]
[390] [The island of Sapienza lies about nine miles to the north-west of
Capo Gallo, in the Morea.
[390] [The island of Sapienza lies about nine miles to the north-west of
Capo Gallo, in the Morea.
Byron
No one with a spark of
true manliness, of which Horace Walpole had none, could have written
it. "--_Table Talk_, March 20, 1834. Croker took a very different view,
and maintained "that the good old English blank verse, the force of
character expressed in the wretched mother . . . argue a strength of
conception, and vigour of expression capable of great things," etc. Over
and above the reasonable hope and expectation that this provocative
eulogy of Walpole's play would annoy the "Cockneys" and the "Lakers,"
Byron was no doubt influenced in its favour by the audacity of the plot,
which not only put _septentrional_ prejudices at defiance, but was an
instance in point that love ought not "to make a tragic subject unless
it is love furious, criminal, and hopeless" (Letter to Murray, January
4, 1821). He would, too, be deeply and genuinely moved by such verse as
this--
"Consult a holy man! inquire of him!
--Good father, wherefore? what should I inquire?
Must I be taught of him that guilt is woe?
That innocence alone is happiness--
That martyrdom itself shall leave the villain
The villain that it found him? Must I learn
That minutes stamped with crime are past recall?
That joys are momentary; and remorse
Eternal? . . .
Nor could one risen from the dead proclaim
This truth in deeper sounds to my conviction;
We want no preacher to distinguish vice
From virtue. At our birth the God revealed
All conscience needs to know. No codicil
To duty's rubric here and there was placed
In some Saint's casual custody. "
Act i. sc. 3, _s. f. _ _Works of the Earl of Orford_, 1798, i. 55. ]
[379] {340}[Byron received a copy of Goethe's review of _Manfred_, which
appeared in _Kunst und Alterthum_ (ii. 2. 191) in May, 1820. In a letter
to Murray, dated October 17, 1820 (_Letters_, 1901, v. 100), he enclosed
a letter to Goethe, headed "For _Marino Faliero_. Dedication to Baron
Goethe, etc. , etc. , etc. " It is possible that Murray did not take the
"Dedication" seriously, but regarded it as a _jeu d'esprit_, designed
for the amusement of himself and his "synod. " At any rate, the
"Dedication" did not reach Goethe's hand till 1831, when it was
presented to him at Weimar by John Murray the Third. "It is written,"
says Moore, who printed a mutilated version in his _Letters and
Journals, etc. _, 1830, ii. 356-358, "in the poet's most whimsical and
mocking mood; and the unmeasured severity poured out in it upon the two
favourite objects of his wrath and ridicule, compels me to deprive the
reader of its most amusing passages. " The present text, which follows
the MS. , is reprinted from _Letters_, 1901, v. 100-104--
"Dedication to Baron Goethe, etc. , etc. , etc.
"Sir--In the Appendix to an English work lately translated into
German and published at Leipsic, a judgment of yours upon English
poetry is quoted as follows: 'That in English poetry, great genius,
universal power, a feeling of profundity, with sufficient
tenderness and force, are to be found; but that _altogether these
do not constitute poets_,' etc. , etc.
"I regret to see a great man falling into a great mistake. This
opinion of yours only proves that the '_Dictionary of Ten Thousand
living English Authors_'[A] has not been translated into German.
You will have read, in your friend Schlegel's version, the dialogue
in _Macbeth_--
"'There are _ten thousand! _
_Macbeth_. _Geese_, villain?
_Answer_. _Authors_, sir. '[B]
Now, of these 'ten thousand authors,' there are actually nineteen
hundred and eighty-seven poets, all alive at this moment, whatever
their works may be, as their booksellers well know: and amongst
these there are several who possess a far greater reputation than
mine, though considerably less than yours. It is owing to this
neglect on the part of your German translators that you are not
aware of the works of William Wordsworth, who has a baronet in
London[C] who draws him frontispieces and leads him about to
dinners and to the play; and a Lord in the country,[D] who gave him
a place in the Excise--and a cover at his table. You do not know
perhaps that this Gentleman is the greatest of all poets
past--present and to come--besides which he has written an '_Opus
Magnum_' in prose--during the late election for Westmoreland. [E]
His principal publication is entitled '_Peter Bell_' which he had
withheld from the public for '_one and twenty years_'--to the
irreparable loss of all those who died in the interim, and will
have no opportunity of reading it before the resurrection. There is
also another named Southey, who is more than a poet, being actually
poet Laureate,--a post which corresponds with what we call in Italy
Poeta Cesareo, and which you call in German--I know not what; but
as you have a '_Caesar_'--probably you have a name for it. In
England there is no _Caesar_--only the Poet.
"I mention these poets by way of sample to enlighten you. They form
but two bricks of our Babel, (Windsor bricks, by the way) but may
serve for a specimen of the building.
"It is, moreover, asserted that 'the predominant character of the
whole body of the present English poetry is a _disgust_ and
_contempt_ for life. ' But I rather suspect that by one single work
of _prose_, _you_ yourself have excited a greater contempt for life
than all the English volumes of poesy that ever were written.
Madame de Stael says, that 'Werther has occasioned more suicides
than the most beautiful woman;' and I really believe that he has
put more individuals out of this world than Napoleon
himself,--except in the way of his profession. Perhaps, Illustrious
Sir, the acrimonious judgment passed by a celebrated northern
journal[F] upon you in particular, and the Germans in general, has
rather indisposed you towards English poetry as well as criticism.
But you must not regard our critics, who are at bottom good-natured
fellows, considering their two professions,--taking up the law in
court, and laying it down out of it. No one can more lament their
hasty and unfair judgment, in your particular, than I do; and I so
expressed myself to your friend Schlegel, in 1816, at Coppet.
