While Leopardi, although at heart a patriot, was virtually proclaiming patriotism a phantom, a poet of a very different cast was assailing abuses and preparing a better day by dint of humorous indignation and sturdy hopefulness. The Italy of the time stands between Leopardi and GIUSEPPE GIUSTI (1809-50) like Garrick between tragedy and comedy. Giusti’s gifts were less sublime than Leopardi’s, but not less original. What Leopardi was to the Italian language in its most classical form, Giusti was to the peculiar niceties of the most idiomatic Tuscan. What Leopardi was to the most elevated description of poetry, Giusti was to political satire. Indeed he was more, for Leopardi merely carried recognised form to more consummate perfection, while Giusti’s style was actually created by him. Rich as Italy had been in most kinds of humorous and burlesque poetry, she had achieved little in political satire for very evident reasons. Campanella and Alfieri had verged upon it; and Casti’s _Animali Parlanti_ and Leopardi’s _Paralipomeni_ may, from one point of view, be regarded as political satires, though rather belonging to the mock-heroic epic. But no political satirist had yet reached the heart of the people, partly because few had the courage to make the attempt, partly because metrical satire was as yet restricted to refined and artificial forms. The gallantry with which Giusti, living under the absolute government of Tuscany, itself wholly subservient to Austria, launched shaft after shaft against the oppressors of his country, is paralleled by the boldness of the literary innovation he made in discarding the time-honoured forms of blank verse and _terza rima_, and conveying satire in easy and familiar lyric. Giusti has been compared to Béranger, but certainly falls short of the Frenchman as a master of song, while he has more of the sacred fire of poetical indignation. The Anacreontic side of Béranger’s genius has no counterpart in him. As a master of idiomatic Tuscan he stands alone; but his poems require a glossary, and what helps his fame with his countrymen hinders it with foreigners. His satires are sometimes called forth by the occurrences of the day, but are more frequently directed at some persistent evil or misfortune of the country; and although the expulsion of the foreigner and his vassals is the idea most commonly in the background, not a few of the best pieces treat of the defects of the Italian people itself, the frivolity of some classes of society, the ignorance and superstition of others, and not least the pretentious emptiness of much modern liberalism. The general tone of Giusti’s compositions is easy and humorous; but under the impulse of emotion he is capable of rising into high poetry, as in the description of the corruption of Florentine society in his _Gingillino_, or in the palinode to the Grand Duke of Tuscany, when (October 1847) the poet for a moment believed that Leopold was about to pursue a liberal course.