The Sun.
London, England, 1817-05-19 00:00:00

THE

Though the celebrityoflif ann. has invited many translators,
and some of them very rminent men, it cannot be said that the
rotult has been such as to place the august Poet of Rome in
his proper dignity and beauty before the public of, Britain.
The illustrious DRYDEN wjs called to the task by the voice,
as it were, of the nation : he was encouraged in the prosecu-
tion of it by the favour of the Great, who were proud in his
day to he regarded as the patrons of the Muses, and herwas
congratulated bn its accomplishment by all the first wits of
his age. But, however aided by the circumstances tinder
which it was 'composed, or however praised on its appear-
ane in the world, his work has not been found, by the im-
partial verdict of subseqUent generations, to be worthy of its
first fame, or cerrespooding with the demands of •the occa-
sion. lime translation of the NNEIs is now very generally
acknowledged to heat, unequal composition; to be slovenly
and mean in many of its parts; anti, on the whole, to be un-
faithful to the sense, and altilgether alien from the character
of its magnificent original. Many of its pass.irs, it is tree,
ate eminently .spirited, harmonious, and poetic, 'ltch as
Might be expected tram the pen of DRYDEN; and, with all
its' faults, it was unquestionably the best transliitiou of the
great AVOsTAN Eut which we posses'sed, till the present
day. Still, however, it left o Want, 'of which the English
Reader had cause to eb-opinin and tbli Want Is nor,. at
length, as we think, sufficiently supplied by the new trans-
lation of the MNRit, tatvilicil we are now desirous of calling
the attention of slich of our Readers as' are interested in
works of this nature, and are rotalifieg to decide on its pre.
tensions to the public approbation...,

The inequality of DnYnEtes Nfuse iJ visible not 6nTy tit the
;meal pages of her long task, but In the general eircution
of some entire books of the Pnem, in conseiluence either of
their having enraged more of the author's attention, or of
their having been written in a happier humour of his mind.
Among those books of the English 2Eszts, which discover
mkt Of the powers of Dnvnen•, may be reckoned the fourth.
the seventh, the ninth, the eleventh, and the twelfth. From
these, therefore, we will Select some of the must brilliant
Passages, and, by placing them with the corresllffloling
passages in the more modern translatio.o, wu shall thus enable
the reader to determine in the fairest way on the respective
merits of the rival Poets.

Our first transcript shall be of the translation of that pa-
thetic and awfully terrific description, in the fourth book, of
the Prodigies and Omens, which, acting on the mind of the
unhappy Qum:, impelled it to phrensy, and urged bur to
self•destruction. The passage begins at line 4bo, and ends
with line 473, in the original
" The wretched Queen, pursued by cruel fate,
Begins at length the light of heaven to hate;
And loathe to live : then dire portents she sees,
To buten on the death her soul decrees.
Strange to relate! for when, before the shrine,
She pours in sacrikce the purple wine;
The purple wine ir turn"d to putrid blood;
And the white offer'd milk converts to mud.
Thit dire presage, to her alone reveal'd,
From all, e'en (tom her sister she conceard,
A marble Temple stood within the grove;
Sacred to death and to her murder'd love,
The hennaed chapel she had hung around
With snowy fleeces, and with garlands crown'd.
Oft, when she visited this lonely dome,
Strange voices inflect from her husband's tomb.
She thotight she heard him sums sou her away
Invite her to his grave, and:chide her stay.
Mutely 'tie heard .r when, with a boding note,
The solitary screech owl
,strains her throat
And on a chimney's top or turret's height,
With songs obscene disturbs the silence of the night.
Besides, old prophecies augment her fears :
And stern MAMAS in her dreams appears
Disdainful as by day. She seems alone
Tewanderin her sleep through ways unknown,
Guideless and dark; or in a desert plain
To seek her sabjeets, and to seek in vain.
• Like Pr:NTlfige's when; distracted his fear,
He saw two suns an.d double Thebee appear:
Or mad.ORLSTEII, what his mother's ghost'
Full in his face infernal wales tost't
And shook-her snaky leeks. tie shuns the sight; •
e'er the stage, surprised with mortal fright "
The Furies guard the gate, and intercept his flight.
Dustiest.
Much of this is good; and re prober it se one of ihe'-bela
efforts of the sublime Muse of, Dwebas. If the following
translation, therefore, should be nutted on the "tinge in .latti

superior, we Tenn
or one-r4unre par ants in 141VUT 05 04
cositemporartnay be confidently presumed i—
• Now all sUbdued, and by tier fetes spin-LIN,
Anxiiiiis on death unhapPyllitio call'd:
Thc,beatus of heaven fetigile hei sicken'd sight
And re.rtents ciriiivd to Scare her from the light.
As Oft frequents with gifts the hallow'd shrtuii •
And-potivs libations of neetareous wine;
Sit r relate ! trpnn the sacred thitit • • ;
The wine falls blackening and corrupts to toles.
This pradigy to none-her lips impart ;
froin the sister of lier heart:
Within the space her ample courts include;
Itais'd to tier former love, a temple stood :
Whoie Wells she dress'd, in fond devationi houri;
With Satiwyffeeces and with festal flowers.
I fere now, whru earth reposed in night's embrace;
gisMil accents whisper throngh the place.
The dead are there,•;—.and, with no mortal tune; -
Her conscious huitiarid claims her for his own .
And, lonely an the roof, night's bird prolongs
Her note; of woe, atid shrieks funereal songi.
Predictions too, front ancient prophets brOught,
with dread simrning on her startled thought.
In dreams note fierce Xmeas, wrapt in gloom,
Inipeli her plitenti, rind provokes her doom :
, Now solitary, watideritig,wiztry, sloe,
•
She seems o'er long and trackless wastes to go :
To seek, ebandoretl, and a queen no more,
tier Tytiot cnuirades on a desert shore.
glad as wild Ps.s.rriens, when his roll* eyei
Saw front the deep infernal legions rise :
Aud, by distraction's lawless poWer coinpell'd,
A two sun and double Thebes beheld
Or Mind-struck, like On arts on the stage, -
When, pale With fright; he shuns his Atother's rage
While, pressing on Lis steps, ilia Shakes her lianas,
Ared with !dick serpents and Tertareari bran&
Aghast he flies ; but at the guarded gate.
The avenging terrors of the•kuriei wait.
Svstmoss.