lained into unbashful meaning. Schoolmasters, transpositions serve at once to give an idea of the who knew all that was in him except his graces, translator's learning, and of difficulties surmounted. give the names of places and towns at full length, and he moves along stiffly in their literal versions,

PENELOPE TO ULYSSES.

as the man who, as we are told in the Philosophi-"This, still your wife, my ling'ring lord! I send: cal Transactions, was afflicted with a universal Yet be your answer personal, not penn'd." anchilosis. His female imitators, on the other

hand, regard the dear creature only as a lover; ex- These lines seem happily imitated from Taylor, press the delicacy of his passion by the ardour of the water-poet, who has it thus;

their own; and if now and then he is found to grow «To thee, dear Ursula, these lines I send,

a little too warm, and perhaps to express himself a little indelicately, it must be imputed to the more poignant sensations of his fair admirers. In a word, we have seen him stripped of all his beauties in the versions of Stirling and Clark, and talk like a debauchee in that of Mrs. ; but the sex should ever be sacred from criticism; perhaps the ladies have a right to describe raptures which none but themselves can bestow.

Not with my hand, but with my heart, they're penn'd."

But not to make a pause in the reader's pleasure, we proceed.

"Sunk now is Troy, the curse of Grecian dames!
(Her king, her all, a worthless prize!) in flames.
O had by storms (his fleet to Sparta bound)
Th' adult'rer perished in the mad profound!

A poet, like Ovid, whose greatest beauty lies rather in expression than sentiment, must be necessarily difficult to translate. A fine sentiment Here seems some obscurity in the translation; may be conveyed several different ways, without we are at a loss to know what is meant by the mad impairing its vigour; but a sentence delicately ex- profound. It can certainly mean neither Bedlam pressed will scarcely admit the least variation with-nor Fleet-Ditch; for though the epithet mad might out losing beauty. The performance before us will serve to convince the public, that Ovid is more easily admired than imitated. The translator, in his notes, shows an ardent zeal for the reputation of his poet. It is possible too he may have felt his beauties; however, he does not seem possessed of the happy art of giving his feelings expression. If a kindred spirit, as we have often been told, must animate the translator, we fear the claims of Mr. Barret will never receive a sanction in the heraldry of Parnassus.

agree with one, or profound with the other, yet
when united they seem incompatible with either.
The profound has frequently been used to signify
mad: who knows but Penelope wishes that Paris
bad verses; and poets are sometimes said to be
might have died in the very act of rhyming; and
as he was a shepherd, it is not improbable to sup
pose but that he was a poet also.

"Cold in a widow'd bed I ne'er had lay,
Nor chid with weary eyes the ling'ring day."

Lay for lain, by the figure ginglimus. The

"Nor the protracted nuptials to avoid,
By night unravell'd what the day employed.
When have not fancied dangers broke my rest?
Love, tim'rous passion! rends the anxious breast.
In thought I saw you each fierce Trojan's aim;
Pale at the mention of hold Hector's name!"

His intentions, even envy must own, are laudable: nothing less than to instruct boys, school-translator makes frequent use of this figure. masters, grown gentlemen, the public, in the principles of laste (to use his own expression), both by precept and by example. His manner it seems is, "to read a course of poetical lectures to his pupils one night in the week; which, beginning with this author, running through select pieces of our own, as well as the Latin and Greek writers, and ending with Longinus, contributes no little toOvid makes Penelope shudder at the name of wards forming their taste." No little, reader obHector. Our translator, with great propriety, serve that, from a person so perfectly master of the transfers the fright from Penelope to Ulysses himforce of his own language: what may not be ex-self: it is he who grows pale at the name of Hecpected from his comments on the beauties of an-tor; and well indeed he might; for Hector is repreother? sented by Ovid, somewhere else, as a terrible felBut, in order to show in what manner he has low, and Ulysses as little better than a poltroon. executed these intentions, it is proper he should

first march in review as a poet. We shall select "Whose spear when brave Antilochus imbrued, the first epistle that offers, which is that from Pene- By the dire news awoke, my fear renew'd lope to Ulysses, observing beforehand, that the Clad in dissembled arms Patroclus died: whole translation is a most convincing instance, And "Oh the fate of stratagem!" I cried. that English words may be placed in Latin order, Tlepolemus, beneath the Lycian dart, without being wholly unintelligible. Such forced His breath resign'd, and roused afresh. my smart,

Thus, when each Grecian press'd the bloody fiel, The Pylian sage inform'd your son embark'd in Cold icy horrors my fond bosom chill'd."

quest of thee

Of this, and he his mother, that is me.