"In behalf of my 'ten thousand' living brethren, and of myself, I
have thus far taken notice of an opinion expressed with regard to
'English poetry' in general, and which merited notice, because it
was yours.
"My principal object in addressing you was to testify my sincere
respect and admiration of a man, who, for half a century, has led
the literature of a great nation, and will go down to posterity as
the first literary Character of his Age.
"You have been fortunate, Sir, not only in the writings which have
illustrated your name, but in the name itself, as being
sufficiently musical for the articulation of posterity. In this you
have the advantage of some of your countrymen, whose names would
perhaps be immortal also--if anybody could pronounce them.
"It may, perhaps, be supposed, by this apparent tone of levity,
that I am wanting in intentional respect towards you; but this will
be a mistake: I am always flippant in prose. Considering you, as I
really and warmly do, in common with all your own, and with most
other nations, to be by far the first literary Character which has
existed in Europe since the death of Voltaire, I felt, and feel,
desirous to inscribe to you the following work,--_not_ as being
either a tragedy or a _poem_, (for I cannot pronounce upon its
pretensions to be either one or the other, or both, or neither,)
but as a mark of esteem and admiration from a foreigner to the man
who has been hailed in Germany 'the great Goethe. '
"I have the honour to be,
With the truest respect,
Your most obedient and
Very humble servant,
Byron,
"Ravenna, 8^bre^ 14? , 1820.
"P. S. --I perceive that in Germany, as well as in Italy, there is a
great struggle about what they call '_Classical_' and
'_Romantic_,'--terms which were not subjects of classification in
England, at least when I left it four or five years ago. Some of
the English Scribblers, it is true, abused Pope and Swift, but the
reason was that they themselves did not know how to write either
prose or verse; but nobody thought them worth making a sect of.
Perhaps there may be something of the kind sprung up lately, but I
have not heard much about it, and it would be such bad taste that I
shall be very sorry to believe it. "
Another Dedication, to be prefixed to a Second Edition of the play was
found amongst Byron's papers. It remained in MS. till 1832, when it was
included in a prefatory note to _Marino Faliero, Works of Lord Byron_,
1832, xii. 50.
"Dedication of _Marino Faliero_.
"To the Honourable Douglas Kinnaird.
"My dear Douglas,--I dedicate to you the following tragedy, rather
on account of your good opinion of it, than from any notion of my
own that it may be worthy of your acceptance. But if its merits
were ten times greater than they possibly can be, this offering
would still be a very inadequate acknowledgment of the active and
steady friendship with which, for a series of years, you have
honoured your obliged and affectionate friend,
"BYRON.
"Ravenna, Sept. 1st, 1821. "
[A][_A Biographical Dictionary of Living Authors of Great Britain and
Ireland, etc_. , London, 1816, 8vo. ]
[B] [_Macbeth_. Where got'st thou that goose look?
_Servant_. There is ten thousand--
_Macbeth_. Geese, villain?
_Servant_. Soldiers, sir. "
_Macbeth_, act v. sc. 3, lines 12, 13. ]
[C][Sir George Beaumont. See Professor W. Knight, _Life of Wordsworth_,
ii. (_Works_, vol. x. ) 56. ]
[D][Lord Lonsdale (_ibid_. , p. 209). ]
[E][_Two Addresses to the Freeholders of Westmoreland_, 1818. ]
[F][See an article on Goethe's _Aus Meinem Leben_, etc. , in the
_Edinburgh Review_ for June, 1816, vol. xxvi. pp. 304-337. ] ]
[cv] {345} _Are none yet of the Messengers returned_? --[MS. M. ]
[380] [The _Consiglio Minore_, which originally consisted of the Doge
and his six councillors, was afterwards increased, by the addition of
the three _Capi_ of the _Quarantia Criminale_, and was known as the
_Serenissima Signoria_ (G. Cappelletti, _Storia della Repubblica di
Venezia_, 1850, i. 483). The Forty who were "debating on Steno's
accusation" could not be described as the "_Signory_. "]
[cw] _With seeming patience_. --[MS. M. ]
[cx] _He sits as deep_--[MS. M. ]
[cy] {346}_Or aught that imitates_--. --[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[cz] _Young, gallant_--. --[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[381] [Bertuccio Faliero was a distant connection of the Doge, not his
nephew. Matters of business and family affairs seem to have brought them
together, and it is evident that they were on intimate terms. --_La
Congiura_, p. 84. ]
[382] [The Avogadori, three in number, were the conductors of criminal
prosecutions on the part of the State; and no act of the councils was
valid, unless sanctioned by the presence of one of them; but they were
not, as Byron seems to imply, a court of first instance. The implied
reproach that they preferred to send the case to appeal because Steno
was a member of the "Quarantia," is based on an error of Sanudo's (_vide
ante_, p. 333). ]
[da] {348} ----_Marin! Falierae_ [sic]. --[MS. M. ]
[383] ["Marin Faliero, dalla bella moglie--altri la gode, ed egli la
mantien. "--Marino Samuto, _Vitae Ducum Venetorum, apud_ Muratori, _Rerum
Italicurum Scriptores_, 1733, xxii. 628-638]. Navagero, in his _Storia
della Repubblica Veneriana_, _ibid_. , xxiii. 1040, gives a coarser
rendering of Steno's Lampoon. --"Becco Marino Fallier dalla belta
mogier;" and there are older versions agreeing in the main with that
Faliero's by Sanudo. It is, however, extremely doubtful whether Faliro's
conspiracy was, in any sense, the outcome of a personal insult. The
story of the Lampoon first appears in the Chronicle of Lorenzo de
Monaci, who wrote in the latter half of the fifteenth century. "Fama
fuit . . . quia aliqui adolescentuli nobiles scripserunt in angulis
interioris palatii aliqua verba ignominiosa, et quod ipse (il Doge)
magis incanduit quoniam adolescentuli illi parva fuerant animadversione
puniti. " In course of time the "noble youths" became a single noble
youth, whose name occurred in the annals, and the derivation or
evolution of the "verba ignominiosa," followed by a natural
process. --_La Congiura, Nuona Archivio Veneto_, 1897, tom. xiii. pt. ii.
