bervie, and again, by John Herman Merivale, under the title of
_The Two First Cantos of Richardetto_, 1820), but the parallel which he
adduces (_vide post_, p. 166) is not very striking or convincing.

On the other hand, after the poem was completed (March 25, 1818), he was
under the impression that "Berni was the original of _all_ ... the
father of that kind [i.e. the mock-heroic] of writing;" but there is
nothing to show whether he had or had not read the _rifacimento_ of
Orlando's _Innamorato_, or the more distinctively Bernesque _Capitoli_.
Two years later (see Letter to Murray, February 21, 1820, _Letters_,
1900, iv. 407; and "Advertisement" to _Morgante Maggiore_) he had
discovered that "Pulci was the parent of _Whistlecraft_, and the
precursor and model of Berni," but, in 1817, he was only at the
commencement of his studies. A time came long before the "year or two"
of his promise (March 25, 1818) when he had learned to simulate the
_vera imago_ of the Italian Muse, and was able not only to surpass his
"immediate model," but to rival his model's forerunners and inspirers.
In the meanwhile a tale based on a "Venetian anecdote" (perhaps an
"episode" in the history of Colonel Fitzgerald and the Marchesa
Castiglione,--see Letter to Moore, December 26, 1816, _Letters_, 1900,
iv. 26) lent itself to "the excellent manner of Mr. Whistlecraft," and
would show "the knowing ones," that is, Murray's advisers, Gifford,
Croker, Frere, etc., that "he could write cheerfully," and "would repel
the charge of monotony and mannerism."

Eckermann, mindful of Goethe's hint that Byron had too much _empeiria_
(an excess of _mondanite_--a _this_-worldliness), found it hard to read
_Beppo_ after _Macbeth_. "I felt," he says, "the predominance of a
nefarious, empirical world, with which the mind which introduced it to
us has in a certain measure associated itself" (_Conversations of
Goethe, etc._, 1874, p. 175). But _Beppo_ must be taken at its own
valuation. It is _A Venetian Story_, and the action takes place behind
the scenes of "a comedy of Goldoni." A less subtle but a more apposite
criticism may be borrowed from "Lord Byron's Combolio" (_sic_),
_Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_, 1822, xi. 162-165.

"The story that's in it
May be told in a minute;
But _par parenthese_ chatting,
On this thing and that thing,
Keeps the shuttlecock flying,
And attention from dying."

_Beppo, a Venetian Story_ (xcv. stanzas) w