Here we may observe how epithets tend to
strengthen the force of expression. First, her hor-"He told how Rhesus and how Dolon fell,
rors are cold, and so far Ovid seems to think also; By your wise conduct and Tydides' steel;
but the translator adds, from himself, the epithet
icy, to show that they are still colder-a fine climax
of frigidity!

"But Heaven, indulgent to my chaste desire,
Has wrapp'd (my husband safe) proud Troy in

fire."

That doom'd by heavy sleep oppress'd to die, And this prevented, a nocturnal spy! Rash man! undmindful what your friends you owe, Night's gloom to tempt, and brave a Thracian foe By one assisted in the doubtful strife; To me how kind! how provident of life! Still throbb'd my breast, till, victor, from the plain, You join'd, on Thracian steeds, th' allies again. The reader may have already observed one or two instances of our translator's skill, in parentheti- «But what to me avails high Ilium's fall, cally clapping one sentence within another. This Or soil continued o'er its ruin'd wall; contributes not a little to obscurity; and obscurity, If still, as when it stood, my wants remain; we all know, is nearly allied to admiration. Thus, If still I wish you in these arms in vain? when the reader begins a sentence which he finds

pregnant with another, which still teems with a "Troy, sack'd to others, yet to me remains, third, and so on, he feels the same surprise which Though Greeks, with captive oxen, till her plains, a countryman does at Bartholomew-fair. Hocus Ripe harvests bend where once her turrets stood; shows a bag, in appearance empty; slap, and out Rank in her soil, manured with Phrygian blood; come a dozen new-laid eggs; slap again, and the Harsh on the ploughs, men's bones, half buried, number is doubled; but what is his amazement, sound, when it swells with the hen that laid them! And grass each ruin'd mansion hides around. Yet, hid in distant climes, my conq'ror stays; Unknown the cause of these severe delays!

"The Grecian chiefs return, each altar shines,
And spoils of Asia grace our native shrines.
Gifts, for their lords restored, the matrons bring;
The Trojan fates o'ercome, triumphant sing;
Old men and trembling maids admire the songs,
And wives hang, list'ning, on their husbands'
tongues."

"No foreign merchant to our isle resorts,
But question'd much of you, he leaves our ports;
Hence each departing sail a letter bears
To speak (if you are found) my anxious cares.
"Our son to Pylos cut the briny wave;

Critics have expatiated, in raptures, on the deli-But Nestor's self a dubious answer gave; To Sparta next-nor even could Sparta tell cate use the ancients have made of the verb penWhat seas you plough, or in what region dwell! dere. Virgil's goats are described as hanging on the mountain side; the eyes of a lady hang on the "Better had stood Apollo's sacred wall: looks of her lover. Ovid has increased the force of O could I now my former wish recall! the metaphor, and describes the wife as hanging on War my sole dread, the scene I then should know; the lips of her husband. Our translator has gone And thousands then would share the common woe: still farther, and described the lady as pendent from But all things now, not knowing what to fear, his tongue. A finc picture!

I

dread; and give too large a field to care.

"Now, drawn in wine, fierce battles meet their Whole lists of dangers, both by land and sea,

Are muster'd, to have caused so long delay.
"But while your conduct thus I fondly clear,
Perhaps (true man!) you court some foreign fair
Perhaps you rally your domestic loves,

Whose art the snowy fleece alone improves.
No!-may I err, and start at false alarms;
May nought but force detain you from my arms
"Urged by a father's right again to wed,
Firm I refuse, still faithful to your bed!
Still let him urge the fruitless vain design;
I am-I must be-and I will be thine.
Though melted by my chaste desires, of late
His rig'rous importunities abate.

ludicrous for serious reproof. While we censure

"Of teasing suitors a luxurious train, From neighbouring isles, have cross'd the liquid as critics, we feel as men, and could sincerely wish

plain.

Here uncontroll'd the audacious crews resort,
Rifle in your wealth, and revel in your court.
Pisander, Polybus, and Medon lead,
Antinous and Eurymachus succeed,
With others, whose rapacious throats devour
The wealth you purchased once, distained with
gore.

