BYRON'S WORKS. out the breath of his nostrils, so I might abide in darkness and blackness, and an empty space! Yea I would lie down, I would not rise, neither would I stir my limbs till I became as the rock in the den of the lion, on which the young lion resteth his head whilst he sleepeth. For the torrent that roareth far off bath a voice; and the clouds in heaven look terribly on me; the Mighty One who is against me speaketh in the wind of the cedar-tree; and in silence am I dried up." Then Enos spake to his father," Arise, my father, arise; we are but a little way from the place where I found the cake and the pitcher." And Cain said, "How knowest thou?" and the child answered-"Behold, the bare rocks are a few of thy strides distant from the forest; and while even now thou wert lifting up thy voice, I heard the echo." Then the child took hold of his father, as if he would raise him; and Cain, being faint and feeble, rose slowly on his knees and pressed himself against the trunk of a fir, and stood upright and followed the child. The path was dark till within three strides' length of its termination, when it turned suddenly: the thick black trees formed a low arch, and the moonlight appeared out of the ethereal journey of the spirit and his victim, and in the vast sketch of the world of phantasms at which they arrive: but they are utterly unlike the massive grandeurs of Milton's creation. We are far from imputing intentional impiety to Lord Byron for this Mystery; nor, though its language occasionally shocks, do we apprehend any danger will arise from its perusal.” [The following is Mr. Galt's opinion: "This performance in point of conception is of a sublime order. The object of the poem is to illustrate the energy and the art of Lucifer in accomplishing the ruin of the first-born. By an unfair misconception the arguments of Lucifer have been represented as the sentiments of the author, upon some imaginary warranty derived from the exaggerated freedom of his life; and yet the moral tendency of the reflections is framed in a mood of reverence as awful towards Omnipotence as the austere divinity of Milton. would be presumption in me, however, to undertake the defence of It any question in theology; but I have not been sensible to the imputed impiety, whilst I have felt in many passages influences that have their being amidst the shadows and twilights of old religion."' -P E.] So much for the professed Reviewers. We shall conclude with a passage from Sir Egerton Brydges's Letters on the Character and Genius of Lord Byron "One of the pieces which have had the effect of throwing the most unfavourable hues, not upon the brilliancy of Lord Byron's poetry, but upon its results to society, is Cain. Yet, it must be confessed, that there is no inconsiderable portion of that poem which is second only to portions of similar import in Milton.-and many of them not second; in a style still sweeter and more eloquent, and with equal force, grandeur, and purity of sentiment and conception; such as the most rigidly-religious mind would have read, had it come from Milton, or any other poet whose piety was not suspected, as the effusion of something approaching to holy inspiration, "Let us then reconsider this extraordinary poem, which we have abandoned a little too hastily; let us task our candour afresh, and inquire of ourselves, whether he who could write such passages could mean wrong? Let us recollect, that as the rebellious and blasphemous speeches he has put into the mouths of Lucifer and Cain are warranted by Milton's example, and the fact of Cain's transgression recorded in the Bible, the omission of the design and filling up a character who should answer all those speeches might be a mere defeet in the poet's judgment. He might think that Lucifer's known character as an Evil Spirit precluded his arguments from the sanction of authority; and that Cain's punishment, and the denunciations which accompanied it, were a sufficient warning. "I know not that any objection has been made to Heaven and Earth. It has the same cast of excellence as the more perfect parts of Cain, but, perhaps, not quite so intense in degree. "It seems as if Lord Byron persuaded himself, with regard to his own being, that he had always within him two contrary spirits of good and evil contending for the dominion over him, and thus reconciled those extraordinary flights of intellectual elevation and purity with a submission to the pride, the ferocity, the worldly passions, the worldly enjoyments, the corporeal pastimes, the familiar humour, the vulgarisms, the rough and coarse manliness, to which he alternately surrendered himself, and which the good-natured public chose to consider as the sole attributes of his personal character his time, however, must have been spent in the musings by which these high poems, so compacted of the essence of thought, were produced; and, in all this large portion of his existence here, his imagination must have borne him up on its wings into etherial regions, far above the gross and sensual enjoyments of the grovelling earth. Much of for a moment like a dazzling portal. Enos ran be- could reach, it was desolate; the bare rocks faced been lovely, fell not on these hot rocks and scorching Did he deal, as minor poets deal, in mere splendour of words, his