The Press. — London, England, 1858-10-30 00:00:00

~~ THE PRESS, OCTOBER 30, 1858. (particularly our rural classes) much nearer t h a n any of them in national habits and dispo sition to that great people, our readers are not to.grudge a few minutes . spent with " The likely Roman at his Farm." There is a piquancy in any tolerably close analogy of minute charac teristics between people separated front each other by large intervals of space or time ; and n o small amount of the interest thence resulting attaches to the picture which the reviewer draws for us of a Roman gentleman—a Tory, of course, for all Tories are gentlemen, though not all gen tlemen are Tories—going down to his country house to enjoy himself after the fatigues of public business in the great city, and the perpetual worry inflicted on hint by what, in a sense some what different from that in which we understand the word, may be termed his numerous con stituents" : Let us imagine one of the old squires of that grave, stately people setting out from Rome, with no small satis faction, to resume his ordinary pursuits at his villa—a term which with us has a purely suburban application, but with him meant a real country-house. We would have him a patrician, a member of one of those old houses whose names had been conspicuous in the Consular Fasti since the expulsion of the kings, and were associated with the triumphs of Coriolanus and Camillus,—a Cornelius or a Valerius or a Claudius, and a strong Tory to bout—wedded to his rural life the more closely by a disinclination to elbow his way through the upstart candidates who now sought to push themselves forwent to high place and fortune through the suffrages of the people. He ss ill not sue to the artificers of the tribes; he will not go through the im posture of pretending acquaintance with every greasy citizen of whom his nomenclatur has whispered— Ilia multum in Fable valet: tile \reline. He will not squander in electioneering the estate which enables him to maintain the dignity of his family; he leaves it to the non homines to spend their money in eicere awe fobis. in largesses to the poorer citizens, by way of purchasing popularity. He himself goes to hie paternal acres, not without an angry belief that the great common wealth is verging to ruin, in which belief, perhaps, he is right enough : for it is the time, let us fancy, when Cicero is a young man; when the angry strife of factions is tending towards the civil wars of Marina and Svlla; when the strides of democratic innovation are rapid and irre- Nistiblc; when a time is approaching for a people no longeroapable of governing itself to resign the faeces of authority to the hands of an imperial dynasty. Such thoughts, perhaps, present themselves to the mind a our Roman as he turns round on sonte eminence to take last look on " the smoke and wealth and roar of Rome." A scornful curse on the Graccbi or Clodius, however —a proud recollection that, even if the Rotnan Republic shall to•mormw sink among the things that have been, she will leave behind her such a chronicle as the future world will not molly match—these things are sufficient to relieve his wrath, sod he is able to feel the full satisfaction which a Roman lambi feel at escaping from the jars of the forum to the fields and woods. Having fairly started our Roman gentleman on his road to his Sabine farm, the reviewer next places before us the scene which awaits him there : There are no small demonstrations of welcome on the occasion. It was especially consonant with Roman habits to celebrate joyously the return of one of the household from a distance. One cr two of Catullus's poems, written to cmunemorate such occasions, will readily recur to the mind of the reader. The Romans hail a high notion of the sacredness of home, as testified by the old Etruscan rites which they preserved in honour of the Lore' and Penates. Herein they bore a strong resemblance to us English, who are wont to boast that the continental nations do not possess a wr.rd which is exactly equivalent to our home. So the Greeks had no larva; and it would be easy to show how this dfference ran through all the several institutions of the two races, the political organization of Rome being throughout based on the family principle, while that of the Greeks betokens People drawn together to public resorts, the agora and elsewhere. So oar Roman in due form is hailed at his arrival by a great excitement on the part of his sturdy vernal m uch who had hi s reappearance with unrestrained delight and of that chaff which earned them their standing epithet °f Pr"earer• All in trim array we may be Rare ; for ours la a well.ordered household : arid there are no such et eltBesl nor need for such excuses, as were made to Pe— truchio on a similar occasion : Nathaniel's cost, Sir, was not fully made. And Gabriel's pumps were all unpii.ked i' the heel : There was no link to colour Peter's hat, And Waltees dagger was not come from sheathinr2: There were none tine but Adam, Ralph, and (It eg ury : YThe rest were r agge