p. 347. ]
[384] {349}[Sanudo gives two versions of Steno's punishment: (1) that he
should be imprisoned for two months, and banished from Venice for a
year; (2) that he should be imprisoned for one month, flogged with a
fox's tail, and pay one hundred lire to the Republic. ]
[385] {350}[_Vide ante_, p. 331. ]
[386] {351}[Faliero's appeal to the "law" is a violation of "historical
accuracy. " The penalty for an injury to the Doge was not fixed by law,
but was decided from time to time by the Judge, in accordance with
unwritten custom. --_La Congiura_, p. 60. ]
[db] {352}_Who threw his sting into a poisonous rhyme_. --[Alternative
reading. MS. M. ]
[387] [For the story of Caesar, Pompeia, and Clodius, see Plutarch's
_Lives_, "Caesar," Langhorne's translation, 1838, p. 498. ]
[dc]----_Enrico_. --[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[388] [According to Sanudo (_Vitae Ducum Venetorum, apud_ Muratori,
_Rerum Ital. Script_. , 1733, xxii. 529), it was Ser Pantaleone Barbo who
intervened, when (A. D. 1204) the election to the Empire of
Constantinople lay between the Doge "Arrigo Dandolo" and "Conte
Baldovino di Fiandra. "]
[dd] {354} ----_in olden days. _--[MS. M. ]
[389] {356}[According to the much earlier, and, presumably, more
historical narrative of Lorenzo de Monaci, Bertuccio Isarello was not
chief of the _Arsenalotti_, but simply the patron, that is the owner, of
a vessel (_paron di nave_), and consequently a person of importance
amongst sailors and naval artisans; and the noble who strikes the fatal
blow is not Barbaro, but a certain Giovanni Dandolo, who is known, at
that time, to have been "_sopracomito and consigliere del capitano da
mar_. " If the Admiral of the Arsenal had been engaged in the conspiracy,
the fact could hardly have escaped the notice of contemporary
chroniclers. Signor Lazzarino suggests that the name Gisello, or
Girello, which has been substituted for that of Israel Bertuccio, is a
corruption of Isarello. --_La Congiura_, p. 74.
]
[390] [The island of Sapienza lies about nine miles to the north-west of
Capo Gallo, in the Morea. The battle in which the Venetians under Nicolo
Pisani were defeated by the Genoese under Paganino Doria was fought
November 4, 1354. (See _Venice, an Historical Sketch_, by Horatio F.
Brown, 1893, p. 201. )]
[391] An historical fact. See Marin Sanuto's _Lives of the Doges_.
["Sanuto says that Heaven took away his senses for this buffet, and
induced him to conspire:--'Pero fu permesso che il Faliero perdesse
l'intelletto. '"--_B. Letters_ (_Works, etc. _, 1832, xii. 82. note 1).
[392] {358}["The number of their constant Workmen is 1200; and all these
Artificers have a Superior Officer called _Amiraglio_, who commands the
_Bucentaure_ on Ascension Day, when the Duke goes in state to marry the
sea. And here we cannot but notice, that by a ridiculous custom this
Admiral makes himself Responsible to the _Senat_ for the inconstancy of
the Sea, and engages his Life there shall be no Tempest that day. 'Tis
this Admiral who has the Guard of the Palais, St. Mark, with his
_Arsenalotti_, during the _interregnum_. He carries the Red Standard
before the Prince when he makes his Entry, by virtue of which office he
has his Cloak, and the two Basons (out of which the Duke throws the
money to the People) for his fee. "--_The History of the Government of
Venice_, written in the year 1675, by the Sieur Amelott de la Houssaie,
London, 1677, p. 63. ]
[393] [_Vide ante_, p. 356, note 1. ]
[394] {360}[The famous measure known as the closing of the Great Council
was carried into force during the Dogeship (1289-1311) of Pietro
Gradenigo. On the last day of February, 1297, a law was proposed and
passed, "That the Council of Forty are to ballot, one by one, the names
of all those who during the last four years have had a seat in the Great
Council. . . . Three electors shall be chosen to submit names of fresh
candidates for the Great Council, on the . . . approval of the Doge. " But
strict as these provisions were, they did not suffice to restrict the
government to the aristocracy. It was soon decreed "that only those who
could prove that a paternal ancestor had sat on the Great Council, after
its creation in 1176, should now be eligible as members. . . . It is in
this provision that we find the essence of the _Serrata del Maggior
Consiglio_. . . . The work was not completed at one stroke. . . . In 1315 a
list of all those who were eligible . . . was compiled. The scrutiny . . .
was entrusted to the _Avogadori di Comun_, and became . . . more and more
severe. To ensure the purity of blood, they opened a register of
marriages and births. . . . Thus the aristocracy proceeded to construct
itself more and more upon a purely oligarchical basis. "--_Venice, an
Historical Sketch_, by Horatio F. Brown, 1893, pp. 162-164. ]
[395] {362}[To "partake" this or that is an obsolete construction, but
rests on the authority of Dryden and other writers of the period.
