n, when he retires to rest, amid the blessings of exulting
nature. It is the balmy breath of the summer breeze, the twilight's last
and holiest sigh. In the dramatic poem before us, the interest is of a
different nature; it is dark--wild, and unearthly. The characters that
appear in it are of no mortal stamp; they are daemons in human guise,
inscrutable in their actions, subtle in their revenge. Each has his
smile of awful meaning--his purport of hellish tendency. The tempest
that rages in his bosom is irrepressible but by death. The phrenzied
groan that diseased imagination extorts from his perverted soul, is as
the thunder-clap that reverberates amid the cloud-capt summits of the
Alps. It is the storm that convulses all nature--that lays bare the face
of heaven, and gives transient glimpses of destruction yet to be. Then
in the midst of all these accumulated horrors comes the gentle Beatrice,

"Who in the gentleness of thy sweet youth
Hast never trodden on a worm, or bruised
A living flower, but thou hast pitied it
With needless tears." Page 50.

She walks in the light of innocence; in the unclouded sunshine of
loveliness and modesty; but her felicity is transient as the calm that
precedes the tempest; and in the very whispers of her virtue, you hear
the indistinct muttering of the distant thunder. She is conceived in
the true master spirit of genius; and in the very instant of her
parricide, comes home to our imagination fresh in the spring time of
innocence--hallowed in the deepest recesses of melancholy. But
notwithstanding all these transcendant qualities, there are numerous
passages that warrant our introductory observations respecting the
Cockney school, and plunge "full fathom five," into the profoundest
depths of the Bathos. While, therefore, we do justice to the abilities
of the author, we shall bestow a passing smile or two on his unfortunate
Cockney propensities.

The following are the principal incidents of the play. Count Cenci, the
_daemon_ of the piece, delighted with the intelligence of the death of
two of his sons, recounts at a large assembly, specially invited for the
purpose, the circumstances of the dreadful transaction. Lucretia, his
wife, Beatrice, his daughter, and the other guests, are of course
startled at his transports; but when they hear his awful imprecations,

"Oh, thou bright wine whose purple splendor leaps
And bubbles gaily in this golden bowl
Under th