d, old , and beggarly: et as they are, here are they come to meet you. Perhaps this noisy gathering at our Sabine farm, how ever, lik e t h e scenes which Shakespeare had in his eye, ra 'Y remind the reader not so much of an English gentle men's return to the Hall after the prorogation of Perna !art, of such a we l come u Mrs. Stowe has drawn in I redi" wher e t h e n i ggers on a Virginian " state assemble to greet their master on his return. And indeed we may isy that in this feature of a Roman household it was more p e arly re p resented by t h at o f a Southern planter than 1 1 anything existing in England. Still there are wide d 'ifereases to be trued between Bowan and Anierican sletery, " Omne simile claudicat," says the proverb; and at the next stage in the progress of our Roman Tory squire there is, we apprehend, a consider able falling off in the likeness : It is dark, probAhly, when our Roman reaches the door of his country house. We must not omit to speculate on the affectionate greeting which he receives from his placena uxor. The old-fashioned Romans had a high notion of the matrimonial tie ; and in the honour which they paid to the virtues of matronhood almost emulated that which the laws of chivalry have since taught towards womankind. The lady of the house, we may take for granted, is worthy of that proud phrase, thrsilim clots et Egetim. She is the staid thrifty matron of old Roman days. She remembers the oft•quoted epitaph in praise of a lady of her nation, Domi monsit,lanansfeeit : and she aspires to no higher enlogium. Even now, at tidings of her hus band's approach, she has hurried from the room where she and her maidens have been busily engaged at the labours of the loom. There they sit, those pretty Sabine wenches, still occupied with their work by lamplight : carding and spinning and weaving the wool yielded by the sheep on the farm. Our modern squire is more likely to find the lady of his choice seated with a friend or com panion in the drawing-room, encased in spreading crinoline, eagerly turning over the pages of the latest novel, or, by way of some nearer approach to the Roman matron, she may be busy with crotchet-work, or embroidery in Berlin wool. The "pretty Sabine wenches" are, in any case, wanting to the picture. Whatever array of female domestics the house may be able to muster are probably by this time enjoying their tea or supper in the servants' hall ; the industrious maidens on the Roman farm have long been su perseded by the spinning-jennies and the power loom. Presently, however, we get back the re semblance. In compliance with Cato's maxim, the Roman country gentleman, on the morning after his arrival—though possibly an hour or two later than his English antitype—sets out, at tended by his bailiff, on a tour of inspection over the whole of his domain, to ascertain how matters have been progressing during his absence : He is drinking in with enjoyment the sights anti sounds of the country, and comparing the scene now before him with that which he has left in the populous city. He has laid aside the toga, the badge of public life and political privilege, remarking to his wife, with a rather sad smile, that he does not much care if he naver assumes it again till the last occasion shall come for so doing. He wanders firth, staff in hand, congratulating himself that he has a pleasanter employment than sitting with open house at Rome, to listen to the clients who came in to offer their salutation or to sock his aid and advice. To follow him in his morning walk, first to the homestead, with its cattle-yard, poultry-yard, and other adjuncts, and then over hill and dale to look after the crops and plantations, as well as after the flocks of sheep and goats on the slopes and of horned cattle in the valleys—and after luncheon to accompany him, along with his wife and children, to his well-kept garden, with its herbs, its flowers, and its bee-hives, with its shrubberies and fountains, its sculptures and vases, its marble alcoves and shady seats—would delay us much beyond the time we have to spare. We must take short leave, therefore, of our friend the Roman squire, but not before, with the re viewer, we have ascertained— whether there are any portions of his life that may remind us of that pleasantest of all rural scenes, a Sun• day in an English village. Who has not felt the spell of that quiet delight which belongs to the green fields on a fine Sunday morning —the horses standing under the shade of a tree, lazily whisking away the flies with their tails, the motley villagers appearing in the distance on the cburchward path, the farmer leaning over one of his gates, while yet the bells knoll from the grey church-tower, thinking of course of the probable yield, but something, too, about " prai.ing Heaven for the merry year "? Is there any scene like this for the Roman farmer? Not indeed so regularly recurring, nor so peaceful and sacred; but our Roman has his holy days too, and provides for their due observance in a devout spirit. It is curious to observe how