For Bonivard's account of his second imprisonment, see _Les Chroniques de Genève_, tom. ii. part ii. pp. 571-577; see, too, _Notice sur François Bonivard_, ...par Le Docteur J. J. Chaponnière, Mémoires et Documents Publiés, par La Société d'Histoire, etc., de Genève, 1845, iv. 137-245; _Chillon Etude Historique_, par L. Vulliemin, Lausanne, 1851; _Revue des Deux Mondes_, Seconde Période, vol. 82, Août, 1869, pp. 682-709; "True Story of the Prisoner of Chillon," _Nineteenth Century_, May, 1900, No. 279, pp. 821-829, by A. van Amstel (Johannes Christiaan Neuman). _The Prisoner of Chillon_ was reviewed (together with the Third Canto of _Childe Harold_) by Sir Walter Scott (_Quarterly Review_, No. xxxi., October, 1816), and by Jeffrey (_Edinburgh Review_, No. liv., December, 1816). With the exception of the _Eclectic_ (March, 1817, N.S., vol. vii. pp. 298-304), the lesser reviews were unfavourable. For instance, the _Critical Review_ (December, 1816, Series V. vol. iv. pp. 567-581) detected the direct but unacknowledged influence of Wordsworth on thought and style; and the _Portfolio_ (No. vi. pp. 121-128), in an elaborate skit, entitled "Literary Frauds," assumed, and affected to prove, that the entire poem was a forgery, and belonged to the same category as _The Right Honourable Lord Byron's Pilgrimage to the Holy Land, etc._ For extracts from these and other reviews, see Kölbing, _Prisoner of Chillon, and Other Poems_, Weimar, 1896, excursus i. pp. 3-55. SONNET ON CHILLON Eternal Spirit of the chainless Mind![1] Brightest in dungeons, Liberty! thou art: For there thy habitation is the heart-- The heart which love of thee alone can bind; And when thy sons to fetters are consigned-- To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom, Their country conquers with their martyrdom, And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. Chillon! thy prison is a holy place, And thy sad floor an altar--for 'twas trod, Until his very steps have left a trace Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod, By Bonnivard!--May none those marks efface! For they appeal from tyranny to God.[2] ADVERTISEMENT When this poem[a] was composed, I was not sufficiently aware of the history of Bonnivard, or I should have endeavoured to dignify the subject by an attempt to celebrate his courage and his virtues. With some account of his life I have been furnished, by the kindness of a citizen of that republic, which is still proud of the memory of a man worthy of the best age of ancient freedom:-- "François De Bonnivard, fils de Louis De Bonnivard, originaire de Seyssel et Seigneur de Lunes, naquit en 1496. Il fit ses études à Turin: en 1510 Jean Aimé de Bonnivard, son oncle, lui résigna le Prieuré de St. Victor, qui aboutissoit aux murs de Genève, et qui formait un bénéfice considérable....