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190 Art. VII.—The Iliad of Homer, in English Hexameter Verse. By J. Henry Dart, M.A. of Exeter College, Oxford. London: Longmans. 1865. If the following pages were to be a sermon instead of an essay, our text would be written in a few words of Lord Derby's preface to his translation of the Iliad: 'That pestilent heresy of so-called English hexameters.' On this we are about to dwell, it is true, but only in the way of 'improving' the occasion, as the old Puritans used to improve any tremendous error, whether of faith or of practice. In that way we shall endeavour to improve the Earl's dictum.1 But, as we shall have occasion over and over again to refer to the Iliad, let us begin by adding our suffrage in a matter which has largely, of late, employed the popular voice. If we take the principal translations in comparison one with another (leaving such trash as Ogilvie's and MacPheraon's out of the question), it would seem to us that they ought to be ranked thus: Dart's, like his favourite Antilochuf, winning the prize by daring; then (however deficient in scholarship) Chapman's; then—far too little known—Wright's; then (and not much behind) Lord Derby's; then—longo sed proximus intervallo— Cowper's; then, and with a far deeper fall still,2 Pope's. 'Your Homer? your Homer? ah, now I remember, Mr. Pope, 'what you mean. It is a very pretty thing, Mr. Pope, but 'you must not call it Homer.' So said the prince of all classical scholars, Bentley, when interrogated by Pope about' his Homer.' And afterwards, when some friend of the great Master of Trinity inquired how it came to pass that the latter should have found a place in the Dunciad, replied (no doubt in his loftiest manner),' Sir, because I would not praise his translation; and the portentous cub never forgives.' 1 The passage is as follows: 'The ordinary couplet in rhyme, the Spenserian stanza, the Trochaic or ballad metre, all hare hail their partisans, even to that "pestilent heresy " of the so-called English Hexameter, a metre wholly repugnant to the genius of our language; which can only be pressed into the service by a violation of every rule of prosody; and of which, notwithstanding my respect for the eminent men who have attempted to naturalise it, I could never read ten lines without being irresistibly reminded of Canning's Dactylics call'st thou them? God help thee, silly one!' II is singular to find Lord Derby speaking of Chapman's version as in 'trochaic or balliid metre.' It is, of course, purely Iambic 8 We have not yet had the pleasure of examining Mr. Worsley's translation. If it be of the same merit as his version of the Odyssey (to which however his metro is perhaps better suited), it must be first-rate. It is our purpose, in the following paper, to do two things: the one, often done before, to defend the principle of English hexameters; the other, which has not been done before, to lay down some rule, as regards them, about English quantity. If the latter may seem a rather presumptuous undertaking, the writer can only say that there are not many days during several years in which he has not, more or less, thought about the subject. 1. It is a most true rule of the schoolmen, ' He that may do more, may do less.' Now, having already the hexameter—only in an elongated form—in our language, we may certainly take any part of it by itself. A dog is not the less a dog if you cut off his tail. So-called long metre is none the less English if, by extracting two syllables from the second and fourth lines, you cut it down into common metre. Common metre is not less popular if, by withdrawing two syllables from the first line, you make it into short metre. Or, to take another example. Many of our common ballads are written in (what would technically be called) iambic tetrameter catalectic: as for example: 'A captain bold of Halifax, who lived in country quarters.' Now, by taking off one syllable at the beginning, and adding one to the end, you turn this, of course, into trochaic tetrameter catalectic: 'Weeping, weeping, late and early, slowly pacing up and down, Sadly mourned the Lord of Burleigh, Burleigh House by Stamford town.' Precisely in the same way Aristophanic anapaests are very popular even to an untrained ear; what is there of 'heresy,' what is there of un-Englishness, in asserting that the same metre, docked of a foot and a half at the beginning, should equally approve itself—which we take to be the great test of the innate vitality of any metre—to uneducated persons? If every body feels the exquisite music as well as sense of the stanza: 'Lightly they'll speak of the spirit that's gone, And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him: But little he'll reck, so they let him sleep on 'In the grave where a Briton has laid him.'

If it be not heresy to admire that rhythm, why should it be so to admire—leaving the sense out of the question, which is not now the point—the rhythm of those two hexameters?— 'Speak of the spirit that's gone, and o'er his cold ashes upbraid him; Reck, so they let him sleep on, in the grave where a Briton has laid him.' We think that one consideration amply proves our point. Lord Derby himself helps us to another instance. Compare the metre:— 'Dactylics call'st thou them? God help thee, silly one!' with that of Scott's ballad:— 'Hail to the ohief that in triumph advances! Honoured and blest be the evergreen Pine! Long may the tree in its banner that glances

Flourish, the shelter and grace of our line! Heav'n send it happy dew, earth lend it sap anew,

Gaily to blossom and gladly to grow! Loud should Clan-Alpine then ring from her deepmost glen,

Koderick Vich-Alpine-dhu, ho, ieroe!' Let it be observed that the only difference between Canning's verse, and the first and third of these lines, is, that while it is Dactylic tetrameter acatalectic, they are catalectic: the second, fourth, sixth, and eighth being brachy catalectic: while the fifth and seventh are Exactly The Very Same as Canning's. Lord Derby is here, like the eagle, shot by his own feather: for he would scarcely say that Scott was one of the 'silly ones' that needed help. II. We are sure that Lord Derby would not assert that English, as a language, had less power in it than German. We are even more certain that he would not believe that a language like ours, which owes so much to the Latin, had less capacity for hexameters than one which, like theirs, owes so little to it. And yet, we not only know how the Germans take to hexameters, but how also their only great epic poem—however it may be the fashion of the present century to depreciate it—was written in that measure. We know how their greatest translator, Voss, in that measure made Homer vernacular in Germany; we know • how Goethe deliberately committed himself to the 'heresy' in his pastoral poem—would he had written all things as well I— 'Hermann and Dorothea.' To Voss we shall have occasion to return again; but who, with any pretensions to an ear, and with the slightest knowledge of German, can be insensible to the exquisite melody of lines like these:— 'Endlich erhub aus seiner Entziickungen Meere sich Adam, Aus den Stromen des Lichts, in denen er sank. Die Gedanken Waren ihm zu tausenden schon durch die Seele geflogen, Schnell, wie die Schwtinge des Blitzes, indem er dem Auge vorauseit; Upd er schwebt zu dem Todeshiigel herab von den Wolken, Stent bey dem Kreuz, und strecket den Arm nach Jesus, des Todes Sieger, aus: Ich schwore bey dir, der ewig lebet! Dass nun Tod nicht langer der Tod ist, und dass an dem Tage Deiner grossen Vollendung sic all' erwachen, die schlafen's.

