‘She will look on thee—I have looked on thee, full of that thought: and from that moment ne’er thy waters could I dream of, name, or see, without the inseparable sigh for her.’
Now, while there was nothing whatever to connect the River Po with tender recollections, there was Byron’s association in childhood with the River Trent, a memory inseparable from his boyish love for Mary Chaworth.
‘But in his native stream, the Guadalquivir,
Juan to lave his youthful limbs was wont;
And having learnt to swim in that sweet river
Had often turned the art to some account.’
In the fourth stanza we perceive that the poet, while thinking of the Trent, ‘betrays his thoughts’ to the Po, a river as wild and as swift as his native stream.
The ninth stanza has puzzled commentators exceedingly. It has been pointed out that the River Po does not sweep beneath the walls of Ravenna. That is, of course, indisputable. But Byron, in all probability, did not then know the exact course of that river, and blindly followed Dante’s geographical description, and almost used his very words:
‘Siede la terra, dove nata fui,
Su la marina dove il Po discende,
Per aver pace co’ seguaci sui.’
It is, of course, well known that the Po branches off into two streams to the north-west of Ferrara, and flows both northward and southward of that city. The southern portion—the Po di Primaro—is fed by four affluents—the Rheno, the Savena, the Santerno, and the Lamone—and flows into the Adriatic south of Comachio, about midway between that place and Ravenna. It was obviously to the Po di Primaro that Dante referred when he wrote seguaci sui.
Unless Francesca was born close to the mouth of the Po, which is not impossible, Byron erred in good company. In any case, we may fairly plead poetic licence. That Byron crossed the Po di Primaro as well as the main river admits of no doubt.
In the eleventh stanza Byron is wondering what will be the result of his journey? Will the Guiccioli return to him? Will all be well with the lovers, or will he return to Venice alone? In his fancy they are both wandering on the banks of that river. He is near its source, where the Po di Primaro branches off near Pontelagascuro, while she was on the shore of the Adriatic.
The twelfth stanza would perhaps have been clearer if the first and second lines had been,