As I stood by the taffrail of the little steamer that plies up and down Lake Como, a good-natured fellow-passenger, whose costume and bearing denoted the experienced gentleman, indicated the various points of interest along the beautiful shores. It was a clear, warm day of that enchanting season, in those climates, when spring is just verging into summer. The atmosphere was transparent, and every indentation of the beach had a well-defined relief; the sails of the fishing-boats were reflected in the water as distinctly as if it were a mirror; and the cloudless sky wore the densely azure hue peculiar to that region. My companion urbanely pointed out every object worthy of note, which the shifting landscape afforded; here was the site of Pliny's country-seat, there the former residence of Queen Caroline of England, and now we are directly opposite the villa of Pasta; but there was a more genial animation in his look and voice, as a low promontory loomed in sight, neither remarkable for the cultivation at its base, nor the picturesque beauty of its treeless slope: “Just behind that ridge,” said he, “is the road which Don Abbondio followed until he encountered the bravi who forbade him to marry the Promessi Sposi.” The perfectly natural manner in which the locality of an imaginary scene was thus designated, as if quite as real and more interesting than the abodes of actual persons, struck me as the very best evidence of Manzoni's genius and fame. All genuine creations assert and maintain a distinct personality; and this is, perhaps, the readiest and most faithful test whereby the legitimate characters of fiction may be distinguished from the counterfeit. The most universal triumph of this kind is that of Shakespeare, of whose personages we habitually speak not only as actual, but world-familiar celebrities. It is probable that if the origin of those characters in fiction, which are recognised by the general feeling of mankind as living originals, could be analyzed, it would appear that their essential features were drawn carefully from life. The chief attraction of the novels of the reign of George the Third is said to have been, that the individuals depicted were well known at that period, and this fact gave a relish to the infirmities of character thus revealed. But a more recent instance occurs in regard to several of the best delineations of Dickens, whose Pecksniff, Squeers, brothers Cheeryble, and others, are confidently identified; so that, even if there is an error in the designation, it only shows how nearly the author followed nature. Another convincing proof of the substantial relation to our experience, such daguerreotypes from life bear, is the habit so prevalent of naming our acquaintances from the well-drawn characters of able novelists. To realize the variety of fanciful beings who have been added by modern genius to the world's vast gallery of memorable portraits, it is only requisite to summon before our minds the long array of Scott's familiar creations. Charles Swain has done this in a poem entitled Dryburgh Abbey; and the obsequies of no human being were ever graced by so glorious an array of the representatives of human nature, acknowledged as such by the verdict of mankind, as this procession of his own “beings of the mind, and not of clay,” which are described as following Sir Walter to the tomb.

An avidity for fabulous narrative seems to have characterized the Oriental races. The indolent life of that dreamy clime naturally induced a necessity of being amused. Professed story-tellers were patronised by those in authority; and doubtless listened to with as earnest an attention as the lazzaroni on the Mole at Naples now bestow upon a reader of Tasso. Pastorals were probably the first improvised tales of rural districts. The more exacting imaginations of Eastern potentates called forth “Arabian Nights;” and, subsequently, when the western world was alive with the lays of troubadours and the thirst for gallant emprise, came the tales of chivalry destined chiefly to be remembered through the genial satire of Cervantes. The supremacy of the Church brought saintly legends in vogue; the spirit of maritime adventure led to the production of countless “voyages imaginaires;” civic revolutions, of a later period, gave birth to political romance, of which Utopia is the English type; and the more complicated interests and varied drama of modern society, finds its most welcome and perhaps faithful portraiture in one or another of the diversified species of the novel. Thus it is evident that from the Song of Solomon and the fables of mythology, to the last hot-pressed emanation from Albemarle Street, Fiction has served as a mirror to successive ages, reflecting, with more or less truth, events and manners, in hues not so emphatic as the drama, but with greater detail and more elaborate exactitude.

