^{page 421 note 1} This paper makes no pretence to rival the detailed studies that have been made of two or three of the poets who have pictured Italy in their verse. It aims rather at a general survey, and it must sacrifice a good deal of detail for the sake of a wider view.

The material for this paper has been gathered by an independent examination of English poetry from about 1525 to 1890. Longfellow's Poems of Places, Boston, 1876–1879, comprises 31 volumes, 18mo., of which three are on Italy. This collection contains but a portion of the English poems dealing with Italy, and it includes translations from Greek, Latin, German, and Italian writers. Another collection has just appeared, under the editorship of Robert Haven Shauffler, Through Italy with the Poets, with selections “ranging from Homer and Pindar to Arthur Symons and William Vaughan Moody.” Two recent books, neither of which I have consulted, are Anna Benneson McMahon's Florence in the Poetry of the Brownings, and Helen A. Clarke's Browning's Italy.

^{page 422 note 1} “It was this presence of danger, as well as of personal inconvenience of travelling, which perhaps delayed for so long the appreciation of natural beauties. The interest in scenery and landscape on the part of the English travellers in Italy was certainly not very pronounced. They noticed the general situation of each city, and at times made a few remarks on the beauty of the locality, but their observation of nature fell behind all their other comments; the real attraction they found in Italy lay in other directions.”—Einstein, Italian Renaissance in England, p. 134.

^{page 424 note 1} Sir Philip Sidney was on the Continent two years in his youth, much of the time at Venice. His work was profoundly influenced by Italian culture, but there is no picture of Italy in any of his verse. Cf. S. Lee, Great Englishmen, p. 73.

“Nearly all the English poets had then travelled abroad, and Wallington even gave advice to such of his travellers in Italy as were anxious to follow the muse.”—Einstein, Italian Renaissance in England, p. 339.

See the whole of Einstein's third chapter, and also Garnett and Gosse, Engl. Lit, i, 241; Maugham, The Book of Italian Travel, 1580–1900, London, 1903.

^{page 424 note 2} Stanza iii, lines 1–5.

^{page 425 note 1} The dramatists are not included in the scope of this paper, but I must find space for the following remarks on the relation of Shakespeare to Italy and Italian themes.

“It seems unlikely that Shakespeare ever set foot on the Continent of Europe in either a private or a professional capacity.”—S. Lee, Great Englishmen of the 16th Century, p. 298.

And yet, as the author hastens to add: “To Italy—especially to cities of northern Italy, like Venice, Padua, Verona, Mantua, and Milan—Shakespeare makes frequent and familiar reference, and he supplies many a realistic portrayal of Italian life and sentiment. But the fact [of various blunders] renders it almost impossible that he could have gathered his knowledge of Northern Italy from personal observation. Shakespeare doubtless owed all his knowledge of Italy to the verbal reports of travelled friends and to Italian books, the contents of which he had a rare power of assimilating and vitalising. The glowing light which his quick imagination shed on Italian scenes lacked the literal precision and detailed accuracy with which first-hand exploration must have endowed it.”—p. 299.

“With Italy—the Italy of the Renaissance—his writings show him to have been in full sympathy through the whole range of his career. The name of every city of modern Italy which had contributed anything to the enlightenment of modern Europe finds repeated mention in his plays. Florence and Padua, Milan and Mantua, Venice and Verona are the most familiar scenes of Shakespearian drama. To many Italian cities or districts definite characteristics that are perfectly accurate are allotted. Padua, with its famous university, is called the nursery of the arts; Pisa is renowned for the gravity of its citizens; Lombardy is the pleasant garden of great Italy. The mystery of Venetian waterways excited Shakespeare's curiosity. The Italian word ‘traghetto,’ which is reserved in Venice for the anchorage of gondolas, Shakespeare transferred to his pages under the slightly disguised form of ‘traject.’”—p. 303.

See also pp. 304–307 for other evidence of Shakespeare's knowledge of Italy and Italian literature.

“In no less than five plays the action passes in Rome. Not only is the ancient capital of the world the scene of the Roman plays Titus Andronicus, Coriolanus, Julius Cæsar, and Antony and Cleopatra, but in Cymbeline much that is important to the plot is developed in the same surroundings. Of all the historic towns of northern Italy can the like story be told.”—p. 311.

On this question, see also, Einstein, Italian Renaissance in England, pp. 369–372.

^{page 426 note 1} Chambers, English Poets, v. 691.

^{page 428 note 1} Moral Essays, Epistle v, ed. Ward.

^{page 429 note 1} Chambers, English Poets, x, 14.

^{page 429 note 2} Book i, No. 18.