poetry would be no proof of this; but he never does so there is always a breathing soul beneath his words, 'That o'er-informs the tenement of clay :' it is like the fragrant vapour that rises in incense from the earth 'Less than a god we think there cannot dwell That sings so sweetly and so well!' "If Lord Byron thought that, however londly noisy voices might salute him with a rude and indiscriminate clamour of applause, his poems were not received with the taste and judgment they merited, and that severe and cruel comments were attached to them by those who assumed to themselves authority, and who seldom allowed the genius without perverting it into a cause of censure, that more than outweighed the praise; those fumes of flattery which are imputed as the causes of a delirium that led him into extravagancies, outraging decorum and the respect due to the public, never, in fact, reached To confer faint praise' is to damn; to confer praise in a wrong place is to insult and provoke. Lord Byron, therefore, had not, after all, the encouragement that is most favourable to ripen the richest fruit; and it was a firm and noble courage that still prompted him to persevere. him. "For this reason, as well as for others. I think his foreign restdences were more propitious to the energies of his Muse than a continued abode in England would have been. The poison of the praises that were insidious did not reach him so soon; and he was not beset by treacherous companions, mortifying gossip, and that! petty intercourse with ordinary society which tames and lowers the tone of the mind. To mingle much with the world is to be infallibly degraded by familiarity; not to mingle, at least, among the busy and the known, is to incur the disrespect to which insignificance is subjected. Lord Byron's foreign residence exempted him from these evils: he saw a few intimate friends, and he corresponded with a few others; but such an intercourse does not expose to similar effects. The necessary knowledge and necessary hints may thus be conveyed ; but not all the pestilent chills which general society is so officious to unveil. "If Lord Byron had not had a mind with a strong spring of virtue within it, I think that he would have thrown down his pen at some of the attacks he received, and given himself up to the sensual pleasures of his rank for the remainder of his life. The finer parts of his poems were of such spiritual splendour, and so pure, though pas sionate, an elevation, that they ought to have redeemed any parts which were open to doubt from a malevolent construction, and even have eclipsed and rendered unnoticeable many positive faults. "Lord Byron's style, like his thoughts, had every variety: it did not attempt (as is the common practice) to make poetry by the me taphorical and the figurative; it followed his thoughts, and was a part of them: it did not fatigue itself to render clear by illustration or important by ornament, because the thought was clear or important in itself. "I remember, when I first read Cain, I thought it, as a composi tion, the most enchanting and irresistible of all Lord Byron's works; and I think so still. Some of the sentiments, taken detachedly, and left unanswered, are no doubt dangerous, and therefore ought not to have been so left; but the class of readers whom this poem is likely to interest are of so very elevated a cast, and the effect of the poetry is to refine, spiritualise, and illumine the imagination with such a sort of unearthly sublimity, that the mind of these, I am persuaded, will become too strong to incur any taint thus predicted, from the defect which has been so much insisted on."-L. E. human concerns, The face of Cain turned pale; but Enos said, "Ere yet I could speak, I am sure, O my father, that I heard that voice. Have not I often said that I remembered a sweet voice? O my father! this is it;" and Cain trembled exceedingly. The voice was sweet indeed, but it was thin and querulous like that of a feeble slave in misery, who despairs altogether, yet cannot refrain himself from weeping and lamentation. Enos crept softly round the base of the rock, and stood before the stranger, and looked up into his face. And the Shape shrieked, and turned round, and Cain beheld him, that his limbs and his face were those of his brother Abel whom he had killed; and Cain stood like one who struggles in his sleep, because of the exceeding terribleness of a dream; and ere he had recovered himself from the tumult of his agitation, the Shape fell at his feet, and embraced his knees, and cried out with a bitter outcry, "Thou eldest-born of Adam, whom Eve, my mother, brought forth, cease to torment me! I was feeding my flocks in green pastures by the side of quiet rivers, and thou killedst me; and now I am in misery." Then Cain closed his eyes, and hid them with his hands-and again he opened his eyes, and looked around him, and said to Enos, "What beholdest thou? Didst thou hear a voice, my son?"