Melanthius add, and Irus, hated name!

A beggar rival to complete our shame.

"Three, helpless three! are here; a wife not strong,
A sire too aged, and a son too young,

He late, by fraud, embark'd for Pylos' shore,
Nigh from my arms for ever had been tore."

that those, whose greatest sin, is perhaps, the venial one of writing bad verses, would regard their failure in this respect as we do, not as faults, but foibles; they may be good and useful members of society, without being poets. The regions of taste can be travelled only by a few, and even those often find indifferent accommodation by the way. Let such as have not got a passport from nature be content with happiness, and leave the poet the unrivalled possession of his misery, his garret, and

his fame.

We have of late seen the republic of letters crowded with some, who have no other pretensions to applause but industry, who have no other merit but that of reading many books, and making long These two lines are replete with beauty: nigh, quotations; these we have heard extolled by symwhich implies approximation, and from, which pathetic dunces, and have seen them carry off the implies distance, are, to use our translator's expres- rewards of genius; while others, who should have sions, drawn as it were up in line of battle. Tore been born in better days, felt all the wants of povis put for torn, that is, torn by fraud, from her erty, and the agonies of contempt. Who then arms; not that her son played truant, and embarked by fraud, as a reader who does not understand Latin might be apt to fancy.

that has a regard for the public, for the literary honours of our country, for the figure we shall one day make among posterity, that would not choose to see such humbled as are possessed only of talents “Heaven grant the youth survive each parent's that might have made good cobblers, had fortune

date,

And no cross chance reverse the course of fate.

Your nurse and herdsman join this wish of mine,
And the just keeper of your bristly swine."

turned them to trade? Should such prevail, the proportion to the power they possess. Let it be real interests of learning must be in a reciprocal then the character of our periodical endeavours, and Our translator observes in a note, that "the sim- hitherto we flatter ourselves it has ever been, not to plicity expressed in these lines is so far from being permit an ostentation of learning to pass for merit, a blemish, that it is, in fact, a very great beauty; nor to give a pedant quarter upon the score of his and the modern critic, who is offended with the industry alone, even though he took refuge behind mention of a sty, however he may pride himself Arabic, or powdered his hair with hieroglyphics. upon his false delicacy, is either too short-sighted Authors thus censured may accuse our judgment, to penetrate into real nature, or has a stomach too or our reading, if they please, but our own hearts nice to digest the noblest relics of antiquity. He means, no doubt, to digest a hog-sty; but, antiquity apart, we doubt if even Powel the fire-eater himself could bring his appetite to relish so unsavoury a repast.

"By age your sire disarm'd, and wasting woes,
The helm resigns, amidst surrounding foes.
This may your son resume (when years allow),
But oh! a father's aid is wanted now.
Nor have I strength his title to maintain,
Haste, then, our only refuge, o'er the main."
"A son, and long may Heaven the blessing grant,
You have, whose years a sire's instruction want.
Think how Laertes drags an age of woes,
In hope that you his dying eyes may close;
And I, left youthful in my early bloom,
Shall aged seem; how soon soe'er you come."

But let not the reader imagine we can find pleasure in thus exposing absurdities, which are too

will acquit us of envy or ill-nature, since we reprove only with a desire to reform.

But we had almost forgot, that our translator is to be considered as a critic as well as a poet; and in this department he seems also equally unsuccessful with the former. Criticism at present is different from what it was upon the revival of taste in Europe; all its rules are now well known; the only art at present is, to exhibit them in such lights as contribute to keep the attention alive, and excite a favourable audience. It must borrow graces from eloquence, and please while it aims at instruction: but instead of this, we have a combination of trite observations, delivered in a style in which those who are disposed to make war upon words, will find endless opportunities of triumph.

He is sometimes hypercritical; thus, page 9. "Pope in his excellent Essay on Criticism (as will, in its place, when you come to be lectured upon it, at full be explained,) terms this making the sound an echo to the sense. But I apprehend that definition

takes in but a part, for the best ancient poets excelled in thus painting to the eye as well as to the ear. Virgil, describing his housewife preparing her wine, exhibits the act of the fire to the eye.