Byron's "have partook" cannot come under the head of "good, sterling,
genuine English"! (See letter to Murray, October 8, 1820, _Letters_,
1901, v. 89. )]
[396] {363}[The bells of San Marco were never rung but by order of the
Doge. One of the pretexts for ringing this alarm was to have been an
announcement of the appearance of a Genoese fleet off the Lagune.
According to Sanudo, "on the appointed day they [the followers of the
sixteen leaders of the conspiracy] were to make affrays amongst
themselves, here and there, in order that the Duke might have a pretence
for tolling the bells of San Marco. " (See, too, _Sketches from Venetian
History, 1831, i. 266, note. _)]
[397] ["Le Conseil des Dix avail ses prisons speciales dites
_camerotti_; celles non officiellement appelees les _pozzi_ et les
_piombi_, les puits et les plombs, etaient de son redoubtable domaine.
Les _Camerotti di sotto_ (les puits) etaient obscurs mais non
accessibles a l'eau du canal, comme on l'a fait croire en des recits
dignes d'Anne Radcliffe; les _camerotti di sopra_ (les plombs) etaient
des cellules fortement doublees de bois mais non privees de
lumiere. "--_Les Archives de Venise_, par Armand Baschet, 1870, p. 535.
For the _pozzi_ and the "Bridge of Sighs" see note by Hobhouse,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 465; and compare _Childe Harold_, Canto IV.
stanza i. line 1 (and _The Two Foscari_, act iv. sc. 1), _Poetical
Works_, 1899, ii. 327, note 2. ]
[398] {365}[For "Sapienza," _vide ante_, p. 356. According to the
genealogies, Marin Falier, by his first wife, had a daughter Lucia, who
was married to Franceschino Giustiniani; but there is no record of a
son. (See _La Congiura_, p. 21. )]
[399] {366}["The Doges were all _buried_ in _St. Mark's before_ Faliero:
it is singular that when his predecessor, _Andrea Dandolo_, died, the
Ten made a law that _all_ the _future Doges_ should be _buried with
their families in their own churches,--one would think by a kind of
presentiment_. So that all that is said of his _Ancestral Doges_, as
buried at St. John's and Paul's, is altered from the fact, _they being
in St. Mark's_. _Make a note_ of this, and put _Editor_ as the
subscription to it. As I make such pretensions to accuracy, I should not
like to be _twitted_ even with such trifles on that score. Of the play
they may say what they please, but not so of my costume and _dram.
pers_. --they having been real existences. "--Letter to Murray, October
12, 1820, _Letters_, 1901, v. 95. Byron's injunction was not carried out
till 1832. ]
[400] A gondola is not like a common boat, but is as easily rowed with
one oar as with two (though, of course, not so swiftly), and often is so
from motives of privacy; and, since the decay of Venice, of economy.
[401] {367}["What Gifford says (of the first act) is very consolatory.
'English, sterling _genuine English_,' is a desideratum amongst you, and
I am glad that I have got so much left; though Heaven knows how I retain
it: I _hear_ none but from my Valet, and his is _Nottinghamshire_; and I
_see_ none but in your new publications, and theirs is _no_ language at
all, but jargon. . . . Gifford says that it is 'good, sterling, genuine
English,' and Foscolo says that the characters are right
Venetian. "--Letters to Murray, Sept. 11, Oct. 8, 1820, _Letters_, 1901,
v. 75-89. ]
[402] [Byron admits (_vide ante_, p. 340) that the character of the
"Dogaressa" is more or less his own creation. It may be remarked that in
Casimir Delavigne's version of the story, the Duchess (Elena) cherishes
a secret and criminal attachment for Bertuccio Faliero, and that in Mr.
Swinburne's tragedy, while innocent in act, she is smitten with remorse
for a passion which overmasters her loyalty to her husband. Byron's
Angiolina is "faultily faultless, . . . splendidly null. "
In a letter to Murray, dated January 4, 1821 (_Letters_, 1901, v. 218),
he says, "As I think that _love_ is not the principal passion for
tragedy, you will not find me a popular writer. Unless it is Love,
_furious_, _criminal_, and _hapless_ [as in _The Mysterious Mother_, or
in Alfieri's _Mirra_, or Shelley's _Cenci_], it ought not to make a
tragic subject. When it is melting and maudlin, it _does_, but it ought
not to do; it is then for the gallery and second-price boxes. " It is
probable that he owed these sentiments to the theory and practice of
Vittorio Alfieri. "It is extraordinary," writes M. de Fallette Barrol
(_Monthly Magazine_, April, 1805, reprinted in Preface to _Tragedie di
Alfieri_, A. Montucci, Edinburgh, 1805, i. xvi. _sq. _), "that a man
whose soul possessed an uncommon share of ardour and sensibility, and
had experienced all the violence of the passions, should scarcely have
condescended to introduce love into his tragedies; or, when he does,
that he should only employ it with a kind of reserve and severity. . . . He
probably regarded it as a hackneyed agent; for in . . . _Myrrha_ it
appears in such a strange character, that all the art of the writer is
not capable of divesting it of an air at once ludicrous and disgusting. "
But apart from the example of Alfieri, there was another motive at
work--a determination to prove to the world that he was the master of
his own temperament, and that, if he chose, he could cast away frivolity
and cynicism, and clothe himself with austerity "as with a garment. " He
had been taken to task for "treating well-nigh with equal derision the
most pure of virtues, and the most odious of vices" (_Blackwood's Edin.