-"Yes, my father, I beheld a man in unclean garments, and he uttered a sweet voice full of lamentation." Then Cain raised up the shape that was like Abel, and said, "The Creator of our father, who had respect unto thee, and unto thy offering, wherefore hath he forsaken thee?" Then the Shape shrieked a second time, and rent his garment, and his naked skin was like the white sands beneath their feet; and he shrieked yet a third time, and threw himself on his face upon the sand that was black with the shadow of the rock, and Cain and Enos sate beside him; the child by his right hand, and Cain by his left. They were all three under the rock, and within the shadow. The Shape that was like Abel raised himself up, and spake to the child. "I know where the cold waters are, but I may not drink; wherefore didst thou then take away my pitcher?" But Cain said, "Didst thou not find favour in the sight of the Lord thy God?" The Shape answered, "The Lord is God of the living only, the dead have another God." Then the child Enos lifted up his eyes and prayed; but Cain rejoiced secretly in his heart. "Wretched shall they be all the days of their mortal life," exclaimed the Shape, "who sacrifice worthy and acceptable sacrifices to the God of the dead; but after death their toil ceaseth. Woe is me, for I was well beloved by the God of the living, and cruel wert thou, O my brother, who didst snatch me away from his power and his dominion!" Having uttered these words, he rose suddenly, and fled over the sands; and Cain said in his heart, "The curse of the Lord is on me-but who is the God of the dead?" and he ran after the Shape, and the Shape fled shrieking over the sands, and the sands rose like white mists behind the steps of Cain, but the feet of him that was like Abel disturbed not the sands. He greatly outran Cain; and, turning short, he wheeled round, and came again to the rock where they had been sitting, and where Enos still stood; and the child caught hold of his garment as he passed by, and he fell upon the ground; and Cain stopped, and, beholding him not, said, "he has passed into the dark woods," and walked slowly back to the rock; and when he reached it, the child told him that he had caught hold of his garment as he passed by, and that the man had fallen upon the ground; and Cain once more sat beside him, and said -"Abel, my brother, I would lament for thee, but that the spirit within me is withered and burnt up with extreme agony. Now, I pray thee, by thy flocks and by thy pastures, and by the quiet rivers which thou lovedst, that thou tell me all that thou knowest. Who is the God of the dead? where doth he make his dwelling? what sacrifices are acceptable unto him? for I have offered, but have not been received; I have prayed, and have not been heard; and how can I be afflicted more than I already am?" The Shape arose and answered—“O that thou hadst had pity on me, as I will have pity on thee. Follow me, son of Adam! and bring thy child with thee:" and they then passed over the white sands between the rocks, silent as their shadows. Werner, or the Inheritance ; A TRAGEDY.(1) TO THE ILLUSTRIOUS GOETHE, PREFACE. BY ONE OF HIS HUMBLEST ADMIRERS, This Tragedy is Dedicated. THE following drama is taken entirely from the German's Tale, Kruitzner, published many years ago in Lee's Canterbury Tales; written (I believe) by two sisters, of whom one furnished only this story and another, both of which are considered superior to the remainder of the collection. (2) I have adopted the characters, plan, and even the language, of many parts of this story. Some of the characters are modified or altered, a few of the names changed, and one character (Ida of Stralenheim) added by myself: but in the rest the original is chiefly followed. When I was young (about fourteen, I think), I first read this tale, which made a deep impression upon me; and may, indeed, be said to contain the germ of much that I have since written. I am not sure that it ever was very popular; or, at any rate, its popularity has since been eclipsed by that of other great writers in the same department. But I have generally found that those who had read it agreed with me in their estimate of the singular power of mind and concep (1) The tragedy of Werner was begun at Pisa, December the 18th, 1821, completed January the 20th, 1822, and published in London in the November after. The reviews of Werner were, we believe, without exception, unfavourable. One critique of the time thus opens: "Who could be so absurd as to think that a dramatist has no right to make free with other people's fables? On the contrary, we are quite aware that that particular species of genius which is exhibited in the construction of plots never at any period flourished in England. We all know that Shakspeare himself took his stories from Italian novels, Danish sagas, English chronicles, Plutarch's Lives-from any where rather than from his own invention. But did he take the whole of Hamlet, or Juliet, or Richard the Third, or Antony and Cleopatra, from any of these foreign sources? Did he not invent, in the noblest sense of the word, all the characters of his pieces? Who dreams that any old Italian novelist, or ballad-maker, could have formed the ima gination of such a creature as Juliet? Who dreams that the Hamlet of Shakspeare, the princely enthusiast, the melancholy philosopher, that spirit refined even to pain, that most incomprehensible and unapproachable of all the creations of human genius, is the same being, in any thing but the name, with the rough, strong-hearted, bloodyhanded Amlett of the north? Who is there that supposes Goethe to have taken the character