There are few more interesting literary processes than the composition of a novel, artistically wrought and genially inspired. If we analyze the method, it seems to be very like that by which a fine picture is executed. First, there are historical materials to collect,—the costume, manners, and spirit of the time chosen, to be studied and reproduced; then the dramatic incidents or plot to be arranged—corresponding to the action of the subject in pictorial art; the impressive background of history, the just perspective of time, so as to render the illusion complete; with the light and shade of cheerful and solemn feeling. These may all be derived from study and observation, and effectively arranged by skill and taste; but another, and the most vital element—the sentiment, or if the work be too prosaic to admit of such a definition, the sensation of the whole—that vague yet magnetic quality which in nature, in painting, and even in social life, we call atmosphere, must be derived from individual consciousness. This it is which brings us into relation with the story; which essentially attracts or repels; its presence gives life, and its absence makes entirely objective the most patiently finished conception. The other traits of a romance are more or less mechanical, or at least originate in the active intelligence of the writer; but this last and crowning principle emanates from the individual soul: it is that which makes the statue appear to breathe, and the picture to be a conscious reality; which carries the words of the poet into the universal heart of mankind, and causes the characters and scenery of a romance to assimilate themselves, in the imagination, with the actual and the endeared.

The gravest artistic faults or deficiencies may be counterbalanced, in a novel, by the truth, elevation, or delicacy of the sentiment, exactly as warmth and sincerity of character atone for a thousand foibles and even distasteful qualities in a friend. Thus Mackenzie's Man of Feeling, and Foscolo's Jacopo Ortis, considered as tales, are barren of striking events, wonderful coincidences, or elaborately-drawn characters; yet the one from its gentle and resigned and the other from its thoughtful and impassioned sentiment, apparently warm from a living heart, win and impress us with an indefinite but entrancing interest. Mrs. Radcliffe's novels abound in local mistakes; Southey demonstrates that her description of Skiddaw is entirely untrue; and in The Sicilian, she makes her heroine look from the towers of Palermo upon Mount Etna—a geographical impossibility; yet the scenes she depicts are so invested with the sentiment of wonder so largely developed in her nature, that the wizard charm of superstition haunts the reader with its gloomy fascination, notwithstanding the improbabilities of her narrative, the tame solution of her mysteries, and the inexcusable incorrectness of her topography. No one can read Corinne without impatience at the inconsistent character of Oswald, and the unsatisfactory reasons assigned for the unhappy course of events; but Madame de Staël has so deeply impregnated the imperfect drama with earnest, acute, and philosophical sentiment, with the sentiment at once of love, of genius, and of Italy, that we pause not to examine and object to the story, in our profound sympathy with the intense feeling and reflection which it sustains, like an unsymmetrical and ill-jointed trellis holding up to the air and sunshine, clusters of purple fruit and masses of autumn-tinted leaves. Some of Hans Andersen's stories, professedly written for children, and quite fantastic in conception, are so sweetly invented and so imbued with genuine humanity, that they charm all who have not outlived heart and imagination. It is, therefore, the idiosyncrasy of the novelist that imparts the zest to his writings; it is the point where his nature overflows, that yields the peculiar charm to his inventions; and it is thus that our real sympathies are awakened. The biographers of Richardson and Mrs. Inchbald let us into the secret of that winsome tenderness that once caused us to hang fondly over Pamela and the Simple Story; it was their own prevailing characteristic. Godwin, on the same principle, excites metaphysical curiosity; Goldsmith, the sense of domestic enjoyment; Scott, chivalrous and patriotic emotion; Cooper, the zest of adventure; Dickens, convivial, pitiful, and humorous feeling; Irving, agreeable reverie; Beckford, an epicurean delight of the senses; Miss Porter and Maturin, the luxury of heroic self-devotion, and the rich but consuming excitement of ardent passion; Paul de Kock, the vagrant but spirited moods of Parisian adventure; and Balzac, the philosophical and sympathetic interest which anatomizes the inmost life of the heart.

