Note 23 — NO. VI.—NINEVEH.

The character of Sardanapalus has been treated more gently by a modern poet. “The Sardanapalus of Lord Byron is pretty nearly such a person as the Sardanapalus of history may be supposed to have been,—young, thoughtless, spoiled by flattery and unbounded self-indulgence; but, with a temper naturally amiable, and abilities of a superior order, he affects to undervalue the sanguinary renown of his ancestors, as an excuse for inattention to the most necessary duties of his rank; and flatters himself, while he is indulging his own sloth, that he is making his people happy. Yet, even in his fondness for pleasure, there lurks a love of contradiction. Of the whole picture, selfishness is the prevailing feature;—selfishness admirably drawn, indeed; apologised for by every palliating circumstance of education and habit, and clothed in the brightest colours of which it is susceptible, from youth, talents, and placidity. But it is selfishness still; and we should have been tempted to quarrel with the art which made vice and frivolity thus amiable, if Lord Byron had not, at the same time, pointed out with much skill the bitterness and weariness of spirit which inevitably wait on such a character; and if he had not given a fine contrast to the picture, in the accompanying portraits of Salamenes and Myrrha.”—Heber.