Mag. _, August, 1819), and here was an "answer to his accusers! "]
[403] {368}[The exact date of Marin Falier's birth is a matter of
conjecture, but there is reason to believe that he Was under
seventy-five years of age at the time of the conspiracy. The date
assigned is 1280-1285 A. D. ]
[de] {369} ----_has he been doomed? _--[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[404] {370}[According to Dio Cassius, the last words of Brutus were,
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? , ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? [? ? ? ? ? ],
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ' ? ? ? ? ?
true manliness, of which Horace Walpole had none, could have written
it. "--_Table Talk_, March 20, 1834. Croker took a very different view,
and maintained "that the good old English blank verse, the force of
character expressed in the wretched mother . . . argue a strength of
conception, and vigour of expression capable of great things," etc. Over
and above the reasonable hope and expectation that this provocative
eulogy of Walpole's play would annoy the "Cockneys" and the "Lakers,"
Byron was no doubt influenced in its favour by the audacity of the plot,
which not only put _septentrional_ prejudices at defiance, but was an
instance in point that love ought not "to make a tragic subject unless
it is love furious, criminal, and hopeless" (Letter to Murray, January
4, 1821). He would, too, be deeply and genuinely moved by such verse as
this--
"Consult a holy man! inquire of him!
--Good father, wherefore? what should I inquire?
Must I be taught of him that guilt is woe?
That innocence alone is happiness--
That martyrdom itself shall leave the villain
The villain that it found him? Must I learn
That minutes stamped with crime are past recall?
That joys are momentary; and remorse
Eternal? . . .
Nor could one risen from the dead proclaim
This truth in deeper sounds to my conviction;
We want no preacher to distinguish vice
From virtue. At our birth the God revealed
All conscience needs to know. No codicil
To duty's rubric here and there was placed
In some Saint's casual custody. "
Act i. sc. 3, _s. f. _ _Works of the Earl of Orford_, 1798, i. 55. ]
[379] {340}[Byron received a copy of Goethe's review of _Manfred_, which
appeared in _Kunst und Alterthum_ (ii. 2. 191) in May, 1820. In a letter
to Murray, dated October 17, 1820 (_Letters_, 1901, v. 100), he enclosed
a letter to Goethe, headed "For _Marino Faliero_. Dedication to Baron
Goethe, etc. , etc. , etc. " It is possible that Murray did not take the
"Dedication" seriously, but regarded it as a _jeu d'esprit_, designed
for the amusement of himself and his "synod. " At any rate, the
"Dedication" did not reach Goethe's hand till 1831, when it was
presented to him at Weimar by John Murray the Third. "It is written,"
says Moore, who printed a mutilated version in his _Letters and
Journals, etc. _, 1830, ii. 356-358, "in the poet's most whimsical and
mocking mood; and the unmeasured severity poured out in it upon the two
favourite objects of his wrath and ridicule, compels me to deprive the
reader of its most amusing passages. " The present text, which follows
the MS. , is reprinted from _Letters_, 1901, v. 100-104--
"Dedication to Baron Goethe, etc. , etc. , etc.
"Sir--In the Appendix to an English work lately translated into
German and published at Leipsic, a judgment of yours upon English
poetry is quoted as follows: 'That in English poetry, great genius,
universal power, a feeling of profundity, with sufficient
tenderness and force, are to be found; but that _altogether these
do not constitute poets_,' etc. , etc.
"I regret to see a great man falling into a great mistake. This
opinion of yours only proves that the '_Dictionary of Ten Thousand
living English Authors_'[A] has not been translated into German.
You will have read, in your friend Schlegel's version, the dialogue
in _Macbeth_--
"'There are _ten thousand! _
_Macbeth_. _Geese_, villain?
_Answer_. _Authors_, sir. '[B]
Now, of these 'ten thousand authors,' there are actually nineteen
hundred and eighty-seven poets, all alive at this moment, whatever
their works may be, as their booksellers well know: and amongst
these there are several who possess a far greater reputation than
mine, though considerably less than yours. It is owing to this
neglect on the part of your German translators that you are not
aware of the works of William Wordsworth, who has a baronet in
London[C] who draws him frontispieces and leads him about to
dinners and to the play; and a Lord in the country,[D] who gave him
a place in the Excise--and a cover at his table. You do not know
perhaps that this Gentleman is the greatest of all poets
past--present and to come--besides which he has written an '_Opus
Magnum_' in prose--during the late election for Westmoreland. [E]
His principal publication is entitled '_Peter Bell_' which he had
withheld from the public for '_one and twenty years_'--to the
irreparable loss of all those who died in the interim, and will
have no opportunity of reading it before the resurrection. There is
also another named Southey, who is more than a poet, being actually
poet Laureate,--a post which corresponds with what we call in Italy
Poeta Cesareo, and which you call in German--I know not what; but
as you have a '_Caesar_'--probably you have a name for it. In
England there is no _Caesar_--only the Poet.
"I mention these poets by way of sample to enlighten you. They form
but two bricks of our Babel, (Windsor bricks, by the way) but may
serve for a specimen of the building.
"It is, moreover, asserted that 'the predominant character of the
whole body of the present English poetry is a _disgust_ and
_contempt_ for life. ' But I rather suspect that by one single work
of _prose_, _you_ yourself have excited a greater contempt for life
than all the English volumes of poesy that ever were written.
Madame de Stael says, that 'Werther has occasioned more suicides
than the most beautiful woman;' and I really believe that he has
put more individuals out of this world than Napoleon
himself,--except in the way of his profession. Perhaps, Illustrious
Sir, the acrimonious judgment passed by a celebrated northern
journal[F] upon you in particular, and the Germans in general, has
rather indisposed you towards English poetry as well as criticism.
But you must not regard our critics, who are at bottom good-natured
fellows, considering their two professions,--taking up the law in
court, and laying it down out of it. No one can more lament their
hasty and unfair judgment, in your particular, than I do; and I so
expressed myself to your friend Schlegel, in 1816, at Coppet.
