It may not be unpleasing to see the same passage in the Lycidas of Milton. Where were ye, nymphs, when the remorseless deep Nor yet where Deva winds her wizard stream. In this Eclogue the lines, Atque utinam ex vobis unus vestrique fuissem, Are copied, in the opinion of Wakefield, from a Greek fragment by an uncertain author in the Anthologia, which I cannot refuse the reader the pleasure of seeing copied. Valckenaer supposes them to belong to Moschus. master. Αιθε πατης μ' εδίδαξε δασυτριχα μηλα νομευειν· Would that my sire, aware of ill, Had taught my youth the shepherd's skill, Then would its notes, at evening played Have charmed away my wo. These then at last are the obligations that Virgil owes to his The first and fourth Bucolicks are exclusively his own; in the fifth and sixth he claims the principal merit; but for all the rest he can only obtain the honour of an elegant translator. This is not said, however, to detract from his merit as a poet. When he was reproached for his imitations of the Iliad, he acknowledged the charge, and observed, "Why do not my detractors do the same? It is easier to steal his club from Alcides, than a verse from Homer." BEEF EATERS. Such is the name given to the body guards of his Britannick Majesty. As they are universally stout men, it is vulgarly supposed that they derive the title from their attachment to beef. But this is a mistake. Beefeater is a corruption of Beaufetteer, a person who attends the beaufett, or sideboard. COLUMBUS. Every circumstance relating to this man, who may be called the greatest benefactor of the human race, is interesting. Dr. Belknap, whose works are no less known for their minute accuracy than for the neatness and purity of the style, has, in his biography of Columbus, omitted a fact, which is worth recording in the Anthology. "He died at Valadolid," says the Dr. "on the twentieth day of May, 1506, in the fifty ninth year of his age; and was buried in the cathedral of Seville, with this inscription on his tomb; A Castilla ya Leon Nuevo Mundo dio Colon." Antonio de Herrera, the historiographer of Spain, informs us, that "his body was conveyed to the monastery of the Carthusians at Sevil, and from thence to the city of Santo Domingo in Hispaniola, where it lies in the chancel of the cathedral." This cathedral, the oldest christian church in America, has been desecrated since the days of Herrera; and when I was in it, a few years ago, was unworthy to be the depository of the remains of Columbus. It is well known, that the Spanish part of the island of Hispaniola was ceded to France by the infamous treaty negotiated by the Prince of Peace in 1795. The degenerate Spaniards had still national pride sufficient to excite them to do justice to their former renown. A ship of the line and a frigate were sent to transport the bones of Columbus to the Havana, so that the new world yet contains the tomb of its discoverer. At this city a eulogy on that occasion was pronounced by an aged priest, in the presence of nearly an hundred thousand people. What the American Biography calls the inscription on his tomb, was the motto of the admiral's arms. In Munoz's History of the New World, a late work written by command of the king of Spain, it is recorded, that Columbus was permitted to bear "the armorial ensigns of Castile and Leon in the two upper; and in the two inferiour fields, dexter, Isles d'or, in azure billows; sinister, his own arms five anchors were afterwards added, as emblematick of the admiraltyship, with the motto: A Castilla á Leon Nuevo mundo dio Colon." Colon gave a new world to Castile and Leon.. FRENCH POETRY. It is not surprising that French poetry should have but few English admirers. The last thing we learn to appreciate in the literature of a foreign nation is the works of its poets. So much of the charm of all poetry is included in the felicity of the expressions which the poet uses, that till our knowledge of the language is so intimate, that we can discern all the varieties and shades of meaning of its words, the delicacy of its phrase, and the graces of its constructions, we must be unable to relish some of the most refined beauties, which its poetry presents. No man, for instance, however exquisite his taste, is capable of relishing the curious felicity of Horace, merely because he knows Latin enough to make out the sense of his words, Besides this there is another circumstance, which contributes to repulse an English taste, particularly in the higher walks of French poetry. It is not to be denied by the warmest of its admirers, that there is a continual attempt to keep up the style of sentiment to a strained and unnatural degree of elevation. There is a constant and fastidious dread of approaching the thoughts and feelings of common life, which destroys all genuine simplicity and tenderness. An offence against bienséance is a crime so unpardonable in the eye of a Frenchman, that any thing is preferable to hazarding it. The severity of the laws of French poetry is also pleaded as an apology for some of its defects; and it must in fairness therefore be admitted as an equally valid apology for some of our English prejudices. Voltaire in his Discours sur la Tragédie, addressed to Lord Bolingbroke, and prefixed to his Brutus, makes an enumeration of the disadvantages with which a French poet has to contend. There is one passage so uncommonly candid for a Frenchman, that I shall translate it. "That which filled me with the greatest alarm,” says he, "in returning to my former career was the severity of our poetry and the slavery of rhyme. I regretted your enviable liberty of writing your tragedies in verse without rhyme; of lengthening, and above all, contracting almost all your words; of running one line into another; and of creating, when you have need, new words, which are always adopted among you, when they are sonorous, intelligible and necessary. An English poet, said I, is a free man, who subjects his language to his genius; a French poet is the slave of rhyme, obliged sometimes to make four verses to express a thought, which an Englishman can give in a single line. The English poet says all that he pleases; the French poet says only what he can; the one runs in a vast career; the other walks with shackles in a narrow and slippery road.” After all however, when we have made all the necessary concessions