Here again, old Chapman may be said, on the whole, to be excellent. But Homer does not shew us Apollo -that translator does-in the act of enduing himself with his bow and quiver. We see from the first the "heavenly archer," (these are Mr Milman's words,) equipped for revenge. "His silver bow twang'd," is indeed wofully inadequate, and "hard-loosing hand," though rather expressive, and shewing that old Chapman may have been a toxopholite as well as Ascham, nor yet unHomeric, is not in the original, and therefore gives offence to us who belong to the King's Body-Guard. Dryden sadly mistakes and mars the majestic meaning of δ ̓ ἄρ ̓ οἷςοὶ ἐπ ̓ ὤμων χωομένοιο, Εκλαγξαν δ ̓ ἄρ ̓ "His bow twang'd and his arrows rattled as they flew !" "In clouds he flew, concealed from mortal sight," is an absolute and manifest lie; for Homer saw him, and so do we, and so did Tickel himself, unless he were bat-blind, which he was not, but, on the contrary, had a couple of good sharp eyes in his head. On Pope's translation it is not possible to bestow much praise. "Bent was his bow the Grecian hearts to wound," is false and feeble. "Resound" should have been "resounded," we suspect; though such capricious change of tense is, we know, a bad trick, common among the poets of Pope's school. "And gloomy darkness gather'd round his head," is idle tautology. "Twang'd his deadly bow," not literal, where literality was demanded; and "feathered fates" may be restored, without Pope This is an unlucky blunder-and being the poorer, to Dryden. it led him into another, "Then with full force his deadly bow he bent!" As much as to say, we presume, that though before his "bow twang'd" it had not been bent with full force. "Glorious John" did not see that it had not before been bent at all. Why should it, till he had taken his station apart from the ships? "Feather'd fates" are fine thingsbut not in the passage. "The Greeks at rovers killed," is a piece of pedantic impertinence-which archers will understand and for which, could Homer have foreseen it, he would have longed even in Hades to have broken Dryden's head. Tickel's translation is nearly a total failure. Vengeful "warrior," is somewhat impertinent. "The well-aimed shafts to throw," suggests a suspicion that our friend was thinking of a "stone bicker;" yet, strange to say, the next line is more truely Homeric than, perhaps, any other single line in any of the other tranlations, and is almost perfect, "For nine long nights, through all the dusky air, The pyres thick-flaming shot a dismal glare," are very noble lines; but the pyres burned by day as well as nightthough by day they were doubtless not so visible. Homer left us to see them of ourselves during both; but since Pope has grandly directed our eyes to the night-imagery, we owe him gratitude. Cowper, on the whole, is good, forcible; but owing to some rather commonish words, we fear, not sufficiently dignified for Apollo. "Marched in his anger," is raw-recruitish; though raw recruits are often formidable fellows; and " told of his approach," is very prosaic. After it, only think of Milton's " faroff his coming shone !" The attempt at imitative harmony or discord in the singular line about "dread-sounding bounding," we confess we like -but liking is not loving, nor loving admiring, nor admiring astonishment, nor astonishment exultation. Sotheby is excellent-but not all we hoped he might have beenwith all these bell-rocks and beat con lights-to shew him his path on "Fierce sprung the string, and twang'd the waters. "Kindled at the word," the silver bow," is sudden and sharp, but quaint and incorrect. "Then Phoebus stayed," has the same merit and the same demerit. We do not like the repetition of" dart" in " shaft." "Immedicable wound" and "inevitable dart," have a sameness of sound not satisfactory to our ears at the close of lines so near each other-nor is there any thing answering to either epithet in Homer. "Dire was the twanging of the silver bow," is admirable in its almost literal simplicity. "Corse lay on corse, to fire succeeded fire, And death unwearied fed the funeral pyre," are in themselves two strong linesbut are they both equal in power and glory, to αἰεὶ δὲ πυραὶ νεκύων καίοντο θαμειαί ; No. There is one half line in the original of which we have yet said nothing-and which loses its identity in some of these translations, and scarcely preserves it in others. What effect does it produce on your