Jesus Christus Erhohung begann mit seinem Erwachen Von dem Tod an dem Kreuze ; sioh stieg auf Stufen zum Throne, Dort hinauf zu des Vaters Rechte, wo Preis und Ehre Dem ea belohnen sollte, der frey sich erniedriget hatte, Ach von dort herab zu dem Staube der Schadelstate. Selber Eloa erhiib' umsonst mit der Harfe der Eeyer Sich in dem Psalme, der Psalm enstromte vergebena dea Geiates Innerstem, diesen Preis, die Gottesehren zu singen.' Of all languages, one should have thought French the worst for classical measures. Yet what can be better than Falloy's 'Longs and Shorts:'— 'Rien ne me plaist sinon de te chanter, et servir et orner, Rien ne te plaist mon bien, rien ne te plaist que ma mort. Plus je requiers, et plus je me tiens seur d'estre refusd,

Et ce refus pourtant point ne me semble refus. A trompeurs attraicts, desir ardent, prompte volonte,

Espoir, non espoir, ains miserable pipeur. Discours mensongers, trahistreux ceil, aspre cruante1,

Qui me ruine le corps, qui me ruine le cceur. Pourquoy tant de faveurs font les Cieux. mis a l'abandon,

Ou pourquoy dans moy si violente fureur 1' III. It has alwavs been held as one of the great advantages or our own blank verse that, while Milton has taught us how "igh it can soar, every day shows us how it is spoken in common conversation. Like Moliere's hero, who was astonished to learn that he had been talking prose all his life without knowing it, so at every dinner party much blank verse is pronounced without the slightest intention of talking poetry. Dr. Johnson—or rather his inimitable biographer—relates how Mrs. Siddons, at some dinner to which she had been invited, said, in her gravest tones, to one of the waiters;— 'You brought me water, boy: I called for beer; All this advantage belongs as much to hexameters as to blank verse. The writer took notice at the last dinner to which he wa3 invited (with his eye on the subject, he owns) of innumerable hexameters then and there spoken, of which a few remain in his memory:— 'Would you rather have mutton, or would you rather have chicken V 1 Oh, you have time enough; the train does not start till five twenty.' And now, a very good one:— 'Well; one could scarcely believe the evils that crinoline causes.' Let any one watch for himself, and he will soon find that hexameters come as naturally out of English mouths as does blank verse. This, in itself, may not be a very high consideration.; yet we shall see by and bye how Mr. Dart has availed himself of it in his Iliad. NO. CXXXL—N.S. 0 IV. But, to rise to a higher argument. Only observe (the Christian Remembrancer has hinted at this before) how the most glorious parts of the poetry of Holy Scripture throw themselves, in our translation (which, if not perfect according to our far higher scholarship as a version, all would take for the perfection of English), into hexameters. What, for example, can be more magnificent than such lines as these ?— • Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the First Kesurrection:' Or again, Tor the Lord God Giveth them light, and they shall reign for ever and ever:'

And again, 'How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground which didst weaken the nations!' And so verses like these:— 'Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?' '— Amalek was the first of the nations; But his latter end shall be that he perish for ever.' 'Israel doth not know: my people doth not consider.' 'Ye will revolt more and more ; the whole head is sick and the heart faint.' 'In the midst of the street, and on either side of the river Was there the Tree of Life; which bare twelve manner of fruits, and Yielded her fruit every month; and the "leaves of the Tree were for healing.' Sometimes the slightest alteration is necessary :— • Binding their kings in chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron.' And so, in like manner, many of the more familiar sentences of Holy Scripture run into the same form:— 'Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them.' V. Southey, in his letters regarding his 'Vision of Judgment,' gives, as one reason for the success of the hexameter, which he then for almost the first time, since the early part of the seventeenth century introduced, that ladies, without any classical education, caught the metre at once. It is, we think, a very strong argument. We have tried it for ourselves. A lady, not a classical scholar, read to us aloud, from Mr. Dart's Homer, four long passages: the storming of the Grecian wall; the fight by the ships; the death of Hector ; and the funeral games of Patroclus. After the first five or six lines, she quite caught the swing of the verse; and it bore her safely through the difficulties of false quantities in proper names. Twice in the passages we have mentioned, the English verse left the quantity of a name doubtful; and in both those cases she went wrong. VI. But we will advance a step farther, and boldly say that— to our most firm belief—hexameters are far more in agreement with the genius of the English, than with that of the Latin, language. In the first place Archbishop Trench has very well pointed out (Introduction to Sacred Latin Poetry, p. 10J :— 'One has but to turn to the lyrical poems of Horace, to become 'at once aware of the wealth of words, which for the writer of the 'hexameter and pentameter may be said hardly to exist. What a 'world, for example, of noble epithets—tumultuosus, luctuosus, 'formidolosus, fraudulentus, contumax, pervicax, insolens, inta'minatus, fastidiosus, periculosus—with many more among the * most poetical words in the language, are under the ban of a per'petual exclusion.' To which his Grace might have added that the same ban of perpetual exclusion existed against the genitives, datives, accusatives, and ablatives of every noun and adjective of the third declension, the nominative of which forms a dactyl. It is true that, by having recourse to a most awkward elision, a long vowel before a short, such words may be hitched in. But, in_ point of fact, as we know, such licences were never taken in serious poetry. Now this great drawback in Latin scarcely exists in the Greek. In nouns, similar to those of which we have just been speaking, the genitive and dative can, of course, be shortened, instead of being elided, before a following vowel. This, we verily believe, is one chief thing which gives to Homer's verse such infinite spring and freshness, as compared with the greater exactness and polish of Virgil. And yet there is no inconsiderable number of Greek words which cannot, by possibility, be fitted into a hexameter. Whereas in English the exceptions are so few as to prove the rule of the admissibility of all words. Therefore it comes to this: that the adoption of the hexameter lost the Latin poets fully half, all cases counted in, of their substantives and adjectives. Certainly it cannot be without regret—if we look at the matter in one point of view—that the Latin language gave up its own glorious heritage of ballad metre, and above all of rhyme, for the sake of adopting a system which is admirably suited to, and contenting, the Greek. It is very ♦rue that herein we may see God's good Providence. When the Church had received the new wine which must be put into new bottles, then she could fall back on the original genius of capabilities, which Latin, above all other languages, has for rhymed veree. Once more, to quote the Archbishop of Dublin: 'It is, indeed, a perilous moment for a youthful literature,—■ 'so youthful as not yet to have acquired confidence in itself, 'and, though full of latent possibilities of greatness, haying • 0 2
 * Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.'

