E600406A. Napoleon III in Italy, and Other Poems.
The Liberator, 6 April 1860, p. 54.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 27, 378–379.
The following are the contents of this volume of 72 pages:—Napoleon III. in Italy; The Dance; A Tale of Villafranca; A Court Lady; An August Voice; Christmas Gifts; Italy and the World; A Curse for the Nation. These effusions are crowded with those pictorial delineations, mystical yet pregnant expressions, lofty aspirations, strong imaginings, and deep throbbings of humanity, which characterize Mrs. Browning as the most remarkable poet of the age. ‘What I have written,’ she says in her preface, ‘has simply been written because I love truth and justice quand meme, more than Plato and Plato’s country, more than Dante and Dante’s country, more even than Shakspeare and Shakspeare’s country.’ Is it not a strange moral paradox, that such a ‘lover of truth and justice’ should regard the perfidious usurper of the liberties of France—whose hands are dripping with the best blood of the empire—as the true friend of Italian freedom and independence, bent on nothing but the highest and noblest objects for Europe and mankind? Thus does she extol him:—
‘Nay, but he, this wonder,
He cannot falter nor prate, (!)
Though many around him and under,
With intellects trained to the curve,
Distrust him in spirit and nerve
Because his meaning is straight. (!)
Measure him ere he depart
With those who have governed and led;
Larger so much by the heart,
Larger so much by the head.
Emperor
Evermore.’
Again, referring to the same French usurper:—
‘Courage, courage! happy is he,
Of whom (himself among the dead
And silent) this word shall be said:
That he might have had the world with him,
But chose to side with suffering men, (!)
And had the world against him when
He came to deliver Italy.
Emperor
Evermore.’
This is personal infatuation, as unaccountable as it is intense. How can the man who has subverted all free institutions in his own country, and caused to be torn down from the public gaze all the emblems and watchwords of freedom, be really interested in the freedom of Italy, or of any other nation? What if the wolf has put on the sheep’s clothing for the hour—is he any the less ravenous a beast? Does it prove that he has lost his appetite for mutton?
But why brand him as guilty of perfidy and usurpation? Has he not been twice chosen Emperor by the suffrages of the people?
‘Emperor, Emperor!
From the centre to the shore,
From the Seine back to the Rhine,
Stood eight millions up and swore
By their manhood’s right divine
So to elect and legislate,
This man should renew the line
Broken in a strain of fate
And leagued kings at Waterloo,
When the people’s hands let go.
Emperor
Evermore.’
Yet these eight millions were manifestly acting only as electoral puppets, under the pressure of violent constraint, and not as free and independent voters; else how happens it that the freedom of the press is struck down among them—that liberty of speech can be indulged only at the peril of imprisonment, ostracism or death—that no public meetings for free discussion can be held in any part of the empire—and that the power of the ‘Emperor evermore’ is absolute over all the thoughts and movements of the people? This is her reply—referring to the day of election:—
‘That day I did not hate,
Nor doubt, nor quail, nor curse.
I, reverencing the people, did not bate
My reverence of their deed and oracle,
Nor vainly prate
Of better and of worse
Against the great conclusion of their will.’
Alas! it was a foregone conclusion, and not a free choice on their part! It was the liberty granted at the last Presidential election, in the slaveholding States of this country; whoever voted for John C. Fremont did so at the peril of his life! Such an election is a mockery.
Under what enchantment is this gifted woman laboring? Hear her once more:—
‘But now, Napoleon, now
That, leaving far behind the purple throng
Of vulgar monarchs, thou
Tread’st higher in thy deed
Than stair of throne can lead
To help in the hour of wrong
The broken hearts of nations to be strong,—
Now, lifted as thou art
To the level of pure song,
We stand to meet thee on these Alpine snows!
And while the palpitating peaks break out
Ecstatic from somnambular repose
With answers to the presence and the shout,
We, poets of the people, who take part
With elemental justice, natural right,
Join in our echoes also, nor refrain.
We meet thee, O Napoleon, at this height
At last, and find thee great enough to praise.’
This would be admirable, if it were true; but it is the strangest mental hallucination! It forcibly suggests the scene between Bottom with his ass’s head, and Titania, the Queen of the Fairies, waking from her sleep, in consequence of his braying:—
Titania. What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again:
Mine ear is much enamor’d of thy note,
So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape,
And thy fair virtue’s force doth move me,
On the first view, to say, to sear, I love thee.
Bottom. Methinks, mistress, you should have little reason for that; and yet, to say the truth, reason and love keep little company together now-a-days: The more the pity, that some honest neighbors will not make them friends.
Titania. Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.
Bottom. Not so, neither; but if I had wit enough to get out of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own turn.
The last piece in this volume, written originally for the Liberty Bell, entitled ‘A Curse for a Nation,’ with reference to American Slavery, is worth the price of it many times. We quote three verses:—
Because ye have broken your own chain
With the strain
Of brave men climbing a Nation’s height,
Yet thence bear down with brand and thong
On souls of others,—for this wrong
This is the curse! Write!
Because yourselves are standing straight
In the state
Of Freedom’s foremost acolyte,
Yet keep calm footing all the time
On writhing bond-slaves,—for this crime
This is the curse! Write!
Go, wherever ill deeds shall be done—
Go, plant your flag in the sun
Beside the ill-doers!
And recoil from the clenching curse
Of God’s witnessing Universe
With a curse of yours!
This is the curse! Write!
Reviewed:
Napoleon III in Italy, and Other Poems (EBB), New York: C.S. Francis & Co., 1860.
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