Truth to nature, rather than dramatic effect, was the aim of Manzoni; and, as is ever the case when realized, it secured for his romance a permanent interest and celebrity. There is no attempt at brilliancy in the dialogue, no accumulation of incredible events in the plot, and scarcely a trait of improbability in the characters. Fidelity is the charm upon which the author relies both to enlist the sympathies of the reader and disarm the opposition of the critic. It is as if a well-skilled artist were to roam, during an exciting epoch, over the fertile plains of Lombardy, and transfer scrupulously to his sketch-book, the most characteristic figures of peasant and prelate,—here a picturesque bit of landscape and there an animated group; now a monastery, and again some by-way cottage, vineyard, or shrine,—thus giving us authentic hints whereby we can reproduce in imagination, especially if seconded by memory, a satisfactory conception of all the prevailing features of the scene. The author's manner, to borrow a term so often applied to the old masters in painting, is more that of Murillo and the Flemish school than of Raphael or Correggio: except that the literary execution of Manzoni has a somewhat classical and even pedantic character. Essentially, however, the same artistic principle is relied upon. There is something of Gainsborough and Moreland in the tone of his graphic pictures; he seldom idealizes, but conscientiously represents the actual. His Promessi Sposi is attractive to Italians on the same ground that the Vicar of Wakefield is a favourite with English readers. We are interested in his characters, not because they are perfect, but because they are natural. Renzo, indeed, can scarcely be called a hero, or Lucia a heroine, in the sense in which that term is employed by fanatical novel-readers. Neither exhibit any poetic sentimentalism. Their love is as unromantic as it is honest. He is but a skilful and industrious silk-weaver; and she, as the disappointed Bergamese, who expected to see a wonderful beauty, discovered, is only “una contadina come tante altre;”—a peasant girl like so many others. But, then, the attractive simplicity of nature, the affectionate disposition, the child-like faith and rustic truth of these lovers, and especially their excellence as types of a local peasantry, render them, in contrast with the remarkable vicissitudes through which they pass, objects of real and sometimes intense sympathy. There is a kind of elemental human nature about Lucia that is irresistibly charming; the very weakness and ignorance, as well as the faithful attachment and irascible temper of Renzo, are eminently illustrative of the rural population of Lombardy. It is, too, exceedingly characteristic of somewhat advanced women of the middle class of Italians, to affect the wisdom of experience, and nourish their self-esteem by a kind of pretension to knowledge of the world—which is the more diverting from the actual narrowness of their ideas and their obvious superficial knowledge and lack of real confidence. The sage counsels, and desire to have her say, ascribed to poor Agnese, peculiarly belong to her sphere and age. The ecclesiastical portraits are the most carefully laboured of all; and even allowing for the author's strong Catholic partialities, they must be admitted to be most consistent, each with itself, and all with probability and truth. The church that can boast a Fenelon and a Cheverus, doubtless has, from time to time, included priests as exalted in their views as Federigo Borromeo, as true to an expiatory vow as Padre Cristofero, and as timid and time-serving as poor Don Abbondio. Nay, at this very time, whoever has been on familiar terms with the Italian clergy, must have encountered exceptions to the general corruption, in the form of a martyr-like asceticism or a life-devoted benevolence. In some, perhaps isolated regions there are members of the monastic fraternities that are idolized by the common people for their charity; preachers who fill a cathedral by their eloquence, and men of saintly lives whose benediction is received with awe and gratitude. In short, traces of the three prominent ecclesiastics of Manzoni's romance, may be easily detected at the present day; and, in many pious minds, yet excite the sentiments of love and reverence, which, at the period described, united the peasant to the church. It was doubtless the author's main object to vindicate the religious sentiment; to show how the essential principles of Christianity were knit into the well-being of society; and to bring into strong relief, for the advantage of a sceptical and revolutionary era, the consoling, purifying, and happy influences of the church, whose superstitions had become a byword, and whose sovereignty already yielded to military power. We can, indeed, imagine no greater contrast than that which exists between the whole spirit and atmosphere of Manzoni's story and the times in which it appeared. The star of Europe's modern conqueror was rapidly culminating; all that was prescriptive and venerable in usage, form, law, manners, and faith, had either yielded to inexorable reform or was in a transition state; and the primal sentiments of our common nature, without whose prevailing sanction and tender intervention we can scarcely hope for the stability of any human institution, were so violently assailed, that a kind of social chaos seemed inevitable. The triumphs of Napoleon had opened the way for an apparently limitless series of experiments in government; and a fearless challenge of all authority, especially that of religion. The mental activity and civic revolutions incident to this state of things, kept Europe in a continual ferment. Old associations had no power to hedge in thought; and new combinations of events gave scope to every kind of speculative hardihood. It was the age of sudden political vicissitudes, splendid military achievements, constant social alternations, and fearless inquiry. It was an experimental, irreverent, and unbelieving age; and even at such a time, Manzoni sent forth his calm pictures of rustic life; he revived the primitive in human nature; exhibited the graces of simplicity, the moral value of faith, the charm of spotless integrity, the need of a vista through which, amid the darkness and tumult of life, glimpses could be afforded of heaven; the blessedness of forgiveness; the tranquil joy of expiation, the glory of repentance, and the beauty of holiness. It was like the low warbling of a lute amid the braying of trumpets; or one of the soft sunsets of Claude reflected on a thunder-cloud. It was an enterprise, in its very hopelessness and beauty, worthy of the heart of genius; and the peaceful and sweet manner in which it was achieved, evinces the dignity of scholarship and the self-possession of faith.

