"When we turned into the Strada Chiaja, and I gave a last glance at the magnificent bay and the shores all resplendent with golden light; I could almost have exclaimed like Eve, 'must I then leave thee, Paradise!' and dropt a few natural tears—tears of weakness, rather than of grief: for what do I leave behind me worthy one emotion of regret? Even at Naples, even in this all-lovely land, 'fit haunt for gods,' has it not been with me as it has been elsewhere? as long as the excitement of change and novelty lasts, my heart can turn from itself 'to luxuriate with indifferent things:' but it cannot last long; and when it is over, I suffer, I am ill: the past returns with tenfold gloom; interposing like a dark shade between me and every object: an evil power seems to reside in every thing I see, to torment me with painful associations, to perplex my faculties, to irritate and mock me with the perception of what is lost to me: the very sunshine sickens me, and I am forced to confess myself weak and miserable as ever. O time! how slowly you move! how little you can do for me! and how bitter is that sorrow which has no relief to hope but from time alone!"
We shall quote only one of the many interesting specimens of poetry with which the volume is interspersed. It is an extempore translation of a beautiful sonnet of Zappi, an Italian poet.
| "Love, by my fair one's side is ever seen, He hovers round her steps, where'er she strays, Breathes in her voice, and in her silence speaks, Around her lives and lends her all his arms. "Love is in every glance—Love taught her song; And if she weep, or scorn contract her brow, Still Love departs not from her, but is seen Even in her lovely anger and her tears. "When, in the mazy dance she glides along, Still Love is near to poise each graceful step: So breathes the zephyr o'er the yielding flower. "Love in her brow is throned, plays in her hair, Darts from her eye and glows upon her lip, But oh! he never yet approached her heart!" |
Upon the whole we earnestly recommend this book to the attention of the public, and especially to our fair countrywomen, whose pride and curiosity will be gratified in so rich an example of the taste and intellectual power of their own sex.
THE MAGDALEN AND OTHER TALES. By Jas. Sheridan Knowles, author of Virginius, The Hunchback, The Wife, &c. Philadelphia: Carey, Lea & Blanchard, 1833.
SKETCHES, by Mrs. Sigourney. Philadelphia: Key & Biddle. 1834.
Both these volumes are by writers of distinction; the first a gentleman well known to the British public, and the last an American lady who devotes her delightful seclusion, near Hartford, Connecticut, to the cultivation of the muses and to the moral improvement of society. Though both are excellent in their way, each is adapted to a distinct class of readers. Mr. Knowles will be particularly acceptable to those who think that the happiness of reading consists in amusement. He depicts with a graphic pencil, and his pictures will be highly attractive to the young, the ardent and romantic. Mrs. Sigourney takes a loftier aim. Though highly gifted with the powers of imagination, and of course capable of exciting that faculty in others, her object seems to be rather to touch the springs of the heart and awaken the moral feelings of our nature. Her spirit is not only imbued with poetry but religion. In all her productions that we have seen, there is a direct tendency to improve as well as to delight. She is an example altogether worthy of imitation among the professors of literature, in enlisting all its allurements in the great cause of human virtue.
Mr. Knowles' book consists of various interesting tales, one of which, "Love and Authorship," we have selected for publication as a fair specimen of the rest. It is a genuine love story, and of course will have its admirers. From Mrs. Sigourney's volume, we have transferred to our own pages the story of the "Patriarch," in which the fair authoress personates, in the narrator of the tale, a minister of the gospel. The scene is laid in the state of North Carolina; and the few remarks in allusion to Bishop Ravenscroft will strike many of our readers as faithful notices of the eloquence and piety of that distinguished and lamented champion of the cross.