^{page 429 note 3} Chambers, English Poets, xiv, 174.

^{page 430 note 1} The First Part of this poem was published late in December, 1734, the Second and Third Parts in 1735, and the Fourth and Fifth Parts in 1736. A good deal of the portion dealing with Ancient and Modern Italy in Liberty, Part I, is merely a reflection of the author's classical reading and shows little trace of actual observation.

^{page 431 note 1} Printed in a collection issued by Richard Savage in 1726, and revised and published separately in 1727.

^{page 433 note 1} For the sake of completeness I cite the following titles. There are probably others that I have overlooked.

1. Arno's Vale. A Song. Written at Florence on the Death of the Last Grand Duke of Tuscany of the Medici Family, by Charles Duke of Dorset. Dodsley, Poems (1783), Supplement, ii, 292, 293. This merely mentions “Arno's silver stream” and “ Arno's vale.”

2. An Epistle from a Swiss Officer to his Friend at Rome. Dodsley, Poems, (1763), iii, 58–61. The Swiss boasts of the freedom of his own land and scorns to “sell himself to Rome and slavery.” This is the burden of the whole piece: Italy is enslaved—“Who fights for tyrants is his country's foe.”

3. On a Bay-Leaf, pluck'd from Virgil's Tomb near Naples, 1736, by —. Dodsley, Poems, iii, 268, 269. Of this, nothing is Italian but the title.

4. To the Memory of a Gentleman, Who died on his Travels to Rome, written in 1738 by the Rev. Dr. Shipley (now Bishop of St. Asaph). Dodsley, Poems (1763), v, 256, 257. This merely mentions the Tiber and

5. An Epistle from Florence, To T. A. Esqr.; Tutor to the Earl of P—.

^{page 434 note 1} Chambers, English Poets, xiii, 175–180. West was born very early in the eighteenth century and died in 1755. The poem mentioned above contains fifty-eight stanzas of nine lines each.

^{page 435 note 1} Dodsley, Poems, iii, 167–171. Cf. also Pope, Dunciad, iv, 293–321.

^{page 435 note 2} Chambers, English Poets, xviii, 165.

^{page 435 note 3} Dodsley, Poems, iii, 99–108.

^{page 437 note 1} Chambers, English Poets, xvii, 226. “Ode to the Tiber. On entering the Campania of Rome, at Otricoli, 1755.”

^{page 437 note 2} Idem, xvii, 228. “ Written at Rome, 1756.”

^{page 438 note 1} We must not lose sight of the novels that drew attention in the eighteenth and the early nineteenth century to the possibilities of Italy as a theme. Mrs. Radcliffe, for example, had doubtless more or less influence on Byron in this matter.

^{page 439 note 1} Anna Benneson McMahon, With Byron in Italy, presents typical scenes in Italy with illustrations of his poems.

^{page 439 note 2} Byron (English Men of Letters, American ed.), p. 208.

^{page 440 note 1} Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, iv, stanzas cxliii ff.

^{page 442 note 1} Prophecy of Dante.

^{page 442 note 2} In Anna Benneson McMahon's With Shelley in Italy are illustrations of many of the scenes pictured in Shelley's poems.

^{page 443 note 1} In comparing this poem with Keats's Ode to Autumn Mr. Matthew Arnold remarks: “The latter piece [the Ode] renders nature, the former tries to render her.”

^{page 446 note 1} William Sotheby's Italy (1828) is a poem suggested by the work of Rogers and is the record of a tour on the Continent in 1816–17. For a detailed comparison of the two poems, see London Monthly Review, July, 1828, pp. 396–407.

^{page 447 note 1} Book vi, “Cambridge and the Alps.”

^{page 448 note 1} In Sonnets Dedicated to Liberty and Order.

^{page 450 note 1} Dipsychus, Part I, sc. i.

^{page 450 note 2} Idem, Part I, sc. ii.

^{page 451 note 1} Amours de Voyage, Canto iv.

^{page 455 note 1} ‘Frater Ave atque Vale.‘ First printed March, 1883.

^{page 458 note 1} Aurora Leigh, Book vii. Tenth ed., London, 1872.

^{page 458 note 2} Aurora Leigh, Book vii.

^{page 459 note 1} Aurora Leigh, Book viii.

^{page 461 note 1} The Ring and the Book, iv, Tertium Quid.

^{page 461 note 2} Idem, vi.

^{page 462 note 1} Book i.

^{page 462 note 2} Prince Hohenstiel.

^{page 463 note 1} By the Fireside.

^{page 465 note 1} Poems, vi, 382.

^{page 466 note 1} Stanza 21.

^{page 467 note 1} Along with this should be read his great poem on Siena.