But it is the poem of ignoble peace, of such peace as Italy enjoyed in servitude, when a nation of _cicisbei_ had naught to occupy their energies but sensual pleasure.

Ingenious as Marino truly was in conducting his romance upon so vast a scheme through all its windings to one issue, we feel that the slender tale of a boy's passion for the queen of courtesans and his metamorphosis into the scarlet windflower of the forest supplied no worthy motive for this intricate machinery.

The metaphor of an alum basket crystallized upon a petty frame of wire occurs to us when we contemplate its glittering ornaments, and reflect upon the poverty of the sustaining theme.

It might in fact stand for a symbol of the intellectual vacancy of the age which welcomed it with rapture, and of the society which formed a century of taste upon its pattern.
In another and higher literary quality the _Adone_ represents that moment of Italian development.

A foreigner may hardly pass magisterial judgment on its diction.