It has, indeed, been objected to the Promessi Sposi, that it is circumstantial even to tediousness; that it lacks vivacity of tone and variety of interest. Perhaps these and similar faults are inseparable from the author's plan; his first object being truth to nature and history, in order to render his work locally authentic, and give it a national interest; and his second to inculcate certain great principles of life and action, which he saw were lost sight of in an age of preternatural and spasmodic excitement. The polished correctness of the style, too, while on the one hand it has given the novel a classical rank and caused it to be one of the most approved textbooks in the acquisition of the Italian tongue, on the other, by a certain stiffness and the use of uncommon words, occasioned by the classic fastidiousness of the author, has induced pedantry of style, the very reverse of that colloquial ease, which is so great a requisite in the popular novel. These and other incidental defects do not, however, at all invalidate the well-founded claims of Promessi Sposi, as a true picture of Italian life, felicitously conceived and artistically developed.

As the artistic representative of truth and the pleasing stimulant of benign emotions, Fiction thus redeems itself from the serious objections to which it was once far more liable than at present. “It is necessary to our rank as spiritual beings,” says a judicious writer, “that we should be able to invent and to behold what is not; and to our rank as moral creatures that we should know and confess that it is not.” Hence the unsatisfactory blending of fact and fiction, by the excessive development of any of the elements we have designated, the exaggerations of professedly veritable travellers, the fanciful narratives of historians, as well as grossly illusive pictures of life and nature even in a romance. Such errors offend the integrity of the novelist's art exactly as mean expedients and grotesque combinations in architecture, or untrue drawing and extravagant colour in painting, or want of proportion in statuary; because such blemishes destroy the sentiment and mar the completeness of invention in writing, as well as in form or design. Legitimately produced, however, and truly inspired, fiction interprets humanity, informs the understanding, and quickens the affections. It reflects ourselves, warns us against prevailing social follies, adds rich specimens to our cabinets of character, dramatises life for the unimaginative, daguerreotypes it for the unobservant, multiplies experience for the isolated or inactive, and cheers age, retirement, and invalidism, with an available and harmless solace. A distinguished modern statesman decided a question that arose in a social circle, by very gravely quoting a passage from Robinson Crusoe. His friends expressed their surprise that one whose pursuits were so complicated and absorbing should remember the very words of that nursery tale; he assured them he had read it once every year since he was a boy as a mental refreshment. Humboldt pauses in his description of tropical vegetation, to mention with gratitude the fact that it is associated in his mind with the correctly delineated scenery of Paul and Virginia. The philosophic Mackintosh advocates fiction because “it creates and nourishes sympathy;” and the poet Gray declared that it was heaven to pass a rainy day in reading new novels. Thus resorted to as a pastime in the intervals of more exacting studies, and at periods of convalescence or recreation, it is one of the most ready and useful of luxuries; but no more to be relied upon altogether as intellectual food, than champagne, spices, or beautiful fruit, for animal nourishment. It is, therefore, only the abuse of fiction which deadens the zest of truth, for its right office is to heighten its effect. “Matter of fact,” says Hunt, “is our perception of the grosser and more external shapes of truth; fiction represents the residuum of the mystery. To love matter of fact is to have a lively sense of the visible and the immediate; to love fiction is to have as lively a sense of the possible and the remote.”