imagination? ὁ δ ̓ ἤμε νυκτὶ ἐοικώς· Old Chapman renders it-rightly so far, for so far literally "Like the Night, he ranged the host." Dryden "Black as a stormy night, he ranged around The tents." Pope "Breathing revenge, a sudden night he spread, And gloomy darkness roll'd around his head," which last line we have already abused. Tickel, idiotically as we said "In clouds he flew, conceal'd from mor. tal sight." Cowper best of all, and perfectly"Like night he came;" and Sotheby As the God descended, dark as night," -which is not so good as Cowper, only because not literally Homer. We ask you again, what effect does it produce in your imagination? Not surely that of night over the whole sky-not utter concealment of the God in a darkness not appertaining to himself, but in which he is merely enshrouded, as are the heavens and earth? No, no, no, that cannot have been intended by Homer. But Homer, we think, in the inspiration of his religious awe, suddenly saw Apollo, the very God of Light, changing in the passion-the agony of rage-into an Apparition the reverse, the opposite, of his own lustrousness, -undergoing a dreadful Transfiguration. It was not as if Day became Night, but that the God of Day was wrath-changed into the Night Godalmost as if Apollo had become Pluto. Milton must have understood the image so, for he has transferred it-not the change-but the image itself, to his most dreadful personage, "Black it stood as Night"-in the daylight, you know, and therefore was that Foul Blotch so terrible. Try then each translation separately, by this the test of truth, and judge for yourself which is good, which bad, and which indifferent. We should like to hear your opinion. Meanwhile, before we proceed to another passage, only hear old Hobbes, who, perhaps you may not know it, translated the Iliad and the Odyssey. "His poetry, as well as Ogilvie's," (which we have never chanced to see,) says Pope truly, "is too mean for criticism." “His prayer was granted by the Deity; Who with his silver bow and arrows keen, Descended from Olympus silently, In likeness of the sable Night unseen." In this stealthiness there seems to us something meanly suspicious. True, that in scripture we read of death coming like a thief in the night-but that was not said for the sake of sublimity, but to shew us how we are, in our imagined deepest home-felt security, unsafe from that murderous wretch Death, or Williams. But Homer being a heathen meant no uncivil scorn of Apollo-whereas Hobbes converts him into a cracks man. "His bow and quiver both behind him hung, The arrows chink as often as he jogs!" We come now to that immortal parent effort, has kept up, throughquarrel "Betwixt Atrides, king of men, and Thetis' godlike son ;" and are thankful to learn that we Is it not amazing to think of it, after we lay down this dramatic scene, how Homer, without any ap out all the furious injustice of these heroes to each other, such strong sympathy with both, that though sometimes shaken, it is never broken; and that,during the course of the quarrel, though assuredly our hearts beat faster and louder towards Achilles, they ever and anon go half over to the side of Agamemnon? He swore but to deprive his antagonist of that blessing of which himself was about to be, as he thought, robbed-the enjoyment of love and beauty. What signifies right, or the observance or violation of right, when disappointment, which in the soul of a king is equal to a subject's despair, has darked conscience and corrupted will, and seeks refuge in revenge? And what signifies blood-thirsty heroism, that has been exulting in victorious fields of death to the soul in which it has burned, when its sweetest meed is ravished out of its embrace, the light of woman's eyes, and the fragrance of woman's bosom, that had captivated the conqueror, and bound him within his night-tent, in divinest thraldom, the slave of a slave? Patriotism, glory, fealty, are all overpowered by pride raging in the sense of degradation, injustice, and wrong, done to it, openly beneath the sun, and before all eyes; and down is flung the goldstudded sceptre on the earth, that the clash may ratify the oath sworn to Jove, that never more shall the hand that swayed it draw the sword, though the hero-slaughtering Hector should drive Greece to her ships, and Troy be triumphant over her flying sons. Is not this a Quarrel indeed of demigods, and who could have sung it but Homer? We