utmost the system of accent,, and demonstrate the infinite 'hitherto actually accomplished little,—to be brought within the 'sphere of an elder, which is now ending a glorious course, and 'which offers to the younger for its imitation, finished forms of ••highest beauty and perfection. Most perilous of all is it, if 'these forms are not so strange, but that with some little skill 'For the younger to adhere to its own forms and fashions, 'rude and rugged, and as yet only most imperfectly worked out —to believe that in them, and in cleaving to them, its true 'future is laid up, and not in appropriating the more elaborate 'models which are now offered ready to its hands—for it thus to 'refuse to be dazzled by the prospect of. immediate results, and 'of overleaping a stage or two of slow and painful progress,— 'this is indeed most hard: the temptation has proved oftentimes It was, therefore, perhaps not unfortunate for the English language that the first attempts at hexameters made by the Elizabethan writers were such dismal failures. Had they been successful, that success might have cost us our own blank verse, elsewhere than in dramatic poems. At the same time, in real truth, those attempts were scarcely worse than a good many specimens of Eunius. Compare, for instance, such performances as those of Sir Philip Sydney, with such lines of the Latin poet as these: 'Sparsis hastis longia campus splendet et horret;' or the ever memorable 'saxo cere—oomminuit—brum.' Which last verse the English reader must understand to be of this sort:— 'Brethren, let all things still be edifi—done to your—cation.' Sir Philip Sydney is really not so bad: no, nor even Stanihurst, of whom take this precious specimen:— 'Neere joynctlyo brayeth with rufflerye rumboled iEtna: Soomtyme owt it bolcketh from bulck clouds grimly bedimmed Like fyerd pitche skorching, or flash flame sulphurous heating: Flownce to the stars towring the fire like a pellet is hurled, Eagd rocks up raking, and guts of mounten yrented From root up he jogleth; stoans hudge slag molten he rowseth, With route snort grumbling in bottom flash furie kindling. Men say that Bnceladus, with bolt haulf blasted, here harbrought, Dinged with this squising and massive burthen of iEtna, Which pres on him nailed, from broached chimneys stil heateth, As oft as the giant his brold syds croompeled altreth, So oft Sicil al shivereth, therewith flaks smoakye be sparckled.'
 * they may be transplanted to the fresher soil, with a fair promise
 * of growing and flourishing there.
 * too strong to be resisted.'

It is manifest, if only from these last verses, (what, however, any tolerable ear can tell for itself,) that there is no such thing in our language as quantity, distinct from accent. And therefore let us endeavour to lay down some rules which may have a tendency to prevent liberty from running into licence. And this is the scheme which we should propose for the English hexameter:— The first thing is, that we must admit a new foot. To the dactyl and the spondee we must of necessity add the trochee. For, by the very laws of our accentuation, we cannot have one word which in and by itself is a spondee. Thus writes Southey on this very question, though not giving the real deep reason for the necessity: 'In forming this 'English measure in imitation, rather than upon the model, of 'the ancient hexameter, the trochee has been substituted for the 'spondee, as by the Germans. This substitution is rendered 'necessary by the nature of our pronunciation, which is so rapid 'that I believe the whole vocabulary of the language does not 'afford a single instance of a genuine native spondee; and only 'one of foreign derivation, which is the word Egypt. The 'spondee, of course, is not excluded from the verse; and where 'it occurs, the effect, in general, is good.' This remark about Egypt is almost curiously absurd. Egypt is merely a rather awkward trochee. Try to lay the ictus on the second syllable, and you find the result. 'O Egypt! what a treasure thou hast; what chariots and horses.' But, though the English language can furnish no specimen, the patois of certain counties can, and does; but then we at once hear it to be patois. Foremost, perhaps, in this respect stands Sussex. In such a name as Holtye, as pronounced by a Sussex man, we have a genuine spondee; for, whereas any other pronouncer of the word would fit it to a hexameter thus, 'Holtye! oh what a treasure thou hast,' etc. Your Sussex peasant would far sooner say, 'Oh. Holtye! what a treasure thou hast,' etc. Therefore the spondee must consist of two monosyllables: a necessity which would so shackle the verse as to make any lengthened poem in it well-nigh an impossibility. We must all remember Coleridge's clever exemplification of the various feet of Greek and Latin poetry: "Trochee trips from long to short; From long to long, in solemn sort,  Slow spondee stalks: strong foot; but ill able  Ever to keep up with dactyl trisyllable.

First and last being loug, middle short, amphiuiacer Strikes hi? hoofs on the ground like a proua high-bred racer. Iambus moves from short to long;

With a leap and a bound the swift anapsests throng,' etc. But it is not simply because necessity has no laws, and that therefore some other dissyllabic foot besides spondees must be admissible in our hexameters; but there is a distinct reason why that foot should be the trochee, and the trochee only. For, be it remembered that a trochee is not so different from a spondee, as it is from an iambus. Yet the genius of our language not only permits, but encourages the use of trochees in iambic verse. No one's ear is offended by that foot occupying the first place in a hymn or song: 'Happy the man whose youngest years.' 'Blest be the everlasting God.' '/#/mite day excludes the night.' And, furthermore, that a certain mixture of trochees in blank verse, often in the first foot, not seldom in the fourth, occasionally in the third, and exceptionally in the second, is a great beauty, and gives much of its richness to the rhythm of 'Paradise Lost.' Nay, that in one and the same line, Milton will sometimes give us two trochees: ■' These are Thy glorious works, Parent of good. 'Servant of God, well done ; well hast thou fought.' If, then, by a licence utterly unknown to the ancients, we employ trochees in a metro diametrically opposed to themselves, why are they to be forbidden to us in a system of verses by no means so opposite in character? In point of fact, hexameters, with their many dactyls, and the weak syllable in which they end, have a kind of trochaic, just as anapaests have a sort of iambic, swing about them. But when we come to the only other two dissyllabic feet that we can employ,—iambi, or pyrrhics, the case is widely different. Here the plea of necessity cannot be urged. Allowing us dactyls, trochees, and such occasional spondees as we can obtain by two adjacent monosyllables, we are amply provided. So that here we altogether part company from Southey, where he thus continues the passage we have already quoted: 'This alteration was necessary, but it is not the only one * which, upon mature consideration and fair trial, it has been 'deemed expedient to make. If every line were to begin with 'a long syllable, the measure would presently appear exotic and 'forced. Therefore the licence has been taken of using any foot 'of two or three syllables at the beginning of a line.' Notwithstanding this last sentence, the poet has scarcely, if at all, allowed an iambus in that place. By the same analogy to which we were just now referring, a trochee may pleasantly occupy the first foot of an iambic verse; so, it might be argued, an iambus might take the same place in trochaics. But make the attempt. Instead of the line, 'Love Divine, all love excelling.' Read it, 'Divine Love, all love excelling.' Instead of, 'Blessed City, Heavenly Salem.' Read it, 'Complete City,' etc. and the whole rhythm is gone at once. And the reason is probably this—the universal tendency of the English language to throw the accent as far as possible back. Any good English reader, not acquainted with Greek, is all but certain thus to pronounce these names: Andronicus: Eubulus. In like manner, the ear so far expects an accent on the first syllable of a verse, as not to be offended if that syllable be long where, strictly speaking, it ought to be short; whereas the exact opposite jars against all our pronunciation under any circumstances, and, in the particular case of hexameters, also against their general swing. But Southey has constantly employed a pyrrhic in the same position. He, we must always remember, was trying an experiment; but his successors have not indeed abused it as he did, though they have by no means—not Dart, not Clough, not Longfellow, not even Kingsley—dropped the use of the pyrrhic entirely in that position. They might, indeed, say with the players, ' We have indifferently reformed it;' and we should be disposed to reply, with Hamlet,' Oh, reform it altogether.' Let us take a few examples from the ' Vision of Judgment,' and see how the practice makes the verse drag. 'For it tells of mortality always: but heavier this day. With a sound like the rushing of winds, or the roaring of waters* By the Sisterhood standing around the Beatified Virgin.'