The word novel has a much higher signification than formerly. It once conveyed the idea of vapid sentimentalism or irrational romance, only adapted to very weak and morbidly fanciful tastes. It furnished pabulum to imaginary woes, and yielded unhealthy excitement to undisciplined minds. Hence the very justifiable prejudice so long cherished against this kind of reading by vigorous intellects. A half century has effected a complete revolution in this department of literature. Perhaps the first example which led to this auspicious change is the Caleb Williams of Godwin. That remarkable work proved that a story may be deeply interesting without being mainly occupied with the tender passion; and it suggested that human nature and human life afforded a boundless and most instructive field for true genius to represent. The English have excelled in fiction, perhaps, in part, from the judgment which they, of all people, know best how to bring to the arrangement of passionate and poetic materials, and thus render them harmonious and effective. If we glance at the number and variety of standard English novels that still maintain their place in select libraries, we cannot but acknowledge that our vernacular is the most prolific source of excellent fiction, in modern times. Consider, also, the important subjects these works illustrate, and how ably they have been made the exponents of grave opinion, social questions, history, philanthropy, art, and morals. The most vivid pictures of London society, in the days of Johnson, are yet to be found in the novels of Miss Burney; and its present absurdities have been most effectually satirized by the novels of Hook. If we desire to realize the life of the East, the Anastasius of Hope is the most available camera obscura into which to enter and view its reflection. We are confidently referred to the novels of Smollett for an authentic character of the English navy fifty years ago. The low life of Great Britain is sketched in enduring colours by Dickens. The philosophy of common sense—that trait of national character which chiefly distinguishes the Anglo-Saxon from the southern European, is permanently elaborated in the novels of Maria Edgeworth and Miss Austin. All salient eras of human history and social life have been reproduced by modern novelists. Scottish annals and scenery may be said to have been revealed to the world by the author of Waverley; and Macaulay sustains his description of the condition of the clergy in the reign of Charles the Second, by the parsons Fielding has bequeathed. Miss Ferrier's novels have immortalized the most humorous and characteristic traits of Scotch society. The life of the north of Europe is now familiar to us through the charming tales of Miss Bremer. Lockhart and our own Ware have given adequate pictures whereby the unlearned may be initiated into that memorable epoch when the advent of Christianity introduced a new element into the life of the Roman Empire. Systems of political economy, the questions that divide the Episcopal Church, the social problems involved in the manufacturing enterprise of England, the racy and pathetic aspects of Irish life, the biography of illustrious men, the arts of diplomacy, principles of taste, government, religion, and science, now, almost daily, find accredited and fascinating interpreters in the guise of popular novelists.

