The sprightly HORACE read his ode

To suit his audience' changing mood,When VIRGIL's deep and flowing lyre

Awakes my spirit's latent fire,

And leads me to Lavinia's shore,

Where cities thick in ruin lie,'

Strewing the wide Campagna o'er
With many a classic memory;

There dwell upon the sacred ground,
Where genius peopled vale and mound 2

With heroes bold and deeds of strife,

And gave to dust eternal life:

Survey where PLINY's villa stood,"

Along the green Laurentine wood;

Where CICERO, LUCRETIA dwelt, 4
Her breast the self-aimed poniard felt ;

The Saracens o'er meadows damp,

In many a savage glittering rank,

Beleaguering the Alban camp;

Mountains of dead all cold and dank;

The conquered army fast receding;

Stern warriors on the red field bleeding; Proud cities now in queenly pride,

Then floating down time's murky tide,

Where empires in decay lie hid,

Review again the Æneid.

VII.

THENCE to TORQUATO's cell I go,
And hear his mournful tale of wo,
Of ESTE's rage-ALPHONSO's ire,
That he presumptuous should aspire
So high as LEONORA's hand,

Or dare resist his high command.
Next DANTE in the exile's land,
His snowy locks by zephyrs fanned,
Weeping along the desert wold,
All pale and haggard, I behold;
Or on the rock he often sought,"
Near the old castle Tulmino,

Or midst the hills of Gubbio,

Moulding imperishable thought;
And linger long in PETRARCH'S grove

To hear him sing immortal love,
His sorrows to the breezes pour,

And chant his LAURA's beauty o'er.

VIII.

WHY my sad thoughts do rove to thee-
O bright, enchanting Italy!

Enamored thus, I cannot say,

But oft, methinks, when sleep controls

The sense, the spirit steals away

To mingle with congenial souls,

Who down from some more hallowed sphere Descending, come to linger near

The cherished spot which gave them birth,

And guard the pure and loved on earth.

NOTES.

NOTE 1, Sect. VI. p. 211.

"Where cities thick in ruin lie."

"Between Terracina and Visterna on the road to Rome, a distance of thirty miles, once stood, it is said, twenty-three Volscian cities.

"Invasions of the Saracens, in the middle ages, aided the progress of destruction; and we have now to seek, amid unpeopled woods, noxious swamps, and pastures on which graze buffaloes, for the cities of Latinus, Turnus, and Æneas."-Spalding's History of Italy and the Italian Islands.

NOTE 2, Sect. VI. p. 211.

"Where genius peopled vale and mound."

"There is no district in Latium," says Spalding,

66 more interest

ing than the region about the mouth of the Tiber, the scene of the last half of the Eneid. In the magic mirror of poetry, we behold here the glade of the Laurentine Forest, and tread with solemn pleasure those solitary woods and meadows, which the power of genius has peopled with heroic beauty. Here was the site of the classical Ostia, and Laurentum, the city of Father Latinus.”

NOTE 3, Sect. VI. p. 211.

"Survey where PLINY's villa stood."

Castle Fusano, an old turreted mansion, situated on the Campagna, in a clump of tall pines, a little to the south of the swamp, has been fixed upon by most antiquaries as Pliny's villa.

NOTE 4, Sect. VI. p. 211,

"Where CICERO, LUCRETIA dwelt."

"Near the southern frontier of Latium, the columns and frag ments of Cicero's paternal mansion lie scattered in the cloisters and kitchen-gardens of the little church and monastery of San Domenico

Abate.

"The bank is still green, though less shady than when his pleasure-ground covered it: the seats on which he sat, with his brother and Atticus, have crumbled away; but 'the lofty poplars' may yet be found."

"Eleven miles from the modern gate, we should look for Collatia, the dwelling of Lucretia."-Spalding's History of Italy, &c.

NOTE 5, Sect. VII. p. 212.

"Or on the rock he often sought,
Near the old castle Tulmino,
Or midst the hills of Gubbio,
Moulding imperishable thought.”