"In behalf of my 'ten thousand' living brethren, and of myself, I
have thus far taken notice of an opinion expressed with regard to
'English poetry' in general, and which merited notice, because it
was yours.
"My principal object in addressing you was to testify my sincere
respect and admiration of a man, who, for half a century, has led
the literature of a great nation, and will go down to posterity as
the first literary Character of his Age.
"You have been fortunate, Sir, not only in the writings which have
illustrated your name, but in the name itself, as being
sufficiently musical for the articulation of posterity. In this you
have the advantage of some of your countrymen, whose names would
perhaps be immortal also--if anybody could pronounce them.
"It may, perhaps, be supposed, by this apparent tone of levity,
that I am wanting in intentional respect towards you; but this will
be a mistake: I am always flippant in prose. Considering you, as I
really and warmly do, in common with all your own, and with most
other nations, to be by far the first literary Character which has
existed in Europe since the death of Voltaire, I felt, and feel,
desirous to inscribe to you the following work,--_not_ as being
either a tragedy or a _poem_, (for I cannot pronounce upon its
pretensions to be either one or the other, or both, or neither,)
but as a mark of esteem and admiration from a foreigner to the man
who has been hailed in Germany 'the great Goethe. '
"I have the honour to be,
With the truest respect,
Your most obedient and
Very humble servant,
Byron,
"Ravenna, 8^bre^ 14? , 1820.
"P. S. --I perceive that in Germany, as well as in Italy, there is a
great struggle about what they call '_Classical_' and
'_Romantic_,'--terms which were not subjects of classification in
England, at least when I left it four or five years ago. Some of
the English Scribblers, it is true, abused Pope and Swift, but the
reason was that they themselves did not know how to write either
prose or verse; but nobody thought them worth making a sect of.
Perhaps there may be something of the kind sprung up lately, but I
have not heard much about it, and it would be such bad taste that I
shall be very sorry to believe it. "
Another Dedication, to be prefixed to a Second Edition of the play was
found amongst Byron's papers. It remained in MS. till 1832, when it was
included in a prefatory note to _Marino Faliero, Works of Lord Byron_,
1832, xii. 50.
"Dedication of _Marino Faliero_.
"To the Honourable Douglas Kinnaird.
"My dear Douglas,--I dedicate to you the following tragedy, rather
on account of your good opinion of it, than from any notion of my
own that it may be worthy of your acceptance. But if its merits
were ten times greater than they possibly can be, this offering
would still be a very inadequate acknowledgment of the active and
steady friendship with which, for a series of years, you have
honoured your obliged and affectionate friend,
"BYRON.
"Ravenna, Sept. 1st, 1821. "
[A][_A Biographical Dictionary of Living Authors of Great Britain and
Ireland, etc_. , London, 1816, 8vo. ]
[B] [_Macbeth_. Where got'st thou that goose look?
_Servant_. There is ten thousand--
_Macbeth_. Geese, villain?
_Servant_. Soldiers, sir. "
_Macbeth_, act v. sc. 3, lines 12, 13. ]
[C][Sir George Beaumont. See Professor W. Knight, _Life of Wordsworth_,
ii. (_Works_, vol. x. ) 56. ]
[D][Lord Lonsdale (_ibid_. , p. 209). ]
[E][_Two Addresses to the Freeholders of Westmoreland_, 1818. ]
[F][See an article on Goethe's _Aus Meinem Leben_, etc. , in the
_Edinburgh Review_ for June, 1816, vol. xxvi. pp. 304-337. ] ]
[cv] {345} _Are none yet of the Messengers returned_? --[MS. M. ]
[380] [The _Consiglio Minore_, which originally consisted of the Doge
and his six councillors, was afterwards increased, by the addition of
the three _Capi_ of the _Quarantia Criminale_, and was known as the
_Serenissima Signoria_ (G. Cappelletti, _Storia della Repubblica di
Venezia_, 1850, i. 483). The Forty who were "debating on Steno's
accusation" could not be described as the "_Signory_. "]
[cw] _With seeming patience_. --[MS. M. ]
[cx] _He sits as deep_--[MS. M. ]
[cy] {346}_Or aught that imitates_--. --[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[cz] _Young, gallant_--. --[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[381] [Bertuccio Faliero was a distant connection of the Doge, not his
nephew. Matters of business and family affairs seem to have brought them
together, and it is evident that they were on intimate terms. --_La
Congiura_, p. 84. ]
[382] [The Avogadori, three in number, were the conductors of criminal
prosecutions on the part of the State; and no act of the councils was
valid, unless sanctioned by the presence of one of them; but they were
not, as Byron seems to imply, a court of first instance. The implied
reproach that they preferred to send the case to appeal because Steno
was a member of the "Quarantia," is based on an error of Sanudo's (_vide
ante_, p. 333). ]
[da] {348} ----_Marin! Falierae_ [sic]. --[MS. M. ]
[383] ["Marin Faliero, dalla bella moglie--altri la gode, ed egli la
mantien. "--Marino Samuto, _Vitae Ducum Venetorum, apud_ Muratori, _Rerum
Italicurum Scriptores_, 1733, xxii. 628-638]. Navagero, in his _Storia
della Repubblica Veneriana_, _ibid_. , xxiii. 1040, gives a coarser
rendering of Steno's Lampoon. --"Becco Marino Fallier dalla belta
mogier;" and there are older versions agreeing in the main with that
Faliero's by Sanudo. It is, however, extremely doubtful whether Faliro's
conspiracy was, in any sense, the outcome of a personal insult. The
story of the Lampoon first appears in the Chronicle of Lorenzo de
Monaci, who wrote in the latter half of the fifteenth century. "Fama
fuit . . . quia aliqui adolescentuli nobiles scripserunt in angulis
interioris palatii aliqua verba ignominiosa, et quod ipse (il Doge)
magis incanduit quoniam adolescentuli illi parva fuerant animadversione
puniti. " In course of time the "noble youths" became a single noble
youth, whose name occurred in the annals, and the derivation or
evolution of the "verba ignominiosa," followed by a natural
process. --_La Congiura, Nuona Archivio Veneto_, 1897, tom. xiii. pt. ii.
