NOTES.

ON THE FIRST PART,

NOTE a.

Awake but one, and lo, what myriads rise!

WHEN a traveller, who was surveying the ruins of Rome, expressed a desire to possess some relic of its ancient grandeur, Poussin, who attended him, stooped down, and gathering up a handful of earth, shining with small grains of porphyry, "Take this home," said he, "for your cabinet; and say boldly, Questa è Roma Antica."

NOTE b.

The church-yard yews round which his fathers sleep.

Every man, like Gulliver in Lilliput, is fastened to some spot of earth, by the thousand small threads that habit and association are continually stealing over him. Of these, perhaps, one of the strongest is here alluded to.

When the Canadian Indians were once solicited

to emigrate, "What!" they replied,

"shall we say

to the bones of our fathers, Arise, and go with us

into a foreign land ?”

Hist. des Indes, par Raynal, vi. 21.

NOTE .

So when he breath'd his firm yet fond adieuHe wept, tears, concurred, with them, to do him honour: he went to the mast-head, waving to the canoes as long as they continued in sight.

but the effort that he made to conceal hie

HAWKESWORTH's Voyages, ii. 181.

Another very affecting instance of local attachment is related of his fellow countryman Potaveri, who came to Europe with M. de Bougainville.

See LES JARDINS, chant it.

NOTE d.

So Scotia's Queen, &c.

Elle se leve sur son lict, et se met à contempler

la France encore, ettant qu'elle peut.

BRANTOME, i. 140.

NOTE e. P. 16.

Thus kindred objects kindred thoughts inspire.

To an accidental association may be ascribed some of the noblest efforts of human genius. The Historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire first conceived the design among the ruins of the Capitol; and to the tones of a Welsh harp are we indebted for the Bard of Gray.

GIBBON'S Hist. xii. 432. Mem. of GRAY, sect. iv. let. 25.

NOTE f. P. 17.

Hence bome-felt pleasure, &c.

Who can sufficiently admire the affectionate attachment of Plutarch, who thus concludes his enumeration of the advantages of a great city to men of letters ; "As to myself, I live in a little town; and I choose to live there, lest it should become still less."

Vit. Dem.

NOTE g. P. 17.

For this FOSCARI, &c.

This young man was suspected of murder, and at Venice suspicion is good evidence. Neither the

interest of the Doge, his father, nor the intrepidity of conscious innocence, which he exhibited in the dungeon and on the rack, could procure his acquittal. He was banished to the island of Candia for life.

But here his resolution failed him. At such a distance from home he could not live; and as it was a criminal offence to solicit the interceffion of any foreign prince, in a fit of despair he addressed a letter to the duke of Milan, and intrusted it to a wretch whose perfidy, he knew, would occasion his being remanded a prisoner to Venice.

See Dr. MOORE's View of Society in Italy, vol. i. let. 14.

NOTE b. P. 17.

And watch and weep in ELOISA's cell.

The Paraclete, founded by Abelard, in Cham

pagne.

NOTE . P. 17,

'Twas ever thus. And now at VIRGIL's tombVows and pilgrimages are not peculiar to the religious enthusiast. Silius Italicus performed annual

ceremonies of the mountain of Posilippo; and it was there that Boccaccio, quasi da un divino esteo inspirato, resolved to dedicate his life to the muses.

NOTE k. P. 17.

So TULLY paus'd amid the wrecks of Time.

When Cicero was quæstor in Sicily, he discovered the tomb of Archimedes by its mathematical inscrip

tion.

Tusc. Quæst. v. 3.

NOTE 1. P. 18.

Say why the pensive widow loves to weep.

The influence of the associating principle is finely exemplified in the faithful Penelope, when she sheds tears over the bow of Ulysses. Odyss. xxi 55.

'NOTE m. P. 18.

If chance he bears the song so sweetly wild

The celebrated Ranz des Vachez ; cet air si chéri des Suisses qu'il fut défendu sous peine de mort de le jouer dans leurs troupes, parce qu'il faisoit fondre en larmes, déserter ou mourir ceux qui l'entendoient, tant il excitoit en eux l'ardent désir de revoir leur pays. ROUSSEAU, Dictionnaire de Musique.

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