mock-heroic
poetry. In rhetoric and histrionic art especially no other nation
equalled or equals the Italians. But in the more perfect kinds of
art they have hardly advanced beyond dexterity of execution, and
no epoch of their literature has produced a true epos or a genuine
drama. The very highest literary works that have been successfully
produced in Italy, divine poems like Dante's Commedia, and historical
treatises such as those of Sallust and Macchiavelli, of Tacitus and
Colletta, are pervaded by a passion more rhetorical than spontaneous.
Even in music, both in ancient and modern times, really creative
talent has been far less conspicuous than the accomplishment which
speedily assumes the character of virtuosoship, and enthrones in
the room of genuine and genial art a hollow and heart-withering
idol. The field of the inward in art--so far as we may in the case
of art distinguish an inward and an outward at all--is not that
which has fallen to the Italian as his special province; the power
of beauty, to have its full effect upon him, must be placed not
ideally before his mind, but sensuously before his eyes. Accordingly
he is thoroughly at home in architecture, painting, and sculpture;
in these he was during the epoch of ancient culture the best disciple
of the Hellenes, and in modern times he has become the master of
all nations.

Dance, Music, and Song in Latium

From the defectiveness of our traditional information it is
not possible to trace the development of artistic ideas among the
several groups of nations in Italy; and in particular we are no
longer in a position to speak of the poetry of Italy; we can only
speak of that of Latium. Latin poetry, like that of every other
nation, began in the lyrical form, or, to speak more correctly,
sprang out of those primitive festal rejoicings, in which dance,
music, and song were still inseparably blended. It is remarkable,
however, that in the most ancient religious usages dancing, and
next to dancing instrumental music, were far more prominent than
song. In the great procession, with which the Roman festival of
victory was opened, the chief place, next to the images of the gods
and the champions, was assigned to the dancers grave and merry.
The grave dancers were arranged in three groups of men, youths,
and boys, all clad in red tunics with copper belts, with swords
and short lances, the men being moreover furnished with helmets,
and generally in ful