Imagens da página
PDF
ePub

the greater part of them seem neither to have lodged so high, nor lived so low, as their more active and abstemious brethren in other cities. M. Grimm observes that, by a remarkable fatality, Europe was deprived, in the course of little more than six months, of the splendid and commanding talents of Rousseau, Voltaire, Haller, Linnæus, Heidegger, Lord Chatham, and Le Kain-a constellation of genius, he adds, that when it set to us, must have carried a dazzling light into the domains of the King of Terrors, and excited no small alarm in his ministers -if they bear any resemblance to the ministers of other sovereigns.

ART. II. The Giaour, a Fragment of a Turkish Tale. By Lord Byron. 8vo. pp. 41. London. 1813.

THIS

HIS, we think, is very beautiful-or, at all events, full of spirit, character, and originality;-nor can we think that we have any reason to envy the Turkish auditors of the entire tale, while we have its fragments thus served up by a restaurateur of such taste as Lord Byron. Since the increasing levity of the present age, indeed, has rendered it impatient of the long stories that used to delight our ancestors, the taste for fragments, we suspect, has become very general; and the greater part of polite readers would now no more think of sitting down to a whole Epic, than to a whole ox :-And truly, when we consider how few long poems there are, out of which we should not wish very long passages to have been omitted, we will confess, that it is a taste which we are rather inclined to patronize-notwithstanding the obscurity it may occasionally produce, and the havoc it must necessarily make, among the proportions, developments, and callida juncture of the critics. The truth is, we suspect, that after we once know what it contains, no long poem is ever read, but in fragments;—and that the connecting passages, which are always skipped after the first reading, are often so tedious as to deter us from thinking of a second ;-and in very many cases so awkwardly and imperfectly brought out, that it is infinitely less laborious to guess at the author's principle of combination, than to follow out his full explanation of it.

In the present instance, however, we do not think that we are driven upon such an alternative; for though we have heard that some persons of slender sagacity, or small poetical experience, have been at a loss to make out the thread of the story, it certainly appears to us to be as free from obscurity as any poe

tical narrative with which we are acquainted-and is plain and elementary in the highest degree, when compared with the lyric compositions either of the Greeks, or of the Orientals. For the sake of such humble readers, however, as are liable to be perplexed by an ellipsis, we subjoin the following brief outline, -by the help of which they will easily be able to connect the detached fragments from which it is faithfully deduced.

Giaour is the Turkish word for Infidel; and signifies, upon this occasion, a daring and amorous youth, who, in one of his rambles into Turkey, had been smitten with the charms of the favourite of a rich Emir; and had succeeded not only in winning her affections, but in finding opportunities for the indulgence of their mutual passion. By and by, however, Hassan discovers their secret intercourse; and in a frenzy of jealous rage, sews the beauteous Leila up in a sheet-rows her out, in a calm evening, to a still and deep part of the channel-and plunges her into the dark and shuddering flood. The Giaour speedily comes to the knowledge of this inhuman vengeance; and, mad with grief and resentment, joins himself to a band of plundering Arnauts, and watches the steps of the cruel Hassan, who, after giving out that Leila had eloped from his Serai, proceeds, in a few days, with a gorgeous and armed train, to woo a richer and more noble beauty. The Giaour sets upon him as he is issuing from a rocky defile, and after a sanguinary contest, immolates him to the shade of the murdered Leila. Then, perturbed in spirit, and perpetually haunted by the vision of that lovely victim, he returns to his own country, and takes refuge in a convent of Anchorets;-not, however, to pray or repent, but merely for the solitude and congenial gloom of that lonely retreat. Worn out with the agony of his recollections, and the constant visitation, of his stormy passions, he there dies at the end of a few miserable years; and discloses to the pious priest whom pity and duty had brought to the side of his couch, as much of his character and history as the noble author has thought fit to make known to his readers.

[ocr errors]

Such is the simple outline of this tale,-which Turk or Christian might have conceived as we have given it, without any great waste of invention-but to which we do not think any other but Lord Byron himself could have imparted the force and the character which are conspicuous in the fragments that are now before us. What the noble author has most strongly conceived and most happily expressed, is the character of the Giaour;-of which, though some of the elements are sufficiently familiar in poetry, the sketch which is here given appears to us in the highest degree striking and original. The

fiery soul of the Marmion and Bertram of Scott, with their love of lofty daring, their scorn of soft contemplation or petty comforts, and their proud defiance of law, religion, and conscience itself,-are combined with something of the constitutional gloom, and the mingled disdain and regret for human nature, which were invented for Childe Harold; while the sterner features of that lofty portraiture are softened down by the prevalence of an ardent passion for the gentlest of human beings, and shaded over by the overwhelming grief which the loss of her had occasioned. The poetical effect of the picture, too, is not lowered, in the present instance, by the addition of any of those debasing features, by which Mr Scott probably intended to give a greater air of nature and reality to his representations. The Giaour has no sympathy with Marmion in his love of broad meadows and fertile fields-nor with Bertram, in his taste for plunder and low debauchery; and while he agrees with them in placing in the first rank of honour, the savage virtues of dauntless courage and terrible pride, knows far better how much more delightfully the mind is stirred by a deep and energetic attachment. The whole poem, indeed, may be considered as an exposition of the doctrine, that the enjoyment of high minds is only to be found in the unbounded vehemence and strong tumult of the feelings; and that all gentler emotions are tame and feeble, and unworthy to move the soul that can bear the agency of the greater passions. It is the force and feeling with which this sentiment is expressed and illustrated, which gives the piece before us its chief excellence and effect; and has enabled Lord Byron to turn the elements of an ordinary tale of murder into a strain of noble and impassioned poetry.