readily the Romans, without any intention of departing from their heathen rites, took up the observance of the Jewish Sabbath. So common was it in Rorace's time that it is the first excuse that suggests itself to Arivtius (not a very serious character, we suspect) for refusing to help his friend out of a scrape. Our Roman will have nothing to do with outlandish rites ; but be respects the usages of his forefathers ; he honours the gods of his country, and justifies the words of the poet, with whom Sacra Dein, annetivie palm, belong to the scenes and habits of rural life. From these rural scenes the companion article takes us into the more polished circle of litera ture. The lion of the day is the Poet Laureate of the Augustan age ; he is supported, with small regard to synchronistic arrangement, on his left by a group of Hellene minstrels 'whose lays he reproduces on the Roman lyre, and on his right by a band of English bards,—among them no less distinguished a worshipper of the Muses than 1061 our noble Premier,—who try their hand in their mother-tongue upon the couplets and stanzas of Horatius Placcus, as he did upon those of Anacreon, Alcteus, Sappho, and other denizens of Parnassus. After a brief introductory review of the field of lloratian criticism, and of the views propounded by various editors of the Venusian poet, touching his history and manner of life, his merits as a lyric bard, a satirist and a moralist, the style and character of his poetry, and the chronological order of his writings, the reviewer proceeds to the main theme of his discourse, a history of the attempts—far more numerous than the reader who has not been at special pains to inform himself on the subject could possibly sup pose—to reproduce the poems of Horace, and more particularly his Odes, in English verse. As it is wholly impracticable for us to follow the writer into the details of criticism into which he is carried in his enumeration of the translators of Horace, from Drant's black-letter version of the " Satyrs " and " Pistles," and of the " Art of Poetrie," published in 1566 and 1567, to the translation of the Odes published by Lord Ravensworth in the course of the present year,— still more to avail ourselves of the numerous illustrations which he has selected, and which are indispensable to a proper appreciation of his remarks, we can only refer our readers for all this to the article itself, with the assurance that they will find its perusal a rich literary treat! Not to dismiss them, however, too drily, atter the promise which we have held out, we will intro duce to them two rival bards,—as it happens, rival statesmen too,—engaged in a competitive effort to render into English the famous amoebcean Donec gratu., cram tibi, Book HI., Ode 9. The first to strike the lyre with his plectrum in this poetic contest is Lord Derby, whose contribu tions Lord Ravensworth has incorporated with his own translations : Horace. While I was dear to thee, While with encircling arms, No youth preferred to me Dared to profane thy bosom's snowy charms ; I envied not, by thee adored, The wealth, the bliss, of Persia's lord. Lydia. While all thy bosom glowed With love for me alone : While Lydia there abode, Where Chloe now has fixed her hateful throne, Well pleased, our Roman Ilia's fame I deemed eclipsed by Lydia's name. Hor. 'Tis true my captive heart The fair-haired Chloe sways, Skilled with transcendent art To touch the lyre, and breathe harmonious lays; For her my life were gladly paid, So heaven would spare my Cretan maid. Lyd. My breast with fond desire For youthful Calais burns, Touched with a mutual fire, The son of Omitting my love returns; For him I'd doubly die with joy, So heaven would spare my Thurian boy. or. What if the former chain That we too rashly broke, We yet should weave again, And bow once more beneath th'accustomed yoke? If Chloe's sway no more I own, And Lydia till the vacant throne? Lyd. Though bright as morning star My Calais' beaming brow; Though more inconstant far, And easier chafed than Adrian's billows thon ; With thee my life I'd gladly spend, Content with thee that life to end. To this Mr. Gladstone—who, it appears, has " favoured " the Quarterly with this effort of his muse, for the specific purpose of its being exhi bited in contrast with that of his rival—responds in the following strain : Horace. While no more welcome arms could twine Around thy snowy neck than mine, Thy smile, thy hotitt, while I possest Not rersia's monarch lived as blest. Lydia. Whilst thou didat feed no rival flame, Nor Lydia next to Chloe came, 0 then thy Lydia's echoing name Excelled e'en Ilia's Roman fame. Hor. ►.yd. ilor, Me now Thrseisn Chloe sways, Skilled in soft kre and softer lays ; My forfeit life I'll Neely Rive, So she my better life may live. The snn of Omyttnt incpire•s My burning breast pith mutual tires, I'll face ten several deaths with joy So fate but spare my Thurian boy. What if our ancient love awoke. And bound us with its golden yoke; If auburn Chloe I resign, And Lydia once again be mine? 1