p. 347. ]
[384] {349}[Sanudo gives two versions of Steno's punishment: (1) that he
should be imprisoned for two months, and banished from Venice for a
year; (2) that he should be imprisoned for one month, flogged with a
fox's tail, and pay one hundred lire to the Republic. ]
[385] {350}[_Vide ante_, p. 331. ]
[386] {351}[Faliero's appeal to the "law" is a violation of "historical
accuracy. " The penalty for an injury to the Doge was not fixed by law,
but was decided from time to time by the Judge, in accordance with
unwritten custom. --_La Congiura_, p. 60. ]
[db] {352}_Who threw his sting into a poisonous rhyme_. --[Alternative
reading. MS. M. ]
[387] [For the story of Caesar, Pompeia, and Clodius, see Plutarch's
_Lives_, "Caesar," Langhorne's translation, 1838, p. 498. ]
[dc]----_Enrico_. --[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[388] [According to Sanudo (_Vitae Ducum Venetorum, apud_ Muratori,
_Rerum Ital. Script_. , 1733, xxii. 529), it was Ser Pantaleone Barbo who
intervened, when (A. D. 1204) the election to the Empire of
Constantinople lay between the Doge "Arrigo Dandolo" and "Conte
Baldovino di Fiandra. "]
[dd] {354} ----_in olden days. _--[MS. M. ]
[389] {356}[According to the much earlier, and, presumably, more
historical narrative of Lorenzo de Monaci, Bertuccio Isarello was not
chief of the _Arsenalotti_, but simply the patron, that is the owner, of
a vessel (_paron di nave_), and consequently a person of importance
amongst sailors and naval artisans; and the noble who strikes the fatal
blow is not Barbaro, but a certain Giovanni Dandolo, who is known, at
that time, to have been "_sopracomito and consigliere del capitano da
mar_. " If the Admiral of the Arsenal had been engaged in the conspiracy,
the fact could hardly have escaped the notice of contemporary
chroniclers. Signor Lazzarino suggests that the name Gisello, or
Girello, which has been substituted for that of Israel Bertuccio, is a
corruption of Isarello. --_La Congiura_, p. 74.
]
[390] [The island of Sapienza lies about nine miles to the north-west of
Capo Gallo, in the Morea. The battle in which the Venetians under Nicolo
Pisani were defeated by the Genoese under Paganino Doria was fought
November 4, 1354. (See _Venice, an Historical Sketch_, by Horatio F.
Brown, 1893, p. 201. )]
[391] An historical fact. See Marin Sanuto's _Lives of the Doges_.
["Sanuto says that Heaven took away his senses for this buffet, and
induced him to conspire:--'Pero fu permesso che il Faliero perdesse
l'intelletto. '"--_B. Letters_ (_Works, etc. _, 1832, xii. 82. note 1).
[392] {358}["The number of their constant Workmen is 1200; and all these
Artificers have a Superior Officer called _Amiraglio_, who commands the
_Bucentaure_ on Ascension Day, when the Duke goes in state to marry the
sea. And here we cannot but notice, that by a ridiculous custom this
Admiral makes himself Responsible to the _Senat_ for the inconstancy of
the Sea, and engages his Life there shall be no Tempest that day. 'Tis
this Admiral who has the Guard of the Palais, St. Mark, with his
_Arsenalotti_, during the _interregnum_. He carries the Red Standard
before the Prince when he makes his Entry, by virtue of which office he
has his Cloak, and the two Basons (out of which the Duke throws the
money to the People) for his fee. "--_The History of the Government of
Venice_, written in the year 1675, by the Sieur Amelott de la Houssaie,
London, 1677, p. 63. ]
[393] [_Vide ante_, p. 356, note 1. ]
[394] {360}[The famous measure known as the closing of the Great Council
was carried into force during the Dogeship (1289-1311) of Pietro
Gradenigo. On the last day of February, 1297, a law was proposed and
passed, "That the Council of Forty are to ballot, one by one, the names
of all those who during the last four years have had a seat in the Great
Council. . . . Three electors shall be chosen to submit names of fresh
candidates for the Great Council, on the . . . approval of the Doge. " But
strict as these provisions were, they did not suffice to restrict the
government to the aristocracy. It was soon decreed "that only those who
could prove that a paternal ancestor had sat on the Great Council, after
its creation in 1176, should now be eligible as members. . . . It is in
this provision that we find the essence of the _Serrata del Maggior
Consiglio_. . . . The work was not completed at one stroke. . . . In 1315 a
list of all those who were eligible . . . was compiled. The scrutiny . . .
was entrusted to the _Avogadori di Comun_, and became . . . more and more
severe. To ensure the purity of blood, they opened a register of
marriages and births. . . . Thus the aristocracy proceeded to construct
itself more and more upon a purely oligarchical basis. "--_Venice, an
Historical Sketch_, by Horatio F. Brown, 1893, pp. 162-164. ]
[395] {362}[To "partake" this or that is an obsolete construction, but
rests on the authority of Dryden and other writers of the period.
Byron's "have partook" cannot come under the head of "good, sterling,
genuine English"! (See letter to Murray, October 8, 1820, _Letters_,
1901, v. 89. )]
[396] {363}[The bells of San Marco were never rung but by order of the
Doge. One of the pretexts for ringing this alarm was to have been an
announcement of the appearance of a Genoese fleet off the Lagune.
