Blanch half reclined, leaning on her elbow, and her face looked like a pale flame in the flickering shadow of the tree above us. She stretched her hand and touched tenderly a lovely spray of partridge-berry that trailed over the moss, but did not break it. Then she looked up.
"Minnie," she said, "I'm homesick."
"So am I."
"When will we start?"
"To-morrow."
THE "ADAM" OF ANDREINI.
Voltaire, in his life of Milton, mentioned the fact that in his youth the poet witnessed at Milan the representation of a drama entitled, Adam; or, Original Sin, written by "a certain Gio. Battista Andreini," a Florentine, and dedicated to Marie de' Medici, Queen of France. The French writer stated that Milton must have taken with him to England a copy of the work. His account was repeated by other biographers of the great English poet, some of whom alluded to the Italian poem as "a farce." In consequence of their unfavorable judgment, the impression has prevailed that Milton was not indebted to Andreini for the conception of his Paradise Lost, but that the grandeur and sublimity of the invention belong solely to him. Andreini's work fell into oblivion soon after its production, and has remained unappreciated even by the author's countrymen; so that it is not surprising that the honors due the Catholic poet have not been rendered by English or American critics or readers.
The mystery, tragedy, or sacred drama of Adam, composed by Andreini, was represented at Milan early in the seventeenth century, and was received with such enthusiasm that the author was invited to the French court by Queen Mary, and was there loaded with honors. A splendid edition of his work, dedicated to the queen, illustrated with plates and a portrait of the author, was issued at Milan in 1617. Such a reception shows the estimation in which his production was held at the time. Defects which did not interfere with the grandeur of the original design impaired its popularity afterward. The author was numbered among the Seicentisti, and belonged to a school noted for its departure from simplicity; for false refinements and extravagant conceits. Under the influence of such writers as Marini, Lappi, Redi, etc., in an age of pedantry, poetry was removed from nature, and dragged from her proper sphere. But though Andreini lived amidst the prevalence of a corrupt taste, and his style was in some degree tainted, it could not have been expected that any succeeding school, however correct, should trample under foot the substance of his work, and slight its sublimity of conception, to which a more enlightened age should have done justice. Such justice, nevertheless, has been denied him.
After it had been forgotten more than two hundred years, a tardy acknowledgment of Andreini's merit was paid by a few Italian critics, and a small, unadorned edition of his work was again published at Lucano; but in such an unattractive form that it seems to have awakened little attention. A few copies of the first edition were sold as a great literary curiosity. One, purchased at a large price, affords us an opportunity of examining the claim so long buried in obscurity, and to see how much the author of Paradise Lost has really borrowed.