church was exposed, and from which it was afterwards delivered, arose from the second marriage of Charlemagne with Armelie, the daughter of Didier, the King of the Lombards, who was exerting himself to depose Pope Adrian. Charlemagne had divorced his first wife, Adelinde, but he is warned in a vision to take her again to his bosom. He does so, and Didier and his daughter consequently become the enemies of this Christian Emperor, who takes arms to defend the Holy See. After the usual casualties and fluctuations of fortune, the son of Pepin finally triumphs.

On a more careful examination, we see no reason to alter our first opinion of this poem. It has given us no strong impulse, nor left any permanent trace on our minds. It opens no new and rich vein of poetry, though certainly great talents are shewn in the use which is made of existing materials. Perhaps it may be said that this is all that can be done in a modern poem: if so, that all is hardly worth the doing. There is no one who has borrowed his materials more than Milton, or who has made them more completely his own: there is hardly a line which does not breathe the same lofty spirit, hardly a thought or image which he has not clothed with the majesty of his genius. It is the same in reading other great poets. The informing mind is every where present to us. Who is there that does not know and feel sensibly the majestic copiousness of Homer, the polished elegance of Virgil, enamoured of its own workmanship,— the severe grandeur of Dante, the tender pathos of Tasso, the endless voluptuousness of Spenser, and the unnumbered graces of Ariosto? Even the mysterious solemnity of Ossian, and the wild romantic interest of Walter Scott, are something gained to the imagination. But in the present instance, we do not feel the same participation with the author's mind, nor accession of strength to our own. little is it in the power even of the most accomplished art to counterfeit nature. The true Florimel did not differ more from the Florimel which was made for the witches' son, than true genius from the most successful and elaborate imitation of it.

So

We shall close these remarks with extracting two passages which in the opinion of our readers will perhaps be thought to amount to a complete refutation of our objections. The first is the description of the funeral rites of Orlando, in the thirteenth canto.

'Gaiffre a suivi son guide au fond du précipice,
Un clocher solitaire a frappé ses regards:
Dans les jours du repos, les fidèles épars
Accourent au signal du divin sacrifice.

Ici du haut des monts descendent les pasteurs.
La vierge des douleurs

De ces mortels obscurs y reçoit la prière :
Sur un autel de bois on a sculpté ses traits;
Les nombreux ex-voto de la divine mère
Dans ces lieux écartés attestant les bienfaits.

e;

Un son plaintif et sourd vient de frapper les airs;
C'est l'airain qui gémit pour les pompes funèbres.
Dans le temple le jour a fait place aux ténèbres;
Des signes de la mort les parois sont couverts.
Un saint pontife offrait la victime ineffable
Et sa voix secourable
Invoquait pour nos preux le céleste repos.
Un simple sarcophage au milieu de l'enceinte
Retrace à tous les yeux la tombe du héros,
Et répand dans les coeurs une tristesse sainte.

Le prêtre des hameaux, suivant l'antique usage,
Dans l'Eglise chrétienne en tout temps révéré,
Trois fois avec l'eau sainte et l'encensoir sacré
Fait solennellement le tour du sarcophage.
"Dans le sein de ton Dieu sois heureux à jamais :
Roland, repose en paix."

Du pontife telle est la fervente prière.

Ces mots ont terminé le sacrifice saint;
Et la foule se rend dans le champ funéraire
Ou gît, sous une croix, le corps du paladin.'

In the nineteenth canto, Lawrence and her children, after their escape from Bourdeaux, arrive at the castle of Melaric, an old christian knight, when the following example of perfect description

occurs:

'La nuit envellopait les champs & les remparts;
Sur les murs menaçants de la salle gothique
Une teinte plus sombre & plus mélancholique
Couvrait les boucliers, les glaives, & les dards;
Le vent du soir soufflait des gorges du Pyrène;
Et sa fougueuse haleine

Des armures des preux entrechoquait l'airain.
Les lances, les cimiers rendent des sons funèbres :
Leur murmure plaintif ressemble au cri lointain

D'un guerrier qui succombe au milieu des ténèbres.'

The author in his notes gives us to understand that he is about another epic poem, the hero of which is Isolier, a native of Corsica, and which is to bear the same relation to Charlemagne, that the Odyssey does to the Iliad.

LUCIEN BUONAPARTE'S COLLECTION, ETC.

The Champion.]
[January 22, 1815.
WE have been able to obtain access to the almost inaccessible collection
of the Prince of Canino. The liberality with which the collections
of foreign princes are thrown open to strangers and the public is often
boasted of; but this liberality, we suppose, ceases when the same
collections are exposed in this country for sale. The pictures of
Lucien Buonaparte, which are valued at £40,000, are kept in most
'vile durance'; and even the ticket of admission, which we presented
to a person who seems placed at the door to keep persons out, and
not to let them in, was inspected and objected to with the same
scrupulous jealousy as if it had been a bank-note presented in payment
of the purchase-money of the collection. A cursory glance round
the room was sufficient to explain the source of so much mystery and
caution. The pictures are in general mere trash. Nor is the general
dearth of attraction relieved by even a few examples of first-rate
excellence. The only exception to these remarks which struck us
was an exquisite female head by Leonardo da Vinci. It is one of
the finest specimens we have seen of that great master, both for
expression, drawing, the spirit and delicacy of the execution, and the
preservation of the tone of colouring. There is in Leonardo's female
heads a grace and charm of expression, which is peculiar to himself
-a character of natural sweetness and playful tenderness, mixed up
with the pride of conscious intellect, and with the graceful reserve of
personal dignity. He blends purity with voluptuousness; and the
expression of his women is equally characteristic of the mistress or
the saint!' His pictures are always worked up to the utmost height
of the idea he had conceived, with an elaborate felicity. No painter
made more a religion of his art! His fault is, that his style of
execution is too mathematical; that is, his pencil does not follow the
graceful variety of nature, but substitutes certain refined gradations
both of form and colour, producing equal changes in equal distances,
with a mechanical uniformity. Leonardo was a man of profound
learning as well as genius; and perhaps transferred too much of the M
formality of science to his favourite art. In making this objection,
we have had in our eye two of the most celebrated pictures, the
Jocunda in the Louvre, and the St. John in the possession of Mr.
Hope. The picture in the present collection has more flexibility and
variety; as well as greater heightening of colour; and perhaps the
latter effect may be the cause of the former. It is not impossible
that a certain degree of monotony may have been sometimes produced