And by way of a most monstrous insertion of two iambi, take this: 'Hear, Heaven! ye Angels, hear! souls of the- good and the wicked :' which is really no verse at all. Next we have to speak of the difference which there almost necessarily must be in the system of caesuras between English and Latin. This is a consequence, partly of the far greater number of monosyllables in the former; partly from the comparative scarcity of words that are either iambi themselves, or have an iambic tendency. But first we may observe, that there can scarcely be more difference between English and Latin in this respect than there is between Latin and Greek. It has scarcely been sufficiently noticed how very rare Homer's favourite caesura, a feminine one in the third foot, is in Virgil. In the first 200 lines of the .iEneid this caesura occurs only eight times; in the first 200 of the Odyssey, ninety-two. In one passage we have it in seven consecutive lines.1 With the later Latin poets this caesura is a far greater favourite. In the first 200 lines of the Thebaid, it is employed forty times. Ansonius is the only remarkable exception. In his Mosella it does not occur oftener than it does in Virgil. Then ngain, whereas in Latin the conclusion of the second foot without caesura is quite sickening, unless a monosyllable follows it—and it is extremely unpleasant even then—in Greek the former case does not sound so very harsh; and the latter is by no" means, if it be only occasional, disagreeable. The termination of the third foot without a caesura simply, of course, destroys all rhythm whatever. Now, in English it would seem that the second foot may fairly end without a caesura, if only followed by a monosyllable. These verses do not sound amiss: 'Lead on the Argive | hosts this day to the heat of the battle.' 'Vengeance for Helen's | loss, for her tears and unheeded entreaties.' 'So may we ponder | well, and advise on some system of action.' And the effect is even more satisfactory, if the second foot be a dactyl: 'Heavy and sulphurous | clouds rolled on and completed the circle.' Even Kingsley, the most artistic of all poets in his formation of hexameters, allows himself in the licence r 'They on the sea-girt f rock, which is washed by the surges for ever.' Nay, where the [second foot is a dactyl, he dispenses with a caesura, even where the succeeding word is not a monosyllable; but not, we think, with a very happy effect: 'Great are the pitiless sea-gods ; but greater the lord of Olympus.' It would seem that occasionally the third foot needs not a ctesura, if followed by a monosyllable; that is, if that monosyllable be in connexion with the former part of the verse. 'Hack'd into pieces the circular | shields, and the quivering bucklers.' 1 eZpe h'apa [>ivr](rrijpas I dytfvopas. ot pXv ZireLra  Trzaro | lit Kpe'a iroAAi Sartuvro.

But, though Southey is often guilty of it, and Dart sometimes, an English line without any caesura or quasi-csesura in the third foot, is simply intolerable: 'Bearing the palm of martyrdom | Cranmer was there in his meekness. Not in him had that awful | ministry deadened or weakened.' 'Pure it was and diaphanous: | in semicircle inclining.' Or, take these from Dart: 'Such the advice of Polydamas; | Hector approved when he heard it. Acamas brave, and Archilochus, | trained up from youth for the combat. There, too, the gallant Leonteus; | rival of homicide Aras.' Something must be said about spondaic verses. It can scarcely be denied that English is far less capable of such than either Greek or Latin. And the reason is obvious. The perfection of a spondaic line in the classical languages is when the last word is a tetrasyllable. But in our own, when this is the case, it follows that the fifth foot must be a trochee. We have many examples of this in Mr. Dart; but none such as to tempt imitation. Take for example such a line as this :— 'But I am jaded with troubles from Zeus, from the jEgiswielder.' This is unrythmical enough: but far worse are lines which have a trochee in the fifth place, without the excuse of a tetrasyllable. Yet Southey delights in these. For instance, in the following line:— 'Lift up your heads, ye gates; and ye everlasting portals.' he might have avoided the uncouth ending by using the word everdurable. Mr. Dart also has some very ugly verses of the same description—take this for instance :— 'Answered the monarch thus, the Gerenian horseman, Nestor,' (which is the more inexcusable, because he generally gives it, 'the Gerenian chivalrous Nestor.) The only satisfactory way which such a termination can be arranged, is to make the fifth foot consist of two strong monosyllables. Kingsley has some noble examples :— 'Why wilt thou follow me down? can we love in the black 11 nk darkness 1' 'Eager to flit, grey ghosts in the depths of the grey salt water.' 'Sobbing she ended her moan, as her neck like a storm-bent lily.' It is, therefore, wonderful that one with so exquisite an ear as Mr. Clough must have possessed, should have taken the freak of making fully half his hexameters spondaic. Witness the following passage:— 'So in the cottage with Adam the pupils five together Duly remained, and read, and looked no more for Philip, Philip at Balloch shooting aud dancing with Lady Maria. Breakfast at eight, and now, for brief September daylight, Luncheon at two, and dinner at seven, or even later. Five full hours between for the loch and the glen and the mountain.— So in the joy of their life and glory of shooting-jackets, So they read and roamed, the pupils five with Adam. What if autumnal shower came frequent and chill from the westward, What if on browner sward, with yellow leaves besprinkled, Gemming the crispy blade, the delicate gossamer gemming, Frequent and thick lay at morning the chilly beads of hoar-frost. Duly in matutine still, and daily, whatever the weather, Bathed in the rain and the frost and the mist, with the glory of headers, Hope. Thither also at times, of cold and of possible gutters Careless, unmindful, unconscious, would Hobbes, or e'er they departed, Come, in heavy pea-coat his trouserless trunk enfolding: Come, under coat over-brief those lusty legs displaying, All from the shirt to the slipper the natural man revealing.' But even if hexameters were not desirable for original poems, there is another and stronger reason why they should be necessary in translations of classical authors. The Archhishop of Dublin—many and many as are the true things he has said— never said anything truer than the law which he laid down in the introduction to his little book of specimens from Calderon: that the essence of the translation of poetry is the retention of the metre of the original. The passage is too long to quote, but it is well worth study. Let us now, to show how completely true this is, as regards Homer, compare two translations in hexameters, the one in Mr. Dart's version, another in that remarkably clever book of one who, it is to be hoped, is destined to do greater things; then that from Voss, with Lord Derby's. ■" God of the silver bow—thou that art the protector of Chryse, Guardest Cilia divine ; over Tenedos mightily rulest;  Smintheus: list to my prayer! If e'er on the walls of thy temple,  Flowery wreaths of mine have bloom'd—if e'er, by my offering,  Bulls, and the blood of goats, have nourish'd the flame of thine altars;  Tear for tear that I shed, let a Danaan die by thine arrows!" Earnestly pray'd his priest; and the prayer rose to Phoebus Apollo! Down from the peaks of Olympus, in all of the pride of his anger, Down the avenger came :—and the silver bow on his shoulder, Clang'd as he rush'd along ; and the shafts rattled loud in his quiver, E'en as alive with the wrath of the god: as like night he descended. •, Planted afar from the fleet, on the fleet flew his terrible arrows. Dire was the clang of the silvery string as it sounded and bounded! First upon mules, and dogs swift-limb'd, and then upon mortals, Hurtled the shafts; and fast through the air rose flames from the death-piles.

