place a Heyne or a Wolf, a Herman or a Schweighauser, or even the devoted Ruperti himself, among the restorers of an age of barbarism and dulness.

Should Mr. Hodgson again de

vote his labours to translation, which his great success in the present instance leads us to hope, we should be happy to hear that he was engaged on the works of Horace,

AFTER the translations of the Georgics by Dryden and Warton, and more especially after the recent and very elegant as well as faithful version of Mr. Sotheby, it might have seemed that this place in English literature was so effectually pre-occupied, as to leave little encouragement to the efforts of any new candidate for fame. Yet it has so chanced, that in the course of the last year, two additional competitors have advanced their claims, and proposed to draw the bow of Ulysses. Yet we must do them the justice to say that they come forward with no arrogant pretensions. Each is aware of the question which will properly and naturally be asked, with what view a new translation of a poem, of which we already possess several versions, has been undertaken, and each has given his auswer. Mr. Stawell observes, that "for elegance and accuracy combined, Mr. Sotheby's translation, published in 1800, is not perhaps surpassed in the range of British literature; the art with which he has connected those precepts which in the original are somewhat independent of each other, can never be praised too much. If notes had accompanied his version, mine certainly should never have seen the light." Mr. Deare avows, "that neither the genius and spirit of the immortal Dryden, the peculiar qualifications of Warton, nor the poetical reputation of Mr. Sotheby, are

unknown or unfelt by him, nor does he presume on any thing but the disdainful carelessness with which Dryden executed a task forced upon him by his necessities, and which, for that reason alone, was unworthy of him; the general improvement of the language of English poetry, even since the date of Warton's translation, and the different characters of rhynie and blank verse." We certainly cannot consider either of these translations as equalling at least one of the versions which have preceded them, yet they are respectable exercises of skill, and had not the task been previously accomplished with such eminent success, would have been thankfully accepted by the public. The translation of Mr. Deare we consider as on the whole approaching somewhat nearer to the spirit of the original than its competitor. The means of comparison we shall furnish to our readers, by quoting the well known description of the laborious progress of human arts.

"Nor yet, with even these, the united toils

Of men and oxen, is the well-dress'd

field

That grain might thus the want of mast supply,

And man securely on the earth rely, When arbutes fail amid the hallow'd wood,

And e'en Dodona spares a scanty food. New labours soon are added to the grain; That blight consuming through the stems should reign,

And thistles sluggish prickle o'er the ground;

Down sinks the corn; a wood now bristles round,

Caltrops and burs; and through the shining crop

The gloomy darnel and wild-oats o'ertop. Unless the earth with harrows oft you lay,

And fright the birds with scaring noise

away,

And prune from leaves the interposing shade,

And pray for showers to fertilize the blade,

In vain your labour's spent, in vain you'll

rue

THE author of this translation states various circumstances, some of them certainly of no little force, in extenuation of any imperfections which may be discovered by the eye of criticism in the perusal of his performance. The translation,

in the evenings he has been sur rounded by the monotonous prolusions, certainly not poetic, of almost thirty schoolboys." He likewise states that he is only twenty years of age. He does not, however, deprecate candid criticism, as "one principal motive of the present publication is to ascertain, by an impartial adjudication, whether the translator may be likely to employ himself usefully and successfully, as he advances in age and experience, on the Latin or Greek poets." His translation certainly contains which lead us to augur fapassages vourably of his talents, while others may betray the inexperience of his age, or the disadvantages of his situation. He will however do well to remember that in the line of poetical translation, nothing short of excellence merits in any great degree the regard of the public. Those writers are accessible in their original languages to many; the merely English reader has a sufficient store of entertainment in the poetry of his native tongue. To translate the ancient poets in a manner inadequate to their merits, is a species of injustice to those writers, and an act of little service to the public. The versions of a Pope or Sotheby rank with the choice specimens of English literature; works of inferior, though consider able merit, will be coldly received, and soon forgotten. As a specimen of the present version we extract the beginning of the second book. "Sublime on golden pedestals uprear

ed,

The blazing temple of the sun appear

455

dart,

er's art:

ed;

surge;

tide;

grace.

Here towns and woods with flowing

streams between,

ral scene:

Beasts, nymphs, and Sylvans grace the ruBetween the signs, high in the ætherial pole,

Shone in mid heaven the universal soul. Soon as fair Clymene's inqui. ing boy, (The fatal product of illicit joy,) Reached by the steep ascent the blest abode,

Instant he sought the presence of the

God,

But-checked his ardent haste-at disNor nearer could the youth endure the

stance stood;

sight

Of such revealed intolerable light."

sage

We must observe that a great liberty is taken in the preceding paswith two verses of the original. Hæc super imposita est cœli fulgentis imago, Signaque sex foribus dextris, totidem que sinistris.