The conditions we have indicated are happily fulfilled in the Romance of Manzoni. Every one at all familiar with the public events of the time, which are made in the novel to lend the dignity of great social phenomena to the humble experiences of the hero and heroine,—will trace a scrupulous authenticity in the narrative; and not less faithful are the incidental glimpses afforded of the laws, customs, and social economy of the period. We seem, as we read, to breathe the atmosphere of that epoch when the feudal spirit yet lingered in Italy, although its practical influence was essentially modified; when haughty lords still kept their armed retainers, and could, with certain precautions, violently outrage individual rights with impunity; when the sanctions of the Church yet exercised an unquestioned authority;—the age of local warfare, of Latin edicts, of gross popular delusions, of scholastic pedantry, and fanciful philosophy. These phases of life in that day and country are brought out with remarkable tact in the course of the story. The war to settle the succession of the ducal states of Gonzaga, and the occurrence of a famine and the plague at Milan, by arousing all the latent elements of society, give ample occasion to indicate the degree of knowledge, the tone of public opinion, and the standard of civilization then and there attained. We are admitted freely to the banquet of the lordly castle, the discussions of the piazza, the domestic life of the palace, the secrets of conventual discipline, the gossip of the osteria, the interviews of the archbishop, and the humble colloquies of the village hearth. Attentively regarded, they yield the most clear and reliable impressions; and the amount of positive information thus gleaned from the story, is not less remarkable than the facility with which it is suggested. The more elaborate pictures thus vividly reproduced from the dusty archives of municipal history, will bear a very thoughtful perusal. The description of the bread riots and the various scenes enacted at Milan during the ravages of the plague, have scarcely been equalled for graphic delineation and true pathos, by any of the many brilliant sketches, in the same vein, subsequently attempted by the most eloquent writers. Their beautiful diction in some cases enhances the effect; the minute circumstances and affecting points of view chosen, are such as an actual spectator would naturally have selected; while the light and shade, the impressive fact and the affecting sentiment, are blended with that inimitable skill which is only an intuition of genius. Indeed, the chastened tone of these parts of the romance,—often affording not only room, but temptation to exaggerate, is one of its prominent merits. We do not, for a moment, lose sight of the dreadful reality on account of the melo-dramatic representation. On the contrary, the dangling hair of virgin-bodies piled on the dead-carts; the horrid buffoonery of the monatti; the maternal tenderness and care lavished so calmly on an infant's corpse, in the midst of the licentious misery around; the remorseful terrors of the selfish noble, and the heartless cupidity of the base servant, the devotion of the benevolent, and the callous indifference of the hardened;—each individual demonstration of character and every special incident that stand out from the general record of pestilence and famine, are usually so true to the great and authenticated occurrences, that we not only confess that they might have been, but feel that they were. So much for the unity of these ghastly, yet memorable pictures. The author is equally felicitous in minor limning;—the forms of salutation, the classic oaths, the religious adjurations, the proverbs, gestures, and casual provincialisms that occur, have not only authority, but significance. Passed over, by the ordinary reader, without interest, to those familiar with the region and the classes depicted, they have a peculiar meaning and an intrinsic charm.

Manzoni has, also, a concise way of sketching a whole genus in one of the species, of exhibiting what is characteristic of a domain or a class by a single effective specimen. Thus, in the portrait of Federigo Borromeo we have not only an historical personage, but the ideal of the scholar, saint, and gentleman combined, of that age. Perpetua's counterparts may be seen by every traveller who sojourns awhile with an Italian family of the middle class. The plants enumerated as having overgrown Renzo's garden during his banishment, might be classified in a botanical nomenclature of Lombardy. Don Ferrante's philosophical creed illustrates the scientific Quixotism then indulged by speculative minds; and a very adequate idea of the scenery of northern Italy may be derived from the account given of the different journeys of the fugitives between Milan, Monza, and Bergamo.

In the unpretending but significant tales of Dana and Hawthorne we often discover the essence of romance—the most pure and subtle elements of original fiction. Remorse has found no more refined and touching interpreter than the former; and it is rarely that what is adjacent and immediate has been so delicately and suggestively delineated as by the latter. Professional life has revealed some of its most thrilling secrets by the pen of Warren; and popular art is most vividly illustrated in Wilhelm Meister. Many of the profound laws of love and music may be learned in Consuelo; the luxuries and the psychological working of sentiment glow and melt along the pages of Rousseau; fantasy, in its wildest, most sublime and most exquisite play, emanates from the German novelists—now shadowy with the weird genius of Hoffman, and now aerial with the crystal grace of Undine. The iris-hues of the Midsummer Night's Dream reappear in the fairy tale; and all the virtues and the comfort of modern civilization are embodied in English stories of domestic life. But the field embraced by this endeared form of literature is too vast for specific comment. The fertility of its resources may be imagined by considering what rich elements are included in the exuberant life of the primitive fiction, the truthful consistency of the standard narrative, and the insight into men and things, of the modern fashionable novel: take, for instance, the tone of Boccaccio—the verisimilitude of De Foe, and the knowledge of the world of Thackeray;—how much of human life, both inward and outward, how many of the elemental and the manifest principles of our common nature and of universal experience, are therein combined!

