fides, that the Poitevins, afraid of met near the village of Bouvines, on being treated as rebels, abandoned the field, and that a great part of the French army, being feized with the like panic, behaved as ill; but, however this matter paffed, it seems to be certain, that king John retired to his caftle at Partenai, refolved to wait there for the event of the campaign in Flanders, where the best of his own troops were, and indeed the combined forces of the whole confederacy, under the command of the emperor in perfon: and as there never was a campaign of more importance to France than this, we hall be obliged to treat it more particularly, though at the fame time as fuccinctly as it is poffible. King Philip believing it more honourable, and not at all more dangerous, to meet than to expect his enemies, advanced as far as Tournay, with an army of fifty thousand men, the flower of his forces, and commanded by the principal nobility of France, fuch as Eudes duke of Burgundy, Robert count of Dreux, Philip his brother, Peter Courtenai count of Nevers, all, in the modern tile, princes of the blood, Stephen count of Sancerre, John count of Ponthieu, Gaucher count of St. Paul, twenty-two other lords carrying banners, twelve hundred knights, and between fix and feven thousand gens d'arms. The emperor Otho, on the other fide, had with him the earl of Salisbury, baftard 1214 brother to king John, Ferdinand count of Flanders, Rainald count of Bologne, Otho duke of Limburgh, William duke of Brabant, Henry duke of Lorrain, Philip count of Namur, feven or eight German princes, thirty bannerets, and an army fuperior in number to that of Philip. The two armies the 27th of July. The emperor laboured to outstretch the French line, giving the command of the right wing to the earl of Flanders, the left to the count of Bologne, and remained himself in the center, encircled by his great lords. The army of France was difpofed in order of battle by brother Guerin of the order of the knights hofpitallers, and bishop ele&t of Serlis; and to the excellent difpofition he made, cotemporary writers afcribe the fortune of the day. The king was in the center, the duke of Burgundy commanded the right, and the count de St. Paul the left. The right was broke in the beginning of the action, but rallied and recovered their ground; the left fuftained the attack of the allies, without giving way; but the heat of the battle was in the center, where the empe ror was once taken, but refcued; Philip wounded in the throat, dragged from his horfe, and in the fame inftant of time expofed to the most imminent danger of being cut to pieces, taken, or trampled to death, if the brave men who were about him had not delivered him. This engagement lafted from noon till about five o'clock, when the allies were totally routed, chiefly through the misfortune of having the fun all the time in their eyes, whereas the French had it on their backs. The counts of Flanders and Bologne, three other great counts, four German princes, and twenty-five bannerets, were taken prifoners. Philip returned to Paris, which he entered in triumph, the two counts of Flanders and Bologne following in chains. He afterwards advanced towards Poitou, with an intent to crush John and his adherents to pieces; pieces; but upon the interpofition about him, that, when he heard of the pope's legate, the fubmiffion of John by Randal earl of Chefter, and a prefent of fixty thousand pounds sterling, he was prevailed upon to admit of a truce for five years; for which he is exceedingly blamed by the modern French writers, who are amazed that he should lofe fo fair an opportunity of completing the re-union of all that John held in France. The character of this prince confidered, who was one of the best statesmen, and one of the most ambitious princes the French ever had, is fufficient to perfuade us, that he had his reafons for acting as he did; and a fufficient attention to certain facts that lie fcattered in the old writers, will enable us to diftinguish what these motives were. He was fenfible before the battle of Bouvines, that it was his own power rather than any regard for the king of England, that had raised fo pow. erful a confederacy; he knew they had intelligence throughout his dominions, and even in his very camp; nay, he was fo fufpicious of fome divine fervice before the action be→ ANECDOTE of the Dutchefs of MARLBOROUGH. SOON after the battle of Oudenarde, the dutchefs of Mailborough made a tour to Flanders, under pretence of complimenting the duke on that victory, but in fact to inform him of the cabals of his enemies, which it was not fafe to enfruft on paper. Her grace landed at Dunkirk, where the lay all night; and in the morning, her thoughts being intent, perhaps, upon more important concerns, though the had given a great deal of trouble in the inn, yet the went away and forgot the ufual prefent to the chamber maid. The girl, who interpreted this neglect to her grace's want of