Came into council the chiefs, convened by the voice of Achilleus. Here urged him on—for the white-armed queen of Olympus Mourn'd for the Danaan hosts, and lamented the deaths of her people. Then, when the chiefs were met, all rang'd in the crowded assemblage,
 * Nine long days through the camp raged the shafts of the god: on the tenth day,

Rising above their ranks, thus spake the swift-footed Achilleus: "Sure, it were better, Atrides, that we, the remains of the people, Wandering back as we came, should fly, if we can, from destruction: War and pest combined, are thinning the ranks of Achaia. Let us at least consult some prophet or skilful diviner, E'eu an expounder of dreams—(for Zeus sends dreams to the dreamer) He may reveal what cause thus enrages Phoebus Apollo. Whether a broken vow, or gift withheld from his altar, Angers the god—and whether the blood of lambs and of sucklings, Spotless, slain at his shrine, may appease and stay the destroyer."' Now Mr. Calverley's version, certainly the better:— 1" Lord of the silver bow, whose arm girds Chryse and Cilia,— Cilia, loved of the gods,—and in might sways Tenedos, hearken.  Oh! if in days gone by, I have built from floor unto cornice,  Smintheus, a fair shrine for thee: or burned in the flames of the altar  Fat flesh of bulls and of goats; then do this thing that I ask thee:  Hurl on the Greeks thy shafts, that thy servant's tears be avenged!"

So did he pray, and his prayer reached the ear of Phoebus Apollo. Dark was the soul of the god as he moved from the heights of Olympus, Shouldering a how, and a quiver on this side fast and on that side. Onward in anger he moved. And the arrows, stirred by the motion, Rattled and rang on his shoulder: he came, as cometh the midnight. Hard by the ships he stayed him, and loosed one shaft from the bowstring; Harshly the stretched string twanged of the bow all royally-radiant; First fell his wrath on the mules, and the swift-footed hound of the herdsman; Afterward smote he the host. With a rankling arrow he smote them, Aye ; and the morn and the even were red with the glare of the corpse-fires. Nine days over the host sped the shafts of the god: and the tenth day Dawned ; and Achilles said, "Be a council called of the people." (Such thought came to his mind from the goddess, Hera thejwhite-armed, Hera, who loved those Greeks, and who saw them dying arouud her.) So when all were collected and ranged in a solemn assembly, Straightway rose up amidst them and spake swift-footed Achilles, "Atreus' son! It were better, I think this day, that we wandered Back, re-seeking our homes (if a warfare may be avoided); Now when, the sword and the plague, these two things, fight with      Achaians.

Come, let us seek out now some priest, some seer amongst us, Yea, or a dreamer of dreams—for a dream too cometh of God's hand— Whence we may learn what hath angered in this wise Phcebus Apollo. Whether mayhap he reprove us of prayer, or of oxen unoffered; Whether, accepting the incense of lambs and of blemishless he-goats, Yet it be his high will to remove this misery from us.'

Next, Voss: 'Hare mich, Gott, der du Chrysa mit silbernem Bogen umwandelst, Sammt der heiligen Killa, und Tenedos machtig beherrschest, Smintheus! hab' ich dir einst den gefalligen Tempel gedecket, Aber hab' ich dir je von erlesenen Farren und Ziegen Fette Schenkel verbraunt, so gewahre mir dieses Verlangeu: Meine Thranen vergilt mit deinem Geschoss den Achaien.

Also flehet' er laut; ihn horete Fobos Apollon; Und von den Holm des Olympas enteilet' er, ziirnendes Herzens, Er auf der Schulter den Bogen und wohlverschlossenen Kocher. Laut erschollen die Pfeil' an der Schulter des ziirnenden Gottes, Als er einher sich schwang; er wandelte, diisterer Nacht gleich; Sezte sich drauf von den Schiffen entfernt, und schnellte den Pfeil ab; Graunvoll aber erklang das Geton des silbernen Bogens. Nur Maulthier" erlegt'er zuerst, und hurtige Hunde: Doch nun gegen sic selbst das herbe Geschoss hinwendend, Traf er; und rastlos brannten die Todtenfeuer in Menge.

Schon neun Tage durchflogen das Heer die Geschosse des Gottes. Drauf am zehnten berief des Volks Versammlung Achilleus, Dem in die Seel' es legte die lilienarmige Here; Denn sie fuhlete Schmerz, die Danaer sterben zu sehen. Als sie nunmehr sich versammelt, und voll die Versammlung ge- drangt war;

Trat hervor und begann der muthige Renner Achilleus: Atreus Sohn, nun denk' ich, wir ziehn den vorigen Irrweg. Wieder nach Hause zuriick, wenn etwa dem tod wir entrinnen; Weil ja zugleich der Krieg und die Pest hinrafft die Achaier. Aber wohlan, fragt einen der Opferer, oder der Seher, Oder der Traumweissager; auch Traume ja kommeii von Zeus her; Dass er melde, warum so eisere Fobos Apollon: Ob ja versaumte Geliibd' ihn erziirneten, ob Hekatomben. Wenn vielleicht der Lammer Gediift und erlesener Ziegen Er zum Opfar begehrt, uns abzuwenden das Unheil.' Lord Derby's:— '" Hear me, god of the silver bow! whose care Chrysa surrounds, and Cilia's lovely vale;  Whose sovereign sway o'er Tenedos extends \

0 Smintheus, hear! if e'er my offered gifts Found favour in thy sight; if e'er to thee

1 burned the fat of bulls and choicest goats, Grant me this boon—upon the Grecian host Let thine unerring darts avenge my tears."

Thus as he prayed, his prayer Apollo heard: Along Olympus' heights he passed, his heart Burning with wrath; behind his shoulders hung His bow, and ample quiver; at his back Rattled the fateful arrows as he moved; Like the night-cloud he passed; and from afar He bent against the ships, and sped the bolt; And fierce and deadly twanged the silver bow. First on the mules and dogs, on man the last, Was poured the arrowy storm; and through the camp, Constant and numerous, blazed the funeral fires.

Nine days the heavenly Archer on the troops Hurled his dread shafts ; the tenth, the assembled Greeks Achilles called to council; so inspired By Juno, white-armed goddess, who beheld With pitying eyes the wasting hosts of Greece. When all were met, and closely thronged around, Hose the swift-footed chief, and thus began:

"Great son of Atreus, to my mind there seems, If we would 'scape from death, one only course,; Home to retrace our steps: since here at once By war and pestilence our forces waste.

