| Goldoni,—good, gay, sunniest of souls,— |
| Glassing half Venice in that verse of thine,— |
| What though it just reflect the shade and shine |
| Of common life, nor render, as it rolls, |
| Grandeur and gloom? Sufficient for thy shoals |
| Was Carnival: Parini's depths enshrine |
| Secrets unsuited to that opaline |
| Surface of things which laughs along thy scrolls. |
| There throng the People: how they come and go, |
| Lisp the soft language, flaunt the bright garb,—see,— |
| On piazza, calle, under portico, |
| And over bridge! Dear King of Comedy, |
| Be honoured! Thou that didst love Venice so, |
| Venice, and we who love her, all love thee! |
| Robert Browning. |
"Painter and son of nature," wrote Voltaire, at thattime the arbitrator and the dispenser of fame in culturedEurope, to Carlo Goldoni, then a rising dramatist, "Iwould entitle your comedies, 'Italy liberated from theGoths.'" The sage of Ferney's quick critical facultyhad once again hit its sure mark, for it is Goldoni'ssupreme merit, and one of his chief titles to fameand glory, that he released the Italian theatre from thebondage of the artificial and pantomime performancesthat until then had passed for plays, and that, togetherwith Molière, he laid the foundations of the drama asit is understood in our days. Indeed, Voltaire, in hisadmiration for the Venetian playwright, also called him"the Italian Molière," a comp