generofity, thought of an expedient to make herfeif amends; and with this view the purchased a number of phials, and then filling them, carefully corked them up, and fealed them; this done, the caufed it to be rumoured abroad, that he had a quantity of the dutchefs of Marlborough's Eye-water, which her grace, at her departure, had put into her hands to fell. It was, in reality, the dutchefs of Marlborough's water that filled the bottles, and and the humour fucceeded to the girl's wish; the Eye-water was bought for the novelty by rich and poor, and the cures it performed were fo wonderful, that the fame of its virtues reached the dutchefs at the English camp. Her grace recollected her omiffion, and was not a little nettled at the wench's firatagem, but could not then help it. In her return home, however, the lay again at the fame inn; and as the wench was putting her to bed at night, Child, faid fhe, I hear you have a famous Eye-water to fell; I have a mind to be a purchaser. The girl, quite confounded, and ready to fink, faintly faid, it was all difpofed of. What quantity might you have of it, faid the dutchefs? Only a few dozens, replied the girl. Well, faid the dutchefs, prepare your bottles, and you now may have a larger quantity of the genuine fort. The girl was miferably perplexed, and could not tell what to fay; but fell into tears, and dropping upon her knees, confeffed her indifcretion, and humbly implored her grace's forgiveness, promifing never to offend again in the like manner. Nay, but indeed, child, faid her grace, you must make up fome for me, for I have heard an excellent character of its fovereign virtues. Being affured her grace was in earnest, the girl replied, the fhould be obeyed. Her grace's intention was, to prevent her Eyewater being any more hawked about in Dunkirk; and therefore, in the morning, fie ordered her young doctrefs, in her own prefence, to bottle every drop of it, to cork it up fafely, and feal it, as she had done the former; by which the discovered that the girl had actually procured her grace's arms to her new noftrum, a circumftance he had not before dreamt of. Well, my dear, faid the dutchefs, I find you are a mistress of your trade; you make no fcruple to counterfeit a feal. Madam, faid the girl, you dropt the feal in the room, and that put me in the head of it. And what might you gain, faid her grace, by your laft fupply? Fifty livres, replied the girl. Very well, faid the dutchess, pleafe to restore the feal, and there is double that fum for you; putting five louis d'ors in her hand; adding, with a stern look, and a fevere tone of voice, Beware of counterfeits, huffey. REFLECTIONS on the IMITATION of the ANCIENTS. GENTLEMEN, To the Authors of the BRITISH MAGAZINE. THE HE contrariety of opinions, inftability of tafte, and difference of judgment, is in no inftance more confpicuous than in the applaufe which imitation met with from the antients, and the cenfure which unavoidably attends fuch bold freedoms from the moderns.-To ac count for fuch a manifeft difference in fentiment, certainly requires a greater depth of thought than I can pretend. The arguments on both fides are too powerful either for me to enforce or confute. It is, however, palpable to any one of the fmalleft obfervation, that the Roman writers writers did borrow very freely from their conquered rivals, the Greeks; and, indeed, from their profeffed imitations, ghey feem to us to have taken it fo granted, that fuch liberties were not only excufable, but even a demonftration of their judgment. Virgil not only raifed the ftru&ture of his Eneid upon the model of the Iliad, but he even took fome of his brighteft thoughts, and fublimeft images, from that poem: and fill, we find none of his cotemporaries exclaiming againft his freedoms, owing, perhaps, either to their being confcious of the like affistance, or to the taste of the Auguftan age. According to the opinion of the moderns, it is an incontrovertible truth, that Virgil was no original poet, and yet, perhaps for thofe very reafons by which he incurs this charge, the ancients pronounced him an original. And this paradox will I hope difappear, if, by the word original, we figaify, as the ancients feem to have done, a trength of judgment joined to a fublimity of thought. This definition once admitted, it must follow, that Virgil was what the ancients thought him; but if, according to the moderns, an original writer is one, who, unaffifted by another, and without being indebted to any one for either thought or hint, produces a truly great and noble work, the former definition mult certainly vanish. By the former, Virgil is an original, and that too in the highest fenfe, fince the requifites of originality are nobly confpicuous in him; and by the latter he is in danger of incurring even (pardon the expreffion) the charge of plagiarifm. To decide the question, however, let us afk, Whether Virgil could have wrote a poem every way equal to the Iliad, Oober 