Personal familiarity with the country and people described in Manzoni's novel, is almost essential to its complete enjoyment and appreciation. To have seen one of the religious processions, in Tuscany, for instance, bearing the relics of a saint for the purpose of checking a freshet or a drought, and to have watched the hopeful countenances of the rustic throng, renders far more vivid the ceremonial of escorting the gorgeously-decked remains of St. Carlo through the streets of Milan, to stay that awful pestilence. The sight of one of the popular tumults which agitated Sicily when the cholera prevailed there, a few years since, and the ocular proof of the fanaticism of the ignorant wretches in sacrificing so many innocent victims to the suspicion of having poisoned the wells, and thus induced the disease,—brings home to the most unimaginative the frantic delusion of the Milanese, in ascribing the pestilence, whose course is so graphically described by the novelist, to the same cause. The scribes who yet sit in the squares of Palermo and Naples to indite letters for the common people, make the difficulties of Renzo in corresponding with his betrothed, appear very natural. An habitué of a trattoria in Italy, will recognise the viands, the language and bearing of the innkeepers as identical with those of our own day; and a certain extraordinary blending of acuteness and candour, of almost childish simplicity in matters of faith and feeling, and dexterity or evasion in cases involving personal safety or interest, which might appear inconsistent elsewhere, are perfectly true to Italian character. In fact, in many particulars, Hogarth and Crabbe are not more thoroughly literal interpreters of nature than Manzoni.

The monotony of provincial life in Italy, the family dictatorship, which virtually forces superfluous children to enter the cloister, and the more benign aspects of Catholicism, to those who have been in contact with the domestic life of the country, are reproduced in this story with singular truth. It was doubtless no small part of the author's plan to touch the patriotic sensibilities of his countrymen by the nationality of his work; and this, perhaps, accounts for the fear he seems to have entertained of the slightest extravagance; and the somewhat tiresome historical interludes scattered through the romance. The sentiments unfolded are those of the author himself. He was thoroughly sincere both in his patriotism and his piety; and this is the more honourable to him inasmuch as his origin is noble, his associations of the highest kind, and his education superior; but the scholar and the man of rank were not suffered to overlay the Christian and the philanthropist. While other authors of the period scarcely professed any faith whatever, and followed their own vagrant impulses, Manzoni looked to God in meekness, and around upon his country with love. His nature was essentially contemplative; he believed rather in the victories of thought than those of the sword; and relied on the primitive and indestructible sentiments of humanity far more than external violence for the advancement of truth. His first work, Conte di Carmagnola, which appeared in 1820, a tragedy embodying the noblest self-devotion and patriotism, excited a deep interest throughout the continent. Other dramas, his famous Ode, entitled Il Cinque di Maggio, on the death of Napoleon, and a volume of hymns,—then a rare species of writing in Italy, increased his literary renown.

But his popularity is derived from his novel—I Promessi Sposi. He adopted this form of literature as that which gave him the surest and most extensive access to the minds of his countrymen. Scott's unparalleled success in the same department was already the literary phenomenon of the day; and to Manzoni belongs the credit of first effectively introducing the modern novel into Italy. By patient elaboration of authentic facts, by careful limning from original elements of character within his observation, by infusing the genuine sentiments of his own heart into the beings he portrayed, and by a scholar-like finish of style, he laboured to produce an unexceptionable, graphic, interesting, and standard national romance; and, however humble the sphere he chose to illustrate, he accomplished his purpose. It is a curious fact that almost the only trace of his ideal tendencies in this work, is discoverable in some of his comparisons, which, by their fancifulness, betray the poet. Otherwise the design is mainly Flemish, both in subjects and exactitude. The atmosphere, however, of the whole picture, to the view of one whose associations are enlisted, is as soft, attractive, and mellow, as that of spring in Italy. The gentle and tranquil excitements of rural life and primitive manners, touch the heart of the sympathetic reader. The resignation of Lucia, the conversion of the wicked Innominato, the sublime patience of Padre Cristofero, the diverting cowardice of Don Abbondio, the shrewishness of Perpetua, the enlarged benevolence of Federigo, with the episodes of extreme human misery, and the final happy fortunes of the humble lovers, gradually win upon our calm attention, and become, at last, endeared to our remembrance.