The subject-matter of this most precious book is thus arranged:-In the first place, there are five large illuminations of the entire size of the page, which are much discoloured. The first four represent the Evangelists, each sitting upon a cushion, not unlike a bolster. The fifth is the figure of our SAVIOUR. The back-ground is purple; the pillow-like seat upon which Christ sits is scarlet, relieved by white and gold. The upper garment of the figure is dark green; the lower purple, bordered in part with gold. The footstool is gold; the book, in the left hand, is red and gold; the arabesque ornaments in the border are blue, red, and gold. The hair of our Saviour is intended to be flaxen. "The text is in double columns, upon a purple ground, within an arabesque border of red, purple, yellow, and bluish green. It is uniformly executed in letters of gold, of which the surface is occasionally rather splendid. It consists of a series of gospel extracts, for the whole year, amounting to about two hundred and forty-two. These extracts terminate with Et ego resuscitabo eum in novissimo die. Amen.' "Next comes a Christian Calendar, from the dominical year DCCLXXV. to DCCXCVII. On casting the eye down these years, and resting it on that of DCCLXXXI., you observe in the columns of the opposite leaf, this very important entry or memorandum, in the undoubted writing of the time: In isto Anno ivit Dominus, REX KAROLUS, ad sem Petrum et baptistatus est filius eius PIPPINUS a Domino Apostolico;' from which, I think, it is evident, (as is observed in the account of this precious volume in the Annales Encyclopediques, vol. iii. p. 378,) that this very book was commanded to be written chiefly to perpetuate a notice of the baptism, by Pope Adrian, of the Emperor's son Pippin.* There is no appearance whatever of fabrication in this memorandum. The whole is coeval, and doubtless of the time when it is professed to have been executed. The last two pages are occupied by Latin verses, written in a lower-case cursive hand; but contemporaneous, and upon a purple ground. From these verses, we learn that the last scribe, or copyist, of the text of this splendid volume, was one Godescale or GODSCHALCUS, a GerThe verses are reprinted in the Decades Philosophiques. man. "This MS. was given to the Abbey of St Servin, at Thoulouse, and it was religiously preserved there, in a case of massive silver, richly embossed, till the year 1793; when the silver was stolen and the book carried off, with several precious relics of antiquity, by order of the President of the Administration (Le Sieur S****), and thrown into a magazine, in which were many other vellum MSS. destined To BE BURNED! One's blood curdles at the narrative. There it lay, expecting its melancholy fate, till a Monsieur de Puymanrin, then detained as a prisoner in the magazine, happened to throw his eye upon the precious volume; and, writing a certain letter about it, to a certain quarter, (which letter is preserved in the fly leaves, but of which I was denied the transcription, from motives of delicacy,) an order was issued by government for the conveyance of the MS. to the metropolis. This restoration was effected in May 1811. I think you must admit, that in every point of view, THIS MS. ranks among the most interesting and curious, as well as the most ancient, of those in the several libraries of Paris." These, then, are among the trea sures of past ages, which the spirit of Bibliomania leads us to preserve and value with an almost idolatrous veneration! Who is there bold enough to deny that they are worth preserving, or captious enough to quarrel with the veneration they inspire? No one, we will venture to affirm, who is susceptible of delight from any thing which does not relate to the selfish enjoyment of the immediate present; and as these, fortunately, constitute a large class among the most enlightened of every country, Mr Dibdin may safely consider the whole of them as the competent admirers of his bibliographical labours. We shall only add, in conclusion, that the supplement to the first volume of this edition, contains an account of a curious old English poem on our fifth Henry's siege of Rouen, recently discovered in the ex haustless treasures of the Bodleian Library, which, we regret, our limits will not permit us to extract. *This conclusion is questioned with acuteness and success by M. Barbier's nephew. It seems rather, that the MS. was finished in 781, to commemorate the victories of Charlemagne over his Lombardia enemies in 774. + This restoration, in the name of the city of Thoulouse, was made in the above year, on the occa sion of the baptism of Bonaparte's son. But it was not placed in the King's private library till 1814. -BARBIER, jun, HENRY THE LION; AN HISTORICAL TRAGEDY. If the natural object of Tragedy be still-notwithstanding the discredit into which the axiom has fallen since its adoption by the erudite Bayes-to" elevate and surprise," there are few subjects in ancient or modern history more calculated to accomplish both than the character and fortunes of Henry the Lion-a prince at the very sound of whose name, as at the opening trumpet-call of some proud tournament, emperors, and princes of the empire, crusaders and chivalry, come sweeping before our mind's eye in all the picturesque array of the middle ages. Who shall command our admiration, or challenge our sympathy, if not this noble ancestor of the house of Brunswick, the scourge of Mahomet, and stay of Christendom, at one time invested by his sovereign with the fairest portion of Germany, and yet so much more loftily endowed with the inherent greatness of valour and ability, as to see that sovereign, the renowned Frederick Barbarossa, a kneeling suppliant at his feet for his aid in arms? At another, despoiled by the treachery of his enemies, and the ban of the empire, of all save his petty hereditary dominions of Brunswick; and yet, when thus "left alone with his glory," greater, if possible, than ever, in magnanimity and self-conquest. Who, also, among the dames of that stirring and chequered period, can more deeply claim, or strongly divide our sympathies, than Clementina, the early bride of the noble Henry, torn from his side by ecclesiastical decrees, yet cherishing, in spite of church and canons, devoted and inextinguishable affection: