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

THE PRESS, OCTOBER 30, 1858.

(particularly our rural classes) much nearer
than 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
no 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 much
who
had his 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 ragged, old, and beggarly:
et as they are, here are they come to meet you.
Perhaps this noisy gathering at our Sabine farm, how-
ever, like the 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 welcome u Mrs. Stowe has drawn in
Iredi" where the niggers 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
pearly represented by that of a Southern planter than
11 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?

1062

Lyd. Though brighter than a star is he,
Thou rougher than the Adrian sea

And fickle as light cork, yet I
With thee would live—with thee would die.
Although it is at once obvious that Mr. Gla-
dstone has, as the reviewer observes, " adopted
" the literal style of translation," whereas Lord
Derby has rather aimed at paraphrase, it appears
to us, with all deference to the reviewer's judg-
ment, that the instances in which the original is,
as regards the literal sense, " rendered with par-
ticular felicity," are quite as numerous in Lord
Derby's as in Mr. Gladstone's translation, whilst
the latter has been forced to deviate from literal
accuracy quite as often as Lord Derby, and in
more than one place has deviated from it more
widely as well as more harshly. Where the very
words of the original could not be reproduced,
there can scarcely be a doubt which of the two
has generally been more successful in rendering
the thought, the feeling, and the spirit of the
original ; nor can, in our opinion, the severer
brevity of Mr. Gladstone's stanzas compensate for
the freer and more harmonious flow of Lord
Derby's verse. But—

Non nostrum inter vos tantas componere lites :
Et ?hula to dignus, et laic.
It is at any rate refreshing to think that amidst
the toils and anxieties of political conflict, our
two illustrious statesmen can still find time, and
have not lost the relish, for such sweet and pretty
trifles.

Before we part with this singularly rich number
of the Review, we must allow ourselves to add a
few words on the only remaining article—a bio-
graphical notice of James Watt, the inventor of
the steam-engine. The personal history of this
self-taught genius, especially during the earlier
years of his life, while it affords ample materials
for the study of the human mind and character,
and of the conditions of their development, holds
out but small encouragement to the scientific
cramming which is now in vogue, and the fruits
of which it is proposed to test by "middle class"
and other newly-devised examinations. The re-
cital of the successive stages by which the
wonderful contrivance that has immortalized the
name of James Watt was brought to maturity,
and of the practical difficulties with which the
inventor had to contend at every step, will more
particularly interest the scientific reader. But
the stupendous results which, up to the present
time, have flowed from the invention, cannot fail
to be appreciated by all to whom the facts are
presented as they are by the reviewer in the fol-
lowing summary:—

The first steam-engine used in Manchester was not
erected till 1790; it is now computed that, in that city and
the district within a radius of ten miles, there are more
than fifty thousand boilers, giving a total power of upwards
of a million of horses! The etigtne of Watt has proved
the very Hercules of modern mythology, the united steam
power of Great Britain being equal, it is estimated, to the
manual labour of upwards of four hundred millions of men,
or more than double the number of males suppos Id to
inhabit the globe.

Even in this merely mechanical and dynamic point
of view, this is marvellous enough, but when to
this is added the consideration, which does not
seem to have occurred to the reviewer, that not
only the power of the hands of all the male inha-
bitants of the earth has been doubled by this in-
vention, but that it has afforded to the brains of
the gifted few, ordained to be the guides and
teachers of their fellow-men—yea, and to the
very voice of Divine inspiration itself—the means
of rapid dissemination of thought to a literally
infinite extent; that day by day, to millions of
minds, intelligence and instruction is conveyed
at a rate which the power of steam is alone
capable of accomplishing, we are enabled to form
a still higher and more correct estimate of the
unspeakable value of the engine first designed
and executed by James. Watt, not for the material
benefit only, but for the mental and moral ad-
vancement of the human race.

Truth's Conflicts. A Series of Essays on some
Great Questions of the I)xv. By the Rev
Stephen Jenner, M.A., late Curate of Camden
Church, Camberwell. London : Longmans.

WE promised to take up this original and
reflective work again in a notice of " Symbolism
in Ecclesiastical and Christian Worship," a sub-
ject entitled to the large space it occupies in this
volume. "There arc, it seems to me,' says Mr.
Ruskin, " three distinct questions to be con-