Sometimes contradictory: thus, page 3. "Styls (says he) is used by some writers, as synonymous with diction, yet in my opinion, it has rather a complex sense, including both sentiment and diction." Oppose to this, page 135. "As to con'Aut dulcis musti Vulcano decoquit humorem, cord and even style, they are acquirable by most Et foliis undam trepidi dispumat aheni.' youth in due time, and by many with ease; but "For the line (if I may be allowed the expres- the art of thinking properly, and choosing the best sion) boils over; and in order to reduce it to its sentiments on every subject, is what comes later." proper bounds, you must, with her, skim off the And sometimes he is guilty of false criticism: as redundant syllable." These are beauties, which, when he says, Ovid's chief excellence lies in dedoubtless, the reader is displeased he can not scription. Description was the rock on which he discern. always split; Nescivit quod bene cessit relinquere, Sometimes confused: "There is a deal of artful as Seneca says of him: when once he embarks in and concealed satire in what Enone throws out description, he most commonly tires us before he against Helen and to speak truth, there was fair has done with it. But to tire no longer the reader, scope for it, and it might naturally be expected. or the translator with extended censure; as a critic Her chief design was to render his new mistress this gentleman seems to have drawn his knowledge suspected of meretricious arts, and make him ap- from the remarks of others, and not his own reflecprehensive that she would hereafter be as ready to tion; as a translator, he understands the language leave him for some new gallant, as she had be-- of Ovid, but not his beauties; and though he may fore, perfidiously to her lawful husband, followed be an excellent schoolmaster, he has, however no him." pretensions to taste.

LETTERS

FROM A

CITIZEN OF THE WORLD

TO HIS

FRIENDS IN THE EAST.

THE EDITOR'S PREFACE.

Their formality our author carefully preserves. Many of their favourite tenets in morals are illusTHE schoolmen had formerly a very exact way trated. The Chinese are always concise, so is he of computing the abilities of their saints or authors. Simple, so is he. The Chinese are grave and senEscobar, for instance, was said to have learning as tentious, so is he. But in one particular the resem. five, genius as four, and gravity as seven. Cara-blance is peculiarly striking: the Chinese are often muel was greater than he. His learning was as dull, and so is he. Nor has any assistance been eight, his genius as six, and his gravity as thir- wanting. We are told in an old romance, of a certain teen. Were I to estimate the merits of our Chi-knight errant and his horse who contracted an intinese Philosopher by the same scale, I would not mate friendship. The horse most usually bore the hesitate to state his genius still higher; but as to knight; but, in cases of extraordinary dispatch, his learning and gravity, these, I think, might the knight returned the favour, and carried his safely be marked as nine hundred and ninety-nine, within one degree of absolute frigidity.

horse. Thus, in the intimacy between my author and me, he has usually given me a lift of his eastern sublimity, and I have sometimes given him a return of my colloquial ease.

Yet it appears strange, in this season of panegyric, when scarcely an author passes unpraised, either by his friends or himself, that such merit as our Philosopher's should be forgotten. While the epithets of ingenious, copious, elaborate, and refined, are lavished among the mob, like medals ac a coronation, the lucky prizes fall on every side, but not one on him. I could, on this occasion, make myself melancholy, by considering the capriciousness of public taste, or the mutability of fortune: but, during this fit of morality, lest my reader should sleep, I'll take a nap myself, and when I awake tell him my dream.

Yet, upon his first appearance here, many were angry not to find him as ignorant as a Tripoline ambassador, or an envoy from Mujac. They were surprised to find a man born so far from London, that school of prudence and wisdom, endued even with a moderate capacity. They expressed the same surprise at his knowledge that the Chinese do at ours. *How comes it, said they, that the Europeans so remote from China, think with so much justice and precision? They have never read our books, they scarcely know even our letters, and yet they talk and reason just as we do. The truth is, the Chinese and we are pretty much alike. Different degrees of refinement, and not of distance, mark the distinctions among mankind. Savages of the most opposite climates have all but 1 imagined the Thames was frozen over, and I one character of improvidence and rapacity; and stood by its side. Several booths were erected tutored nations, however separate, make use of upon the ice, and I was told by one of the specta the very same method to procure refined enjoy-tors, that FASHION FAIR was going to begin. He

added, that every author who would carry his works there, might probably find a very good reception. I was resolved, however, to observe the humours of the place in safety from the shore; sensible that the ice was at best precarious, and having been always a little cowardly in my sleet.