308 Arundines Cami; sice, Musarum Cantabrigiensium Lusus Canori. Collegit atque edidit HENRICUS DRURY, A. M. Editio altera. Parker, London: Deighton, Cambridge. WE are glad, but not surprised, to see that Mr. Drury's book has reached a second edition. Latin verses are connected in the minds of most of us with pleasant recollections. Some retain a taste for them, whom no other form of poetry has ever interested; and many, whose classical studies ceased when they left school, are glad to find a ground where they can meet professed scholars on a level. Mr. Drury showed sound judgment in confining his collection to translations. Original Latin poems are, at best, imitations-sometimes of ancient modes of thought; more often of ancient phrases without any thought, strung together, like the Platonic colloquialisms in Lucian's AntiAtticista, with an equal disregard of the purposes to which they were originally applied, and of any present meaning in those who use them. Good translations from modern languages into Latin or Greek, are, in every sentence, exercises of comparative philology; and, to use still more obscure language, of comparative æsthetics; showing, at a glance, what it is that modern poets have, or have not, in common with Catullus, or Ovid, or Euripides. They are the more valuable, because, either from a want of richness in the thoughts of Latin poets, or from the comparative diffuseness of our languages, all considerable attempts at poetical versions of Latin writers have hitherto failed. The Pieces done into English by eminent hands, as translations by Dryden and his contemporaries were called in the jargon of the time, are, as their title imports, mere products of manual labour. The extraordinary similarity of genius between Pope and Horace, and the strong resemblance of the social circumstances of the times in which they lived, have produced an equivalent in English literature to the Satires and Epistles; but familiar and easy versification belongs to a low form of poetry, and imitative paraphrases have different merits from translations. From whatever reason the popularity of the work before us may arise, we are glad of any proof that Latin scholarship is still held in general esteem. If we are suspected of an arrière penséeof a professional partiality to Latin as the language of the Church in the West, we are not solicitous to deny it. The second edition of the Arundines Cami is enriched by some valuable additions. In its outward form it is worthy of the elegance of its contents, smooth and thick in paper, clear in print, and regular in margin; and the English originals of the Latin versions are sufficiently agreeable and various to furnish pleasant occupation, even when a reader is too indolent to appreciate the scholarship of the opposite page. The title is pretty and appropriate enough; but why should Mr. Drury, in his motto, make his pastoral pipe into a horse for a child to ride? Equitare in arundine longo!!-as if one was to discuss, in the musical periodical, which probably exists under the name of the "Flutist," the properties of a fluted Doric column, or of a ship armed en flute. In Bromham, from which the advertisement to the second edition is dated, we are glad to find the interpretation of the mysterious Genistarum Villa, from which the original preface issued, having found a difficulty in reconciling our erroneous theory of Brompton with the reductum rus, of which the editor speaks in his preface. A large proportion of the poems are translated into elegiacs; there are also specimens of almost all the Horatian metres, as well as of Iambic trimeters, hendecasyllabics, and hexameters. In the second part, where, to quote the preface, "Omnia sacra per se reverenter sunt seposita atque distributa," there are some imitations of the rhymed ecclesiastical hymns, principally by Mr. Drury himself; and he, and the late Archdeacon Wrangham, have attempted, (we think without success,) to apply the accentuated rhyming verse to lighter purposes. In our review of Macaulay's "Lays of Ancient Rome," (Christian Remembrancer, February, 1843,) we made some remarks on the early use of accentuated poetry among the Latins, and the possible connexion between the Christian hymns and the old rustic ballads of Italy. However this may be, it is certain that, in the Middle Ages, Latin became for religious purposes a new poetical language, as in prose it became a pliable vehicle of metaphysical discussion, instead of the pregnant and compact language of business and polished literature which it was in the days of its prime; yet, among many hymns which we have seen, it is surprising how few are distinguished by the poetical beauty and dignity of the Dies ira, or Stabat Mater. The possibility of success has been proved; but there must always be a great difficulty in adapting a language to purposes for which it was not formed; and modern scholars have an additional impediment, which did not affect uncritical monks. They, no doubt, formed the rhythm with reference to their own pronunciation, and with indifference to quantity. Mr. Drury knows long syllables from short, writes very good metrical verses, and is liable to be embarrassed by his conscious violation of the classical laws of prosody; and the consequence is, that he has not even followed the ordinary pronunciation, but transposed accent at the same time that he has neglected quantity, and left his readers to supply the rhythm by their own intonation, with almost as little assistance as if they were reading would-be English hexameters. On what principle is the following stanza constructed? "Oh no: we never mention her; Her name is never heard: My lips are now forbid