The images are sometimes strained and unnatural-and the language sometimes harsh and neglected, or abrupt and disorderly; but the effect of the whole is powerful and pathetic; and, when we compare the general character of the poem to that of the more energetic parts of Campbell's O'Connor's Child, though without the softness, the wildness, or the occasional weakness, of that enchanting composition, and to the better parts of Crabbe's lyrical tales, without their coarseness or details,→ we have said more to recommend this little volume to all true lovers of poetry, than if we had employed a much larger space than it occupies with a critique and analysis of its contents. is but fair, however, that the reader should be enabled to judge, from a few specimens, of the justness or accuracy of this comparative estimate. He may take, first, the following little sketch of an Oriental beauty.

'Her eye's dark charm 'twere vain to tellBut gaze on that of the Gazelle,

It will assist thy fancy well,

It

As large, as languishingly dark, But Soul beam'd forth in every spark That darted from beneath its lid, Bright as the gem of Giamschid. On her fair cheek's unfading hue, The young pomegranate's blossoms strew Their bloom in blushes ever newHer hair in hyacinthine flow When left to roll its folds below, As midst her handmaids in the hall She stood superior to them all, Hath swept the marble where her feet Gleamed whiter than the mountain sleet Ere from the cloud that gave it birth, It fell, and caught one stain of earth. p. 11, 13. The drowning of this lovely, loving, and unresisting creature, is described with great force and feeling. Hassan comes, in profound silence, with a silent band, bearing gently among them a silent and heaving burden in a white sheet. They row out in a still and golden evening from the rocky shore, and silently slip their burden into the water.

Sullen it plunged, and slowly sank,
The calm wave rippled to the bank;
I watch'd it as it sank,-methought
Some motion from the current caught
Bestirr'd it more,-'twas but the beam
That checquer'd o'er the living stream,-
I gaz'd, till vanishing from view,

Like lessening pebble it withdrew;

Still less and less, a speck of white

That gemm'd the tide, then mock'd the sight;
And all its hidden secrets sleep,

Known but to Genii of the deep,

Which, trembling in their coral caves,

[ocr errors]

They dare not whisper to the waves. p. 5, 6,

The death of Hassan is no less characteristic, and forms a picture of equal excellence, though of a very different expres

sion.

[merged small][ocr errors]

A stain on every bush that bore

A fragment of his palampore,

His heart with wounds unnumber'd riven,
His back to earth, his face to heaven,
Fall'n Hassan lies-his unclos'd eye
Yet lowering on his enemy,

As if the hour that seal'd his fate,
Surviving left his quenchless hate;

And o'er him bends that foe with brow

As dark as his that bled below.-' p. 19, 20.

The imprecation of the Moslem upon the Christian conqueror, is also conceived with great spirit. The passage about the vampire is the most original and energetic.

• But first, on earth as Vampire sent,
Thy corse shall from its tomb be rent;
Then ghastly haunt thy native place,
And suck the blood of all thy race,
There from thy daughter, sister, wife,
At midnight drain the stream of life;
Yet loathe the banquet which perforce
Must feed thy livid living corse.' &c.
But one that for thy crime must fall,
The youngest-most belov'd of all,
Shall bless thee with a Father's name-
That word shall wrap thy heart in flame!
Yet must thou end thy task, and mark
Her cheek's last tinge, her eye's last spark,
And the last glassy glance must view
Which freezes o'er its lifeless blue. '
Wet with thine own best blood shall drip,
Thy gnashing tooth and haggard lip;

Then stalking to thy sullen grave

Go-and with Gouls and Afrits rave.' p. 23-25.

We hasten, however, to the Giaour's own dying and passionate confessions; in which, we think, the chief force and beauty of the poem is summed up. It opens thus

Father! thy days have pass'd in peace,

"'Mid counted beads, and countless prayer;

"To bid the sins of others cease,

"Thyself without a crime or care,

"Save transient ills that all must bear,
"Has been thy lot from youth to age,
"And thou wilt bless thee from the rage
"Of passions fierce and uncontroul'd,
"Such as thy penitents unfold,
"Whose secret sins and sorrows rest

"Within thy pure and pitying breast. "'

P. 30.

He then goes on to explain his own principles of action, and

the state in which they had left him,

« AnteriorContinuar »