of his Faust from the nursery rhymes and penny pamphlets about the Devil and Dr. Faustus? Or who, to come nearer home, imagines that Lord Byron himself found his Sardanapalus in Dionysius of Halicarnassus? "But here Lord Byron has invented nothing-absolutely NOTHING, There is not one incident in his play not even the most trivial, that is not to be found in Miss Lee's novel, occurring exactly in the same manner, brought about by exactly the same agents, and producing exactly the same effects on the plot. And then as to the characters,-not only is every one of them to be found in Kruitzner, but every one is to be found there more fully and powerfully developed. Indeed, but for the preparation which we had received from our old familiarity with Miss Lee's own admirable work, we rather incline to think that we should have been unable to comprehend the gist of her noble imifator, or rather copier, in several of what seem to be meant for his most elaborate delineations. The fact is, that this undeviating closeness, this humble fidelity of imitation, is a thing so perfectly new in any thing worthy of the name of literature, that we are sure no one tion which it developes. I should also add conception, rather than execution; for the story might, perhaps, have been developed with greater advantage. Amongst those whose opinions agreed with mine upon this story, I could mention some very high names: but it is not necessary, nor indeed of any use; for every one must judge according to his own feelings. I merely refer the reader to the original story, that he may see to what extent I have borrowed from it; and am not ! unwilling that he should find much greater pleasure in perusing it than the drama which is founded upon its contents. I had begun a drama upon this tale so far back as 1815 (the first I ever attempted, except one at thir- ¦ teen years old, called Ulric and Ilvina, which I had sense enough to burn), and had nearly completed an act, when I was interrupted by circumstances. This is somewhere amongst my papers in England; but as it has not been found, I have re-written the first, and added the subsequent acts. The whole is neither intended, nor in any shape adapted, for the stage. (3) PISA, February 1822. who has not read the Canterbury Tales will be able to form the least conception of what it amounts to. "Those who have never read Miss Lee's book will, however, be pleased with this production; for, in truth, the story is one of the most powerfully conceived, one of the most picturesque and at the same time instructive stories, that we are acquainted with. Indeed, thus led as we are to name Harriet Lee, we cannot allow the oppor tunity to pass without saying, that we have always considered her works as standing upon the verge of the very first rank of excellence; that is to say, as inferior to no English novels whatever, excepting those of Fielding, Sterne, Smollett, Richardson, Defoe, Radcliffe, Godwin, Edgeworth, and the Author of Waverley. It would not, perhaps, be going too far to say, that the Canterbury Tales exhibit more of that species of invention which, as we have already remarked, was never common in English literature, than any of the works even of those first-rate novelists we have named, with the single exception of Fielding. "Kruitzner, or the German's Tale, possesses mystery, and yet clearness, as to its structure, strength of characters, and admirable contrast of characters: and, above all, the most lively interest, blended with and subservient to the most affecting of moral lessons. The main idea which lies at the root of it is the horror of an erring father, who, having been detected in vice by his own son, has dared to defend his own sin, and so to perplex the son's notions of moral rectitude, on finding that the son, in his turn, has pushed the false principles thus instilled, to the last and worst extreme-on hearing his own sophistries fiung in his face by a-murderer." The reader will find a minute analysis, introduced by the above remarks, in Blackwood, vol. xii. p. 710.-L. E. (2) This is not correct. The Young Lady's Tale, or the Two Emily's, and the Clergyman's Tale, or Pembroke, were contributed by Sophia Lee, the author of The Recess, the comedy of The Chapter of Accidents, and Almeyda, a tragedy, who died in 1824. The German's Tale, and all the others in the Canterbury Collection, were written by Harriet, the younger of the sisters.-L. E. (3) Werner is, however, one of Lord Byron's dramas | that has proved successful in representation. It is still (1834) in possession of the stage.-L. E. Yes, but not to thyself: thy pace is hurried, Wer. 