or our own Matilda, of England, the pious daughter of Henry II., now a mourner for the supposed death of her lord in Palestine, now exulting in his unexpected return, yet even, spite of piety and pride, feeling the hourly jealousy of her unhappy rival's memory, so natural to the human, and especially to the female heart? With these elements, even a sor rier playwright than Klingemann might have erected a showy edifice. But this poet, one of the nearestthough still at immeasurable distance whom Germany has produced, to the spirit and power of Schiller, has had higher and juster views of dramatic character. His personification of Henry is neither a gigantic antique Colossus, robbed by time and distance of human lineaments and individuality of expression, nor a hero of modern romance, blending with reckless improbability the rude virtues and doughty deeds of the 13th century with the refinement and liberality of our own. Henry the Lion, to be admired and appreciated, had only to be fairly drawn ; in some things raised far beyond his age by the omnipotence of talent, in others remaining enchained on a level with all around him. Devout, even to superstition, as he must needs have been, who abandoned his extensive dominions to the mercy of the spoiler to embark in the Crusade, and divorced a beloved bride from ecclesiastical scruples, Henry is all the more dramatically interesting from this contrast of adventitious weaknesses with a character proverbially lofty and unbending, even where interest and prudence would have dictated compliance. Mistaking the appeals of feeling and nature against an unnatural divorce for the unappeased clamours of conscience; capable at times of seeing in the disguised and devoted wife of his youth, hovering around him as a guardian angel, a minister of hell to ensnare him; yet remaining, amid these conflicting elements, still true to the claims of gratitude and justice; failing, through wounded pride, and the elation almost inseparable from a long course of personal greatness, in his duty and fealty to his liege lord the Emperor, yet ready, at the sug gestion of his better feelings, and the consideration of the miseries of others, to humble that pride in the dust, the Henry of the poet only differs from the Henry of history in being more of the man, without for feiting one jot of his claim to the well-earned name of hero. Having said thus much of a play which seems constructed on the happy neutral ground between the much-disputed provinces of the Classicists and Romanticists, we shall leave the thread of the action to develope itself, and our readers to form their own judgment of the author's success. The play opens in a gothic hall at Augsburg, hung round with arms and trophies, where appears, seated on his throne, the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, surrounded by several of his chief nobles. Philip, Archbishop of Cologne, Margrave Bernhard of Ascania, Landgrave Lewis of Thuringia, and the Palatine Otto of Wittelsbach, of whom, be it remembered, all, save the last, are enemies, open or concealed, of the absent Lion, reported, though erroneously, to have fallen in the Holy Land. The Emperor is in the act of receiving grievous news from Italy, viz. the successful revolt of the Milanese, and his own threatened excommunication by Alexander, the most powerful of the two rival Popes. The former misfortune the messenger mainly attributes to the non-attendance of the chief nobles of Germany, who, contenting themselves with sending their contingents, had declined combating personally in Italy. To this the deeply-mortified Emperor thus assents: Fred. Aye, Knight! there lies the evil! one we lack; Fred. Even he-'tis he I mean. For the bare possibility he lived! What would I give Otto (aside.) Aye! now he's miss'd! and he would fain awake him. (To Philip of Cologne.) Ye brought me tidings of his death-full well Nought but the imperial crown is unbestow'd; Till all her princes shrink to nought before him, Itself is grown an empty hollow sound. Philip. He hath invaded too the Church's rights, Like a strange language on mine ear, my liege! Are few, and far between; such lordly spirits Bern. The empire needs No heroes such as this, whose wayward will What in his sight are princes? What's the Emperor ?— Otto. All ties are rent-vassals forswear their oath, Fred. Ye're in the Emperor's presence-Palatine! To Palestine, gave me in trust Bavaria; Till of his death we're sure! Fred. Bold words, Count Otto! Otto. I've lived among bold deeds, my liege; and words Weigh lightly in that scale-'Tis yours to deal In these, my Lord Archbishop! (to Philip.) Fred. (to himself.) As here opinions clash-so in my breast Conflicting feelings rise alternately, For and against this Henry. Ties of blood (Aloud.) Enough! my lords; Our purpose holds for Italy-all ye Who own the Emperor's sway, prepare to follow. [Exit, attended by most of the Princes. Bern. (detaining Philip.) A private word, Lord Bishop. Phil. For secrets Bern. 'Tis no place Pardon me, suspicion lurks Less amid light than darkness. Know ye nothing? Phil. What mean ye, Margrave Bernhard? Duke Henry is in Germany! Phil. All is lost! Duke Henry! Then woe betide us-we must to the ground. Phil. How hath he 'scaped all perils ? I hoped that Death, that mighty leveller, Had been our ally. Nay, though ev'n he lived, Had he not now return'd-now, ere our work Was fully ripe! The chief of Saxony Still owns his might-Oh! had more holds surrender'd, Had rent them from our grasp !-Fair Saxony! Phil. Well may it touch thine heart! Methinks thy father, Bern. Bern. I count not upon Fred'rick, mingled streams The worthy pair, after mutually renewing former engagements to co-operate in the Duke's destruction, resolve to achieve it by means of suborning the already perjured Eckbert of Wolfenbuttel, to accuse his lord of secret practices with Milan and Pope Alexander, to dethrone and supplant the Emperor. We are next introduced to Matilda of England-the pious and dutiful wife, and now supposed widow, of the Lion, in his castle of Dankwerderoda, at Brunswick, attended by a waiting-woman, leading her little stepdaughter Gertrude. Gert. Mother! these sable weeds become you not. Gert. Thou look'st not lovingly. Mat. Aye, but I do!—I see in thee his features— Thou giv'st me back, and these have won my love. |