But seek we first some prophet, or some priest, Or some wise vision-seer (since visions too From Jove proceed), who may the cause explain, Which with such deadly wrath Apollo fires: If for neglected hecatombs or prayers He blames us; or if fat of lambs and goats May soothe his anger and the plague assuage."'

But one feature of the English hexameter, which, we confess, kd never so forcibly struck us before, is the wonderful power it gives of expressing the familiar speeches, and the trivial matters which, the great poet so delights to record: also of, without derogation to dignity, putting into plain English the bitter irony of some of his speakers. What, for example, can be better turned than the savage exultation of Patroclus over the death of Cebriones? 'Full on the top of his face came the huge stone, smashing the eyebrows, Crushing the solid skull; and the eyeballs, forced from the sockets, Fell in the dust at his feet: and himself, as plunges the diver, Plunged to the earth from the car: and the fierce soul fled from the carcase.

Loud, as he marked his fall, thus, scoffingly, shouted Patroclus: Gods! what a nimble man ! how easy that shoot from the chariot! Did he but happen to live by the ocean, where fish are abounding, Many a mouth, through him, might be satisfied,—diving for oysters, Even in times of storm, from his boat's side taking his headers: Easy enough for one who on land dives thus from his warsteeds. Who would have thought such tumblers had ever been found 'mid the Trojans!'

That from his boats side taking his headers seems to us quite inimitable. Let us see the lines in blank verse of Lord Derby. And first notice, though in itself well translated, how rounded off is Lord Derby's version in comparison: just the difference between cast and wrought metal. 'It struck Cebriones, a bastard son Of royal Priam, as the reins he held. Full on his temples fell the jagged mass, Drove both his eyebrows in, and crushed the bone; Before him in the dust his eyeballs fell; And, like a diver, from the well-wrought car Headlong he plunged; and life forsook his limbs. O'er whom Patroclus thus with bitter jest: "Heaven! what agility! how deftly thrown That somersault! if only in the sea  Such feats he wrought, with him might few compete,  Diving for oysters, if with such a plunge  He left his boat, how rough soe'er the waves,  As from his car he plunges to the ground:  Troy can, it seems, accomplished tumblers boast."'

So again, in the funeral games for Patroclus, how admirably Well are these lines in the speech of Nestor to his son rendered: and how, but in hexameters, could they have been so truly given? Observe especially, the idiomatic, almost the slang, expression, with which they conclude :— 'One, who on build of his car, and the speed of his chargers reliant, Taking a winding course drives foolishly hither and thither, Letting his steeds thus wander, is sure, in the end, to be nowhere.' Or again: the protest of Menelaus, when, Antilochus forced his way in the narrow gully:— 4 Not among men can be found a more mischievous fellow than thou art! Drive away! but by mistake deemed wise by the sons of Achaia! Yet if the prize thou gain, it shall cost thee an oath to retain it.' Once more: the way in which hexameters allow of the introduction of conversational or technical expressions, Mr. Dart's book fully proves. Here is the message, as he gives it, sent by Menestheus, while the Trojans were storming the Grecian wall, to ask for help :— 'Hasten, with quickest speed, call Ajax here to assist us; Better the two than one: that, in sooth, were the safer arrangement; Best for this time of need; for fate stands imminent o'er us. Here are the Lycian leaders advancing to storm ; men, of old time, Known for their skill in arms, and their prowess and strength in the combat.

But if, as here, there also the peril of battle is urgent, Then, let us have but the aid of the great Telamonian Ajax; Also let Teneer come ; to assist with his skill as a bowman.'

When the herald has given his message, our translator speaks thus:— 'Thus did he speak;—and assented the great Telamonian Ajax. Unto Oileus' son did he rapidly speak and address him. Ajax, abide thou here, both thou and the brave Lyeomodes; Stand and encourage the troops, and their spirits arouse to the battle. I must be off for a while, where an imminent danger assails us; When it is fairly repelled, / am with you again in an instant'

And how wonderfully English are turns of expression like these:— 'Them, as they fell and died, did he leave, did the king Agamemnon.' 'Speaking, away did he stride—did the great Telamonian Ajax.' .Further: could that great difficulty of the minutiae of Homer's feasts be better overcome, than in this translation?— 'Earnestly prayed his Priest; and the prayer reached Phoebus Apollo. Then, when the prayers were prayed, and the salt cakes cast on the victims, Stretching their necks to the full, they smote, and slaughtered, and flayed them: Severed the thighs for the god, and wrapped caul carefully round them; Wrapped it in double folds ; and placed choice morsels upon it. Then did he kindle the faggots, and pour rich wine on the offering; Ready, with five pronged forks, were the servants standing around him.

So, when the thighs were consumed, and the inwards, too, had been tasted, All of the rest of the victim they cut into morsels and spitted; Dressed it with careful skill; and removed when the broil was completed. And, when the food was cooked, and they ceased from the toil, having finished, Down to the feast they sat; nor did any lack ample refreshment.' Or again: what can be better than—as we should now say— the collation which Nestor gives to Machaon?— 'And, to assuage their thirst, did the bright-haired slave Hecameed, Temper a draught—fair captive of Tenedos, won by Achilleus, Daughter of noble Arsinous, and by the sons of Achaia Given to Nestor's hand—the reward of his excellent counsels. First, ere she mingled the draught, did she spread a fair table before them,

Polish'd and bright in face, with dark steel feet; and upon it Ordered a brazen salver—with onions sliced for a relish; And the pale liquid honey, and crush'd wheat—holy refreshment. Then set an ample goblet, of excellent frame, which the elder Brought from his distant home, all studded with gold, and the handles Four in number around, had two doves feeding, uniting Into a golden link—two doves were the foot of the goblet. Such was the form of the bowl—when full, an effort to lift it; Great, for a man in years; yet Nestor could easily raise it. And, in this ample bowl, did the nymph, fair-form'd as a goddess, Pour of the Pramnian wine; and rasp on the top, as a relish, Cheese, of the milk of goats;—then white meal sprinkled upon it: And, when the draught was mix'd, gave the bowl, and invited to      drink it.

Long did t hey quaff at the bowl; and the deep thirst slaked that was in them: And, when sufficed, they sat holding converse one with the other.' From the above passages we may learn how admirably adapted are hexameters for that kind of domestic poetry in which Crabbe so much delighted. Gothe has proved this in his 'Hermann and Dorothea;' so has Voss in his pastoral epic. The lines we lately quoted from Clough bear witness to the same thing. And how, we should like to be told, could the following passage from Longfellow, vivid and spirited as it is, be translated into any other metre? 'Nothing was heard in the room but the hurrying pen of the stripling, Or an occasional sigh from the labouring heart of the Captain, Reading the marvellous words and achievements of Julius Csosar. After a while he exclaimed, as he smote with his hand, palm downwards, Heavily on the page: "A wonderful man was this Caesar! You are a writer, and I am a fighter, but here is a fellow  Who could both write and fight, and in both was equally skilful!" Straightway answered and spake John Alden, the comely, the youthful: "Yes, he was equally skilled, as you say, with his pen and his weapons. Somewhere have I read, but where I forget, he could dictate  Seven letters at once, at the same time writing his memoirs."