for these and other disadvantages and defects of French poetry, I still believe that no one, who has read Andromaque, Phédre, Polyeucte, Athalie and Zaire, with the feelings with which they merit to be read, will deny to the French a capacity for the highest efforts of dramatick poetry. AUSTRIA AND FRANCE. The dogs of war are again let loose; and, as the independence or slavery of continental Europe depends on the event of the present contest, it may not be uninteresting to inquire into the relative strength of the parties engaged. France is unquestionably weaker than she was before the Spanish revolution. She is not only deprived of the treasures which she drew from South America, and of the Spanish troops, with which she recruited her armies, but has lost a considerable portion of her best soldiers in attempting the subjugation of the country, and must keep up a large force to retain and extend her conquests, Her means of annoyance on the ocean are also considerably diminished, as, since the capture of Martinique, she has not a single port in the West Indies open to her, Guadaloupe excepted. The defeat of Austria must terminate in her annihilation. Of this she must be sensible, and consequently will make every exertion to secure victory. The Archduke, who commands her armies, is idolized by his soldiers, and is inferiour perhaps to no French general in the accomplishments requisite for a commander in chief. He is now, for the first time, permitted to follow the dictates of his own judgment, unshackled by an Aulick council, and no longer obnoxious to court intrigues. Hungary is also said to be well affected, and powerful levies may be raised in that warlike country. The part which Russia means to take is not yet known, nor can much dependence be placed on that versatile power. If she keeps aloof, it is not impossible for Austria to make a successful stand. That she should unite heartily with France, seems almost incredible, as it would be forging her own chains. From past events we have much to fear, but do not entirely despond. Unless Spain is abandoned, we do not believe that Napoleon can bring an overwhelming force against Austria. The following lines of Cowper are not inapplicable to this scourge of the human race. "But let eternal infamy pursue The wretch, to nought but his ambition true, ELOQUENCE. Pulchrum est bene facere reipublicae, et bene dicere haud absurdum est. Sall. Bel. Cat. "As for teachers of rhetorick," said an elegant writer of our own country about eight years ago, 66 we are happily not yet encumbered with that species of literary beggary;" and though by a singular coincidence he has himself been lately called to discharge that honourable office in our principal university, his name is almost the only one that disproves that observation. So rare are the teachers of rhetorick; and the learners are not more numerous. Can it be supposed that the Americans are less gifted with the organs of speech? That their lips are inactive, and their voices harsh? It is said indeed that an American may always be distinguished from an Englishman by the greater slowness of his speaking. If this be true, I cannot suppose that it is occasioned by a torpor of the tongue or the palate, but by a superiour coolness of thought, and delicacy in the choice of expression. There never was a country where eloquence had a better field for its display than the United States: from the town-meeting to the national congress, every mode of transacting business affords a theatre for the orator. It may be said, perhaps, parties are so completely organized, that all efforts of eloquence are totally idle and insignificant; that Demosthenes or Burke would not gain in our councils a single suffrage. Passing over the obvious idea, that an attention to this principle would have deprived these very lights of Oratory of their fame, and the world of their glorious productions, the correctness of the statement may be doubted. Are parties steadfast and immoveable in a government like this? Do we not observe a continual fluctuation," and that now to this side, now to that they nod?" And what produces these changes? A certain proportion is, no doubt, occasioned by the force of arguments operating on reason, or feeling, or interest, as stated by those of opposite opinion. That party then, whose champions are most gifted with the power of words, who are best able to enforce the considerations of principle, and to seize an advantage from circumstances, will generally, caeteris paribus, be most likely to obtain the ascendant. Perhaps there is even now an instance in our national legislature, where one man, by a slow, powerful, and impressive eloquence, has gained, if not votes, yet a strong reluctant influence over a body of political adversaries. This influence is natural and instinctive: men grant it to the orator as to the poet, and where their actions are to be the immediate consequences of their feeling, their actions prove the influence. If such are the effects of eloquence, it is a satisfaction to recollect the adage of antiquity, "Nascitur poeta, orator fit.” Sallust has observed, concerning the superiority of men to other animals, and the observation is very applicable to the superiority of one man over others, Omnis homines qui sese student praestare saeteris (aminalibus) summa ope niti decet ne vitam silentio tran-- seant. PITT, FOX AND SHERIDAN. How strongly were the characters of the two illustrious rival oras tors and statesmen marked in their last moments. Mr. Pitt seems to have been born a politician. Even from his earliest youth, none of the common passions which distract other men ever interfered to divert his attention. His whole time, his whole soul were occupied in the management of public affairs. At a period when most persons have hardly shaken off the boy, to personate the man, he managed the helm of state, and with the most unwearied assiduity, sustained a responsibility, which has generally been divided among the ablest statesmen. His last words, which discovered an agony of mind at the critical situation of Great Britain after the humiliation of Austria, by the short campaign which commenced with the stupefaction of Mack, and finished with the bloody battle of Austerlitz, strongly shew "the ruling passion strong in death." Oh, my country! In what a situation do I leave thee! |