and, fervid, turbulent, and somewhat mystical
composition, full of the highest sentiment and the highest poetry; ...
but disfigured by many faults of precipitation, and overclouded with
many obscurities. Its great fault with common readers will be that it
is not sufficiently intelligible.... It is, however, beyond all
question, a work of a man of great genius."

Other notices of _Marino Faliero_ and the _Prophecy of Dante_ appeared
in _Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_, April, 1821, vol. 9, pp. 93-103; in
the _Monthly Review_, May, 1821, Enlarged Series, vol. 95, pp. 41-50;
and in the _Eclectic Review_, June 21, New Series, vol. xv. pp.
518-527.

DEDICATION.

Lady! if for the cold and cloudy clime
Where I was born, but where I would not die,
Of the great Poet-Sire of Italy
I dare to build[276] the imitative rhyme,
Harsh Runic[277] copy of the South's sublime,
Thou art the cause; and howsoever I
Fall short of his immortal harmony,
Thy gentle heart will pardon me the crime.
Thou, in the pride of Beauty and of Youth,
Spakest; and for thee to speak and be obeyed
Are one; but only in the sunny South
Such sounds are uttered, and such charms displayed,
So sweet a language from so fair a mouth--[278]
Ah! to what effort would it not persuade?

Ravenna, June 21, 1819.

PREFACE

In the course of a visit to the city of Ravenna in the summer of 1819,
it was suggested to the author that having composed something on the
subject of Tasso's confinement, he should do the same on Dante's
exile,--the tomb of the poet forming one of the principal objects[279]
of interest in that city, both to the native and to the stranger.

"On this hint I spake," and the result has been the following four
cantos, in _terza rima_, now offered to the reader. If they are
understood and approved, it is my purpose to continue the poem in
various other cantos to its natural conclusion in the present age. The
reader is requested to suppose that Dante addresses him in the interval
between the conclusion of the _Divina Commedia_ and his death, and
shortly before the latter event, foretelling the fortunes of Italy in
general in the ensuing centuries. In adopting this plan I have had in my
mind the Cassandra of Lycophron,[280] and the Prophecy of Nereus by
Horac