"Truly," continued the Captain, not heeding or hearing the other, "Truly a wonderful man was Caius Julius Cajsar! Better, be first, he said, in a little Iberian village, Than be second in Rome, and I think he was right when he said it. Twice was he married before he was twenty, and many times after; Battles five hundred he fought, and a thousand cities he conquered; He, too, fought in Flanders, as he himself has recorded; Finally he was stabbed by his friend, the orator Brutus. Now, do you know what he did on a certain occasion in Flanders, When the rear-guard of his army retreated, the front giving way too, And the immortal Twelfth Legion was crowded so closely together There was no room for their swords? Why, he seized a shield from a        soldier,

Put himself straight at the head of his troops, and commanded the captains, Calling on each by his name, to order forward the ensigns; Then, to widen their ranks, and give more room for their weapons; So he won the day, the battle of something-or-other. That's what I always say; if you wish a thing to be well done, You must do it yourself, you must not leave it to others !"' Take a few detached passages, as displaying the far superior power, in the translation of hexameters, that the same metre has over blank verse :— 'Just as a stubborn ass, amid corn, encounters the prowess Of some troop of boys, whose sticks are broken upon him;  Yet does he stand and browse on the ears of the corn, while the urchins  Urge him with frequent blows, and their vigour is all unavailing:  Nor does he beat a retreat till his hunger is filled to the fullest.'

Dart, xi. 517. 'As near a field of corn, a stubborn ass Upon whose sides had many a club been broke, O'erpowers his boyish guides, and entering in, On the rich forage grazes; while the boys Their cudgels ply, but vain their puny strength, Yet drive him out, when fully fed, with ease.'

Lord Derby, xi. 639—644. 'Hector, and all ye chiefs, both of Troy and the aids of the Trojan! It were a senseless risk to encounter the trench with our warsteeds. Difficult is it to pass: for the sharp stakes planted within it Stand in the way; and behind is the wall of the sons of Achaia; There is no room to deploy, no place there to marshal the battle If we retain our cars ; it is narrow and threatens destruction.'

Dart, xii. 61—66. 'Hector, and all ye other chiefs of Troy, And brave Allies, in vain we seek to drive Our horses o'er the ditch; 'tis hard to cross; 'Tis crowned with pointed stakes, and them behind Is built the Grecian wall; there to descend And from our narrow cars to fight Were certain ruin.'—Lord Derby, xii. 66.

Sent from the ranges of Ida, the blast of a tempest, it drove on Whirling the dust on the galleys, unnerving the sonu of Achaia.'
 * Thus did the warrior speak: and he led the assault; and his soldiers Followed with terrible shout; and Zeus, great lord of the lightning,

Dart, xii. 251—254. 'This said, he led the way; with joyous shouts They followed all; then Jove, the lightning's Lord, From Ida's heights a storm of wind sent down, Driving the dust against the Grecian ships; Which quelled their courage, and to Hector gave, And to the Trojans, fresh incitement.'—Lord Derby, xii. 272—277.

'Shouting aloud, they incited the fight on the side of Achaia," From both hostile ranks, thick, fast, as the flakes of a snow-storm  Fall on a wintry day; when the provident Zeus in his wisdom  Wills to release his snows, and resort to the arrows of heaven;  And—for the winds are tranquil—the snow falls steady and ceaseless  Until it covers at once the high ridges and peaks of the mountains;  Covers the lotus-beds ; and the deep fat tilth of the farmers;  E'en on the salt sea-coast does it lie; in the bays and the shallows;  Save where the wash of the waves cuts the coating away, and beyond     them

All is alike conceal'd, as the snow falls steadily downwards. So, and from either side, did the stones fly in pitiless showers.'

Dart, xii. 275—277. 'Thus they, with cheering words, sustained the war: Thick as the snow-flakes on a wintry day; When Jove, the Lord of counsel, down on men His snow-storm sends, and manifests his power: Hushed are the winds ; the flakes continuous fall j That the high mountain-tops, and jutting crags, And lotus-covered meads are buried deep, And man's productive labours of the field; On hoary Ocean's beach and bays they lie, The approaching waves their bound; o'er all beside Is spread by Jove the heavy fall of snow '—Lord Derby, xii. 303.

'Thus did he speak: his men—for the felt that he justly reproaoh'd them— Bore, in support of the king, with a sterner might on the foeman. While on the other side did the Argives serry their phalanx Closer within their wall; for a crisis plainly approach'd them.'

Dart, xii. 412—416. 'He said; and by the king's rebuke abashed, With fiercer zeal the Lycians pressed around Their King and councillor: on the other side Within the wall the Greeks their squadrons massed.'

Lord Derby, xii. 454—457. 'What is to be the result of the present conjuncture, Machaon 1 Louder, about our ships, rise the shouts of encountering foemen! Sit thou here in peace; and drink the red vintage before thee; Until the bath is warm'd by the fair-haired slave Hecamede; She with a tepid stream shall the gore wash away from thy shoulder. I will awav with speed, to look out from some post of advantage.'

'Dart, xiv. 3—9, • Say, good Machaon, what these sounds may mean; For louder swells the tumult round the ships: Rut sit thou here, aud drink the ruddy wine, NO. CXXXI.—N.S. P

Till fair-haired Hecamede shall prepare The gentle bath, and wash thy gory wounds; While I go forth, and all around survey.'—Lord Derby, xiv. 4—9. 'Up to the front of the ships come the roar and rout of the combat, In unceasing whirl. You may look on the scene and discern not, Whether Achaia's hosts now give or gain ground in the thick fray: So intermingled is the slaughter; so deep is the roar of the battle. Let us consult and think, with a view to the present conjuncture, What is the wisest course. To the field I would never persuade you Back: for a wounded man is at best an indifferent soldier.'

Bart, xiv. 58—61. 'And now around the ships their war they wage, Unceasing, unabated ; none might tell By closest scrutiny, which way are driven The routed Greeks, so intermixed they fall Promiscuous j and the cry ascends to heaven. But come, discuss we what may best be done, If judgment aught may profit us; ourselves To mingle in the fray I counsel not; It were not well for wounded men to fight.'