to speak That once familiar word. "Ah! Ejus nunquam mentio fit, Nomén tam notum olím farí Haud mi conceditúr. Ad varios me lusús trabúnt From sport to sport they hurry me To banish my regret; And when they win a smile from me They think that I forget." Without the arbitrary accents which we have affixed, the lines would be as unrhythmical to an English as to a Roman ear. We might also notice the false rhyme of the second and fourth lines, the awkward appearance of antithesis between Ejus and Illa, and the un-English elision of the termination of notum. Mr. Drury has followed the modern accent better in the following singular lines: "I love it, I love it, and who shall dare To chide me for loving that old arm-chair? I've treasured it long as a sainted prize; I've bedewed it with tears, and embalmed it with sighs : Not a tie will break, not a link will start; Would ye know the spell ?—a mother sat there ! And a sacred thing is that old arm-chair" "Illam amo, quantum amo! Invidus taceat, Sedit in illa heu! matrum tenerrima; Et vetus hæc cathedra est rerum sacerrima." And so on, for three stanzas more. We hope the curious dancing-step of the Latin version is intended to throw into deserved ridicule the mawkish and false sentiment of the original, which, for any other purpose, ought never to have been disinterred from its native obscurity. It would have been difficult to make better poetry out of a useful article of furniture, which it appears was at the same time a prize and an heir-loom, which was first canonized, and then embalmed, the stuffing, we presume, having been removed; then chained to the poet's heart so securely, that, with all his struggles, "not a link would start," and all the while governed by a spell; but even here it was not necessary that cordi should be used as a rhyme to audi; or, in a subsequent line, ridebat to supplicabat; least of all, reminiscimur to ipsissima. The most anomalous metre in the volume however occurs in Archdeacon Wrangham's version of "I'd be a butterfly," of which the second stanza runs thus:— "Oh! could I pilfer the wand of a fairy, I'd have a pair of those beautiful wings; Their summer-day's ramble is sportive and airy, Those who have wealth must be watchful and wary, I'd be a butterfly, sportive and airy, Rocked in a rose, when the nightingale sings." "Magicam si possem virgam furari Alas has pulcras aptem mi eheu! Rosa cubant Philomelæ cantu Opes quid afferunt?-curas, somnum rare, Ah sim Papilio die volans aëre, Rosa cubans Philomelæ cantu." How different is the use of accented rhythm in the familiar lines of the old drinking song: "Mihi est propositum in taberna mori, Ut dicant cum venerint angelorum chori : Among the more legitimate compositions, are included many versions from English nursery rhymes by the Editor, and by the Rev. F. Hodgson, Provost of Eton. The originals can never be read too often, and no part of the volume is more agreeable than the pages where they appear; but we should not have expected, and do not find, that their peculiar excellence admits of being transferred into a Latin version. Their inimitable peculiarity consists in the rhythm and metre, which almost sings itself. The substance and meaning is less valuable, but perfectly appropriate, generally presenting to the imagination of a child one or two definite and familiar objects, with a sketch or a mere hint of a story, to set them in motion; the more wonderful the better, whether the prodigy excites admiration or laughter. The key to the whole is the rhythm; and the rhythm itself is generally suggested by the commencement. There can be no doubt that the mere refrain of " Hey diddle diddle" produced the "cat and the fiddle," with all the mythological events which follow. The sense suits the sound to perfection, but will hardly bear to be transferred to the regular hexameters and pentameters of the editor. "Hey diddle diddle! the cat and the fiddle! The little dog laughed to see such fine sport, "Hei didulum-atque iterum didulum! Felisque Fidesque! Nescio qua catulus risit dulcedine ludi; Abstulit et turpi lanx cochleare fuga." The epithet turpi shows the erroneous principle of the translation. There was nothing base in the conduct of the dish; the legend is quite independent of moral considerations. The careless musical gaiety of such rhymes as these is more capable of being expressed in the Greek of Aristophanes, who will furnish many specimens of melody as flowing, and extravagance as wilful. A well-known English scholar now living has caught the spirit of the original more successfully than Mr. Drury :— Οτοτοῖ γαλέας· τοτοῖ κιθάρας· ἡ βοῦς ὑπερᾶλτο σελάναν Ἐγέλα δ ̓ ὁ κύων σοφίαν ἐσίδων· τὸ δ ̓ ἄμυστρον ὑφήρπασε κράτηρ. As far, however, as the nature of the language and metre allows, many of these scolia are well translated. The following is Mr. Drury's:— "Little Bopeep has lost her sheep, And does not know where to find them; "Parva vagabundos Bopæpia perdidit agnos, Nescia secreti quo latuere loci; Bellula, cant, abeant; ad pascua nota redibunt, Et reduces caudas post sua terga gerent." Where we may remark, that Bopeep is an English word, but "Bonnie lass, bonnie lass, will you be mine?: Thou shalt neither wash dishes, nor serve the swine; And thou shalt have strawberries, sugar, and cream." "Pulcra puella, velis fieri mea, pulcra puella? The following is better, because there is a conscious humour in the original, as well as in the translation:-- "The man in the wilderness asked me How many strawberries grow in the sea? Fraga quot in pelagi fluctibus orta putes?' A popular poem may be recognised as the germ of these meditative hexameters. · "The corner of the chamber which you see |