems to lead into a lower world,

Shall have its depths search'd by the sweeping wave,
And dolphins gambol in the lion's den!
And man-

Oh, men! my fellow-beings! Who
Shall weep above your universal grave,
Save I? Who shall be left to weep? My kinsmen,
Alas! what am I better than ye are,

That I must live beyond ye? Where shall be
The pleasant places where I thought of Anah
While I had hope? or the more savage haunts,
Scarce less beloved, where I despair'd for her?
And can it be ! - Shall yon exulting peak,
Whose glittering top is like a distant star,
Lie low beneath the boiling of the deep?
No more to have the morning sun break forth,
And scatter back the mists in floating folds
From its tremendous brow? no more to have
Day's broad orb drop behind its head at even,
Leaving it with a crown of many hues?
No more to be the beacon of the world,
For angels to alight on, as the spot

Nearest the stars? And can those words "no more
Be meant for thee, for all things, save for us,
And the predestined creeping things reserved
By my sire to Jehovah's bidding? May

He preserve them, and I not have the power
To snatch the loveliest of earth's daughters from
A doom which even some serpent, with his mate,
Shall 'scape to save his kind to be prolong'd,
To hiss and sting through some emerging world.
Recking and dank from out the slime, whose ooze
Shall slumber o'er the wreck of this, until
The salt morass subside into a sphere
Beneath the sun, and be the monument,
The sole and undistinguish'd sepulchre,
Of yet quick myriads of all life? How much
Breath will be still'd at once! All-beauteous world!
So young, so mark'd out for destruction, I
With a cleft heart look on thee day by day,
And night by night, thy number'd days and nights:
I cannot save thee, cannot save even her
Whose love had made me love thee more; but as
A portion of thy dust, I cannot think
Upon thy coming doom without a feeling
Such as- Oh God! and canst thou-[He pauses.

A rushing sound from the cavern is heard, and shouts
of laughter-afterwards a Spirit passes.
Japh.

Of the Most High, what art thou?

Spirit (laughs).

In the name

Ha ha ha!