cannot quote all the translations of the progress of this Wrath up to the intervention of Minerva, and therefore we shall quote none of them-but go to the passage in which the goddess reveals herself to the goddess-born, and so far calms the roar within his soul, as does a sudden lull for a while that of the sea. Agamemnon has just said—as Dryden makes him say, "Briseis shall be mine." CHAPMAN. "Thetis' son at this stood vext, his heart Bristled his bosom, and two ways drew his discursive part, VOL. XXIX. NO. CLXXIX. X If from his thigh his sharp sword drawn, he should make room about And curb his spirit. While these thoughts strived in his blood and mind, And careful of the good of both. She stood behind, and took To him appearance; not a man of all the rest could see. DRYDEN. "At this the impatient hero sourly smiled; РОРЕ. "Achilles heard, with grief and rage oppress'd, That prompts his hand to draw the deadly sword, Force thro' the Greeks, and pierce their haughty lord: This whispers soft, his vengeance to control, And calm the rising tempest of his soul. Just as in anguish of suspense he stay'd, While half-unsheath'd appear'd the glittering blade, Sent by the sister and the wife of Jove; A sable cloud conceal'd her from the rest. COWPER. "He ended, and Achilles' bosom swell'd With indignation; raeking doubts ensu'd, And sore perplex'd him, whether forcing wide A passage through them, with his blade unsheath'd, To lay Atrides breathless at his foot, Or to command his stormy spirit down. So doubted he, and undecided yet, Stood drawing forth his falchion huge; when, lo! SOTHEBY. "He spake-Achilles flam'd-wrath, deep, disdain, Who watch'd the rival chiefs with equal love, Unseen by all, behind Achilles stood, Seiz'd his gold locks, and curb'd his madd'ning mood. Achilles has now lost all desireall power to speak-and he late so insultingly, and scornfully, and savagely, and fiercely, and ferociously eloquent, is dumb. “Ns Páro• Inλtív d'axos ever'. Homer then in four lines says, that the heart of Achilles deliberated-to kill Atrides, or to subdue his own rage. The words he uses are strong as strong may be, and direct as his alternate purposes of slaughter or silence. Let them be so, therefore, in all translation. Old Chapman deserves to have his grave disturbed for having said "his heart bristled his bosom," which either means nothing, or that the hair thereon bristled, which is mean and miserable falsehood of the chest of the youth who excelled all living in heroic beauty. "Stood vext," is perhaps good-to them who remember Shakspeare's "still vexed Bermuthes." "This discursive part," no doubt, gives the right meaning, but is too formal and philosophical for the occasion. What follows on to the Apparition of Pallas, is forceful and rather grim-which is goodbut there is a dignity in the original -in the verbs, especially-which has forsaken Chapman's eyesight. Minerva, sent by Juno, the protectress of both heroes alike, comes from heaven, and takes Achilles by his yellow hair, who, astounded, turns his head, and by her stern eyes recognises the Goddess. Now when Chapman says that Athenia" shined about his temples," he is mani festly thinking not of her Person, which was there, but of Wisdom, of which she was Goddess-and this open expression of Homer's hidden meaning, is as bad as can be, and brings out marringly the lesson which the great moral bard doubted not all the world would read for itself.Otherwise the translation has the merit of much vigour. Dryden's version is, of course, also vigorous; but it is not literal, but licentious; and he wilfully violates throughout both the style and the spirit of Homer. The "hero sourly smiled," is in itself good, but not in the original; and one hates to see heightenings of the expression of any strong passion beyond the aim of the mind that depicted it. "And, justled by two tides of equal sway, Stood for a while suspended in his way," is coldly conceived and inaccurately expressed, as are the two, indeed the six lines, which follow-a sorry sort of declamation, in which the plainest statement is perverted and falsified, and fire made mere smoke. The rest is sweeping and sonorous; but thirteen lines of Greek into twenty-one of English, is a dliution that must be severely condemned. Pope's translation is very fine. It flows freely, and has few faults, except that it is somewhat too figurative. "Now fired by wrath, and now by reason cool'd," |