Lord Derby, xiv. 63—71. By way of contrast to this their powers of familiarity, let us try one of the noblest passages in the Great Poem, as regards the comparative power of Hexameters: the speech of Sarpedon to Glaucus, while the storm of the Grecian wall is going on. And we will begin, as is fitting, from the worst translation: Pope's. And yet, we very much doubt whether his version here does not come nearer the original than anywhere else.* 'Why boast we, Glaucus! our extended reign, Where Xanthus' streams enrich the Lycian plain, Our numerous herds that range the fruitful field, And hills where vines their purple harvest yield, Our foaming bowls with purer nectar crowned, Our feasts enhanced with music's sprightly sound: Why on those shores are we with joy surveyed, Admired as heroes, and as gods obeyed: Uuless great acts superior merit prove, And vindicate the bounteous powers above? 'Tis ours, the dignity they give to grace; The first in valour, as the first in place: That when, with wondering eyes, our martial bands Behold our deeds transcending our commands, Such, they may cry, deserve the sovereign state, Whom those that envy, dare not imitate! Could all our care elude the gloomy grave, Which claims no less the fearful than the brave, For lust of fame I should not vainly dare In fighting fields, nor urge thy soul to war. But since, alas! ignoble age must come, Disease, and death's inexorable doom,

1 Some of our readers may remember how, in Miss Edge-worth's Early Lessons, this passage of Pope is made the favourite of her heroine Laura. The life which others pay, let us bestow, And give to fame what we to nature owe; Brave tho' we fall, and honoured if we live, Or let us glory gain, or glory give.'

They are magnificent verses; perhaps the best that Pope ever wrote. In fact he seems to have known that they were very good; and therefore puts in a modest little note: 'I ought not 'to neglect putting the reader in mind, that this speech of 'Sarpedon is excellently translated by Sir John Denham, and if 'I have done it with any spirit, it is partly owing to him.' But done well as it is, let us see two other translations. This is Mr. Dart's:— 'Why, in our Lycian land, do we stand as the first and the foremost, Graced with the highest places, and full crowned cups, at the banquet, And with the largest mess—and are honoured as gods by the people? Why does a wido domain spread afar—and for us—by this Xanthus, Dark with empurpled vines, and bright with the gold of its harvests? Does it not all demand that we mingle in fight with the foremost, Leading our Lycian bands far ahead in the heat of the battle? So that the common speech of the mail-clad soldiers around us, Thus may describe their chiefs: "Our kings are not barren of glory; They who have sway in the land, and who feed on the fat of the sheep-folds,  Drinking the luscious wine, have sinew and nerves in abundance;  Strength for fight—and shine in the battle the foremost among us." For if, in sooth, good friend! supposing us clear from the combat, We could rely on a life never ending, and never afflicted By old age and its ills—neither / would press on in the battle, Nor would I urge it on thee thus to barter existence for glory. But as it is—since fate presses on by a thousand approaches, Comes in ten thousand forms, and we cannot escape or evade it— Let us advance on the foe ; let us either win glory, or yield it!'

Of course, Macaulay had these lines in his mind, when, in perhaps his finest ballad, he wrote:— Then outspake brave Horatius, The captain of the gate: 'To every man upon this earth

Death cometh, soon or late: And how can man die better

Than facing fearful odds, For the ashes of his fathers,

And the temples of his gods, And for the aged mother

That dandled him to rest, And for the wife that nurses

His baby at her breast, And for the holy maidens

That feed the eternal flame, To shield them from false Sextus,

That wrought the deed of shame. The question may fairly be asked: why should hexameters, after three hundred and fifty years of English poetry, (descending, we mean in regular succession, and putting out of the question its morning star, Chaucer, and its lesser stars, Gower and Richard de Hampole, separated by so wide a gap as they are from the Earl of Surrey, and Sackville, and Tusser, and the rest of Henry's or Elizabeth's worthies,) now at last seem to be natural to English; more especially when the Elizabethan poets failed in them so entirely? Witness, as we saw just now, Stanihurst's Virgil: perhaps, more absurd than the hexameters in which the Edinburgh Review of the day ridiculed the 'Vision of Judgment:'— 'Jack ascended the hill, and Gill ascended it after; Down tumbled poor Jack, and Gill came tumbling down headlong; Jack fractured his skull, but of Gill nothing more is recorded/ But this question may fairly be answered by a counter question. Why is it that one of the loveliest English measures— trochaic tetrameter catalectic, which, by interpretation in the hymn-books, is 8. 7s.—should have been virtually unknown to us till within the last century? Pope has one parody in this metre: but, for its true and serious employment, the Wesleys mast have the credit. Why, again, has it been only so lately that the longer trochaic lines, so popular among the Germans, have been adopted by ourselves? 'Casar fiel, am einem dunklem Tage Ab von leben wie enstttrmtes laub: Friedrich liegt in engen Sarkophage; Alexander ist ein wenig Staub.'

Or why, once more, that a very pretty measure—and that almost peculiar to English—anapaestic—dimeter brachycatalectic, though employed as long ago as by Tusser, should have been never popularized till, secularly, by Shenstone; and religiously by Charles Wesley? 'I have found out a gift for my fair; I have found where the wood-pigeons breed; But let me the plunder forbear;

She will say 'twas a barbarous deed: For he never was true, she averr'd,

Who would rob a poor bird of its young; And I loved her the more, when I heard

Such tenderness flow from her tongue.' Another objection to the English Hexameter is the fact that it makes the same syllable both short and long. But this is the fault, not of the tool, but of the workman. No doubt it is very easy to begin a line with such words as and, to, for, by, in, &c. Southey, as we said, did so on principle. Both Dart and Longfellow give in to it: Kingsley hardly ever. The failure therefore lies in the verse-man, not in the verse. At the same time it must be remembered that, as accent and quantity are, in English, convertible terms, a word may very likely at one time be employed as long, which at another is short. No words can be more distinctly short than a and the. Yet emphasize, i.e. accent them, and they naturally and fairly become long, e.g.— 'A man might have come in, but the man certainly never.' So in monosyllabic verbs, the imperative by force of the emphasis is long, while the indicative or infinitive may be short. It does not fall within our subject to discuss the question whether, in a translation of the Iliad, Greek or Latin names of the deities should be employed. To our own mind, indeed, the matter seems clear ; and we certainly wonder to see Lord Derby, though with a half apology in the preface, using Latin names. But it is another question whether, in such names, English accent or Greek quantity should be adopted: whether one should say Andr6meda, or Andromede. Kingsley not only takes Greek quantity, but occasionally declines proper names. Mr. Dart chooses a via media, which, if not strictly logical, is perhaps the most satisfactory. In the continuous list of nymphs or towns, where the English pronunciation would necessitate a vast amount of verbiage, and which to the English reader are generally unfamiliar, he employs the Greek; but, elsewhere, our own accentuation: Andrdmache, for instance. Indeed, one could hardly get Helen, Hecuba changed to Helene\ Hecabe. He is, however, not very consistent in his spelling. If he gives us Achilleus and Odysseus, why not Helena and GSas? In the lists to which we'havejust referred, lie seems to us especially happy in his use of too, as representing re. Nor must we forget to add that his notes, from their great vividness of description, and the unflinching faith which they display in the historical truth of the Iliad, are very interesting. We now take our leave of him with the earnest hope that he will, ere long, give us a similar version of the Odyssey: where, with a little more attention to accent, he may unite equal scholarship and correctness.