1764. fuppofing he had been deprived of his immortal model? To determine this, let us examine whether fome of the original bright parts in Virgil are equal to others he borrowed from Homer. The reader for his fatisfaction in this point, out of many inftances, may turn to the third book of the Æneid, 571ft line, where he may compare the defcription of an eruption of Mount Etna, with a most beautiful fimile clofely copied from Homer, in which the fall of Troy is reprefented by a wild afh felled in the woods; Book the fecond, 626th line. If the preference is given to the original thought, then doubtlefs it will be allowed, that Virgil could have been an original poet, though perhaps he chofe to difplay his learning and tafte, in complaifance to an age which looked upon Homer as fomething preternatural, in illufrating his beauties, it being allowed that where he imitates he improves. Nor does this verdict detract from the praifes of a poet, 66 Cujus veftigia femper adoro." It only keeps the middle way between the extremes of madame Dacier and Scaliger: extremes, I prefume, notorious to every one: nor is Virgil fingular in fuch bold freedoms; it is fufficiently known that his friend Horace was as much obliged to the ancients, and the only obftacle to the detection of his imitation is, that the treasures, from whence he carried off such glorious fpoils, are loft. The reader may eafily perceive that I mean the Odes of Pindar; most of which, it is generally allowed, have fallen a prey to the devaftations of time. From among the few that have reached our times, the learned have, at feveral times, pointed out manifeft imitations, and in particular 3 Z the the beginning of that ode of Pindar, Tiva Ocov TI' Hpwa, &c. is tranflated, though certainly improved upon by the Roman Lyrick. The works of Pindar too, like thofe of Homer, were doubtlefs in the hands of every learned man in the court of Auguftus: yet we read of no exceptions made to fuch free imitations; and it would be an abfurdity to fuppofe, that they could efcape the obfervation of fuch judges as Mæcenas, Verus, and Auguftus himfelf, are allowed to have been. I fhall pass over in filence Tibullus, Propertius, and the reft of the poets that adorned that glorious period, only making this obfervation, that they, not confining themselves to one ancient, boldly borrowed from every one whom they found to their purpofe, Callimachus, Anacreon, &c. Perhaps the learned of the Romans were ambitious of having the spirit of Greek poetry transfufed into their language, and therefore they not only indulged their poets in this liberty, but even encouraged them in it. From fuch indulgence the Roman language derived all its boafted advantages; for, if thofe that compofed in it had been then debarred from this liberty, I leave any one to judge how narrow, how circumfcribed, it would ever after have remain. ed. Perhaps the Roman poets in this, as they did in many other things, pleaded the example of the Greeks before them, it being a certainty that they made no fcruple in borrowing from one another. The ocritus, for example, copied his 19th Idyllium, Tor KASTTAY HOT Τον Κλέπτων ποτ' Epara, from an ode of Anacreon, entirely to the fame purpofe. And if Hefiod is allowed to have been an older poet than Homer, then it is pretty clear that the latter borrowed fome of his moft glorious images from his predeceffor. In particular Homer fays, that when Vulcan was thrown from heaven, he was one whole day before he reached the ifland of Lemnos. Now Hefiod, in his Theogenia, 720th line, tells us, that a fmith's hammer would be nine days in falling from heaven to earth. Εννέα γαρ Νυκτα, &c. It cannot be denied, but that Homer's thought infinitely furpaffes that of Heliod in fublimity and nobleness of expreffion, and that at first fight there appears fcarce the leaft fimilitude; but ftill, when we confider circumftances apart, the refemblance must strike us. Hefiod fays, that were a fmith's hammer to be thrown from heaven, it would be nine days before it reached the earth. Homer fays, that Vulcan was one whole day in falling from heaven to earth. One is told us as a fuppofition, the other as a reality but let us fuppofe that Hefiod told us, that the hammer was thrown from heaven, &c. Doubtlefs then the refemblance would be pronounced vifible; all the difference would be, that the one was a hammer that fell, and the other a god, a difficulty that would foon vanifh, and in its place the fimilitude would ftand confeft. Two or three more examples, and then I have done. Heliod fays, that hell was fuch a horrid place, that even the gods hated it ; Στυγεουσι cop. And Homer relates the fame circumftance in the fame words. The firft poet, in his defcription of the battle between the gods and giants tells us, that Pluto, with all his ghofts, was terrified at the uproar in heaven. The fame circumftance in Homer has been too much the obiect of admiration for it to have efcaped obfervation. From thefe |