According to Sanudo, "on the appointed day they [the followers of the
sixteen leaders of the conspiracy] were to make affrays amongst
themselves, here and there, in order that the Duke might have a pretence
for tolling the bells of San Marco. " (See, too, _Sketches from Venetian
History, 1831, i. 266, note. _)]
[397] ["Le Conseil des Dix avail ses prisons speciales dites
_camerotti_; celles non officiellement appelees les _pozzi_ et les
_piombi_, les puits et les plombs, etaient de son redoubtable domaine.
Les _Camerotti di sotto_ (les puits) etaient obscurs mais non
accessibles a l'eau du canal, comme on l'a fait croire en des recits
dignes d'Anne Radcliffe; les _camerotti di sopra_ (les plombs) etaient
des cellules fortement doublees de bois mais non privees de
lumiere. "--_Les Archives de Venise_, par Armand Baschet, 1870, p. 535.
For the _pozzi_ and the "Bridge of Sighs" see note by Hobhouse,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 465; and compare _Childe Harold_, Canto IV.
stanza i. line 1 (and _The Two Foscari_, act iv. sc. 1), _Poetical
Works_, 1899, ii. 327, note 2. ]
[398] {365}[For "Sapienza," _vide ante_, p. 356. According to the
genealogies, Marin Falier, by his first wife, had a daughter Lucia, who
was married to Franceschino Giustiniani; but there is no record of a
son. (See _La Congiura_, p. 21. )]
[399] {366}["The Doges were all _buried_ in _St. Mark's before_ Faliero:
it is singular that when his predecessor, _Andrea Dandolo_, died, the
Ten made a law that _all_ the _future Doges_ should be _buried with
their families in their own churches,--one would think by a kind of
presentiment_. So that all that is said of his _Ancestral Doges_, as
buried at St. John's and Paul's, is altered from the fact, _they being
in St. Mark's_. _Make a note_ of this, and put _Editor_ as the
subscription to it. As I make such pretensions to accuracy, I should not
like to be _twitted_ even with such trifles on that score. Of the play
they may say what they please, but not so of my costume and _dram.
pers_. --they having been real existences. "--Letter to Murray, October
12, 1820, _Letters_, 1901, v. 95. Byron's injunction was not carried out
till 1832. ]
[400] A gondola is not like a common boat, but is as easily rowed with
one oar as with two (though, of course, not so swiftly), and often is so
from motives of privacy; and, since the decay of Venice, of economy.
[401] {367}["What Gifford says (of the first act) is very consolatory.
'English, sterling _genuine English_,' is a desideratum amongst you, and
I am glad that I have got so much left; though Heaven knows how I retain
it: I _hear_ none but from my Valet, and his is _Nottinghamshire_; and I
_see_ none but in your new publications, and theirs is _no_ language at
all, but jargon. . . . Gifford says that it is 'good, sterling, genuine
English,' and Foscolo says that the characters are right
Venetian. "--Letters to Murray, Sept. 11, Oct. 8, 1820, _Letters_, 1901,
v. 75-89. ]
[402] [Byron admits (_vide ante_, p. 340) that the character of the
"Dogaressa" is more or less his own creation. It may be remarked that in
Casimir Delavigne's version of the story, the Duchess (Elena) cherishes
a secret and criminal attachment for Bertuccio Faliero, and that in Mr.
Swinburne's tragedy, while innocent in act, she is smitten with remorse
for a passion which overmasters her loyalty to her husband. Byron's
Angiolina is "faultily faultless, . . . splendidly null. "
In a letter to Murray, dated January 4, 1821 (_Letters_, 1901, v. 218),
he says, "As I think that _love_ is not the principal passion for
tragedy, you will not find me a popular writer. Unless it is Love,
_furious_, _criminal_, and _hapless_ [as in _The Mysterious Mother_, or
in Alfieri's _Mirra_, or Shelley's _Cenci_], it ought not to make a
tragic subject. When it is melting and maudlin, it _does_, but it ought
not to do; it is then for the gallery and second-price boxes. " It is
probable that he owed these sentiments to the theory and practice of
Vittorio Alfieri. "It is extraordinary," writes M. de Fallette Barrol
(_Monthly Magazine_, April, 1805, reprinted in Preface to _Tragedie di
Alfieri_, A. Montucci, Edinburgh, 1805, i. xvi. _sq. _), "that a man
whose soul possessed an uncommon share of ardour and sensibility, and
had experienced all the violence of the passions, should scarcely have
condescended to introduce love into his tragedies; or, when he does,
that he should only employ it with a kind of reserve and severity. . . . He
probably regarded it as a hackneyed agent; for in . . . _Myrrha_ it
appears in such a strange character, that all the art of the writer is
not capable of divesting it of an air at once ludicrous and disgusting. "
But apart from the example of Alfieri, there was another motive at
work--a determination to prove to the world that he was the master of
his own temperament, and that, if he chose, he could cast away frivolity
and cynicism, and clothe himself with austerity "as with a garment. " He
had been taken to task for "treating well-nigh with equal derision the
most pure of virtues, and the most odious of vices" (_Blackwood's Edin.
Mag. _, August, 1819), and here was an "answer to his accusers! "]
[403] {368}[The exact date of Marin Falier's birth is a matter of
conjecture, but there is reason to believe that he Was under
seventy-five years of age at the time of the conspiracy. The date
assigned is 1280-1285 A. D. ]
[de] {369} ----_has he been doomed? _--[Alternative reading. MS. M. ]
[404] {370}[According to Dio Cassius, the last words of Brutus were,
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? , ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? [? ? ? ? ? ],
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ' ? ? ? ? ?