'Tis chill; the tapestry lets through Wer. (smiling.) Why! wouldst thou have it so? Jos. (1) "Werner- we mean Kruitzner—is admirably drawn. Who does not recognise in him the portrait of too common a character? The man of shining talent, ardent mind, powerful connections, brilliant prospects, who, after squandering away all in wanton self-indulgence, having lived only for himself, finds himself bankrupt in fortune and character, the prey of bitter regret, yet, unrepentant, as selfish in remorse as in his gaiety. All that is inconsistent in the character of Kruitzner is rendered still more so in the Werner of the drama. If he is made sometimes less criminal, he appears only the more weak, and his conduct is as wayward as his fate. His remorse at taking the rouleau from the man who was about to usurp his domains and throw him into prison is somewhat overcharged; and though his horror at hearing of Stralenheim's death is natural, it seems unaccountably to absorb his joy at finding himself delivered from his enemy, and restored to affluence. If his misfortunes should appear to exceed his errors, let it be remembered,' Wer. Something beyond our outward sufferings (tho' These were enough to gnaw into our souls) Hath stung me oft, and, more than ever, now. When, but for this untoward sickness, which Seized me upon this desolate frontier, and (2) Hath wasted, not alone my strength, but means, And leaves us-no! this is beyond me!--but For this I had been happy (3)--thou been happyThe splendour of my rank sustain'd-my name— My father's name-been still upheld; and, more Than those says his biographer, 'how easily both might have been avoided, since an adherence to his duties at almost any period of his life would have spared him more than half his sufferings. This is the moral of the tale; but it is but faintly il lustrated in the drama. Werner is more the victim of what would be called fate. Lord Byron has not felt the real force of the character." Ecl. Rev.-L. E. (2) "In this play, Lord Byron adopts the same nerveless and pointless kind of blank verse, which was a sorrow to every body in his former dramatic essays. It is, indeed, 'most unmusical, most melancholy.'- Ofs,' 'tos,' 'ands,' 'fors,' 'bys,'buts,' and the like, are the most common conclusions of a line; there is no ease, no flow, no harmony, 'in linked sweetness long drawn out:' neither is there any thing of abrupt fiery vigour to compensate for these defects." -Blackwood. (3) In this drama there is absolutely no poetry to be found; and if the measure of verse which is here dealt to BYRON'S WORKS. Lonely! my dear husband? Wer. Or worse-involving all I love, in this Jos. And I had not outlived thee; but pray take Jos. We are not baffled. The fluttering bird, hath ere this time outstept me, Jos. "Tis hopeless. Wer. Himself, no tidings have reveal'd his course. The promise that his anger would stop short us be a sample of what we are to expect for the future, we have only to entreat that Lord Byron will drop the ceremony of cutting up his prose into lines of ten, eleven, or twelve syllables (for he is not very punctilious on this head), and favour us with it in its natural state. very cunning alchemy to transmute his verse into prose, It requires no nor, reversing the experiment, to convert his plain sentences into verses like his own. When,' says Werner, 'but for this untoward sickness, which seized me upon this desolate frontier, and hath wasted, not alone my strength, but means, and leaves us-no! this is beyond me! but for this I had been happy.'-This is indeed, beyond us. If this be poetry, then we were wrong in taking his Lordship's preface for prose. It will run on ten feet as weil as the rest-[See ante, p. 532]: Some of the characters are modified Or altered, a few of the names changed, nd Original is chiefly followed. When I was young (about fourteen, I think) I First read this tale, which made a deep impression Nor is there a line in these so lame and halting, but we Of the third generation; but Heaven seems Jos. I must hope better still,-at least we have yet Baffled the long pursuit of Stralenheim. Wer. We should have done, but for this fatal sickMore fatal than a mortal malady, [ness; Because it takes not life, but life's sole solace: Even now I feel my spirit girt about By the snares of this avaricious fiend;- None hold us here for aught save what we seem. Even to our very hopes.-Ha! ha! Jos. Alas! Wer. Jos. Wer. An exile's daughter with an outcast son Jos. Your father did not think so, though 't was Has done in our behalf,—nothing. Wer. All which it How,-nothing? Jos. Or worse; for it has been a canker in Thy heart from the beginning: but for this, (1) "The story, which has great capabilities, is puzzled and ill told, and the general structure of the piece, considered as a dramatic performance, ridiculously inartificial. For instance, take the very opening scene between Werner and his wife. You there see the old silly expedient, which is resorted to by all incompetent play-writers; viz. that of making the dramatis personæ inform one another of events, which must have been so perfectly familiar to them, as never by any chance to be made matter of conversation, but which are manifestly given for the benefit of the audience. I thought The Critic had laughed this manœuvre down so completely, that no one would now-a-days have had recourse to it. Lord Byron might as dramatically, and more satisfactorily, have brought forward a god or devil to prologuise, as of old, or have adopted Terence's plan at once, and hauled up on the stage some unfortunate Sosia, or Davus, to act the part of a channel, to convey to the audience information which the poet had not skill otherwise to communicate. Werner gravely informs his wife, that he had been married to her twenty years-that his father disinherited him in consequence-that they had one son-that they had not seen him for twelve years-that his real name was not Werner-and other impertinences of the kind." Dr. Maginn.-L. E. |