by the rubbing off of the higher tints and finishing touches of the pencil, so as to leave little more of the picture than the general ground-work.

To return to the collection before us. The only remaining pictures which can excite any interest are, some curious specimens of the early masters, Ghirlandaio, Bellino, and others; -some small sketches of Titian; a finely coloured Holy Family by the same master; a portrait by Sebastian del Piombo; a sketch of Diana and Acteon, by A. Caracci; a landscape by Ruysdael; and a transfiguration, said to be by Vasari. Besides these, there is a Frenchified Salvator Rosa, coloured pink and blue, a copy of Domenichino's head of St. Jerome, one or two pretended Claudes, and some amatory pictures of the modern French school. To these shall we add the picture of Lucien Buonaparte himself? Nothing certainly can go beyond it in its way. It is the very priggism of portrait-painting.

We have already said something of the French style of portraits, and we shall here add a few remarks in explanation, though we are aware that any hints of a want of refinement will be thrown away on a nation so entirely spirituel as the French, and we are also afraid that some of our own artists may take credit to themselves for as many excellences, as we may charge their neighbours with defects.

same.

The French systematically paint all objects as they would paint still life; and hence they in general never paint any thing but still life. It is not possible to paint that which has life and motion by the same mechanical process by which that which has neither life nor motion may be represented. Thus it is not possible to imitate the human countenance, which is moveable and animated, as you would imitate a piece of drapery, or a chair, or a table, in which the physical appearance is every thing, and that appearance always remains the The industry of the eye and hand will go a great way in giving the effect of a number of parts of any external object, arranged in the same order; but to give truth of effect to that which is always varying, and always expressive of more than strikes the senses, imagination and feeling are absolutely required. Whenever there is life and motion, life and motion become the principal things; and any attempt to give these, without a distinct operation or feeling of the mind as to what constitutes their essence, by a mere attention to the physical form, or particular details, must necessarily destroy all appearance both of one and the other. To instance in expression only. This can only be given by being felt. Take for instance the outline of part of a face, and let it be so placed as to form part of the outline of a rock, or any other inanimate object. A copy of this, done with tolerable care, will seem to be the same thing: but let it

be known that this is really a part of a human countenance, and then it will probably be found to be quite different from the difference of expression. We distinguish all objects more or less by habitual knowledge; and this knowledge is always acute in proportion to the interest excited, that is, to the intensity of the feeling or passion which is combined with the immediate impression on the senses. Expression is therefore only caught by sympathy; and it has been received as a maxim, that no painter can succeed in giving an expression which is totally foreign to his own character. There are some painters who cannot paint a wise man, and others who cannot paint a fool: some who cannot give strength, and others softness to their works. It is the want of character, of flexibility, and transient expression, which is the great defect of French portraits. Without the indications of the mind breathed into the countenance and moulding the features, the whole must appear stiff, hard, mean, unconnected, and lifeless-like the mask of a face, not like the face itself forced, affected, and unnatural. Another consequence of this mode of copying the letter and leaving out the spirit of all objects, is that the face in general looks the least finished part of the picture, for while the other parts remain the same, this necessarily varies, and the only way to make up for the want of literal exactness, must be by seizing the force and animation of the expression. A head that does not look like life, cannot look like any thing else. The portrait of Lucien Buonaparte is a striking confirmation of these remarks. We do not know how to describe it otherwise than by saying that it looks as if the artist had first modelled the face in wax, oiled it over, painted the lips purple, stuck on a pair of artificial eyebrows, and inserted a pair of dark blue glass eyes, and then set to work to copy every part of this perverse misrepresentation, with tedious and disgusting accuracy. In a portrait of the author of Charlemagne, one has a right to expect some refinement of intellect and feeling, if not the marks of elevated genius. No such thing. The picture has just the appearance of a spruce holiday mechanic, with all the hardness, littleness, and vulgarity of expression which is to be found in nature, where the countenance has not been expanded by thought and sentiment, and in art, where this expression has been entirely overlooked. The French artists themselves, both men and women, seem to be aware of the dilemma to which they are reduced, and prefer copying from plaster casts, or lay figures, to painting from the life; which baffles the mechanical minuteness and laborious foolery' of their style of art. They set about painting a face as they would about engraving a picture. This cannot possibly answer. From the general idea of the liveliness and volatility of the French character one would be apt to suppose, that