But why on new-year's day, said I again, Are suits commenc'd in courts? The reason's plain, With business is the year auspiciously begun; From the first word, we guess the whole design, Their ears and temples always open are." } Is there a possibility that any thing can be more different from Ovid in Latin than this Ovid in English? Quam sibi dispar! The translation is indeed beneath all criticism. But let us see what Mr. Massey can do with the sublime and more animated parts of the performance, where the subject might have given him room to shew his skill, and the example of his author stirred up the fire of poetry in his breast, if he had any in it. Towards the end of the second book of the Fasti, Ovid has introduced the most tender and interesting story of Lucretia. The original is inimitable. Let us see what Mr. Massey has made of it in his translation. After he has described Tarquin returning from the sight of the beautiful Lucretia, he proceeds thus: "The near approach of day the cock declar'd, (1) Jam dederat cantum lucis prænuncius ales; Cum referunt juvenes in sua castra pedein. MASSEY'S OVID'S FASTI. Back to the camp; but Sextus there could find Thus at her wheel she sat! and thus was drest! Hos habuit vultus: hic illi verba fuere: Comparat indigno vimque dolumque toro. Accipit ærata juvenem Collatia porta: Condere jam vultu sole parante suos. Hostis, ut hospes, init penetralia Collatina: Comiter excipitur: sanguine junctus erat. Quantum animis erroris inest! parat inscia rerum Infelix epulas hostibus illa suis. Functus erat dapibus: poscunt sua tempora somni. Surgit, et auratum vagina deripit ensem: Et venit in thalamos, nupta pudica, tuos. Utque torum pressit; ferrum, Lucretia, mecum est, Sed tremit, ut quondam stabulis deprensa relictis, Quid faciat? pugnet? vincetur femina pugna. Nunc primum externa pectora tacta manu. Falsus adulterii testis adulter ero. Interimam famulum; cum quo deprensa fereris. Quid, victor, gaudes? hæc te victoria perdet. Grandævumque patrem fido cum conjuge castris Utque vident habitum; quæ luctus causa, requirunt : Illa diu reticet, pudibundaque celat amictu Ora. Fluunt lacrymæ more perennis aquæ. Hinc pater, hinc conjux lacrymas solantur, et orant So though by absence lessen'd was his fire, But Tarquin still pursued his vile intent; That what he could not win, he might command; Trembling with fear, she not a word could say, Appall'd and stunn'd, her breath she hardly draws; She a weak woman, he a vig'rous man. By your dead corpse I'll kill and lay a slave, And begg'd she would the cruel cause declare." Our readers will easily perceive by this short specimen, how very unequal Mr. Massey is to a translation of Ovid. In many places he has deviated entirely from the sense, and in every part fallen infinitely below the strength, elegance, and spirit of the original. We must beg leave, therefore, to remind him of the old Italian proverb,-" Il tradattores Tratatore," and hope he will never for the future traduce and injure any of those poor ancients who never injured him, by thus pestering the world with such translations as even his own school-boys ought to be whipped for. (1) (1) ["It was the merit which Goldsmith discovered in criticising a despi. cable translation of Ovid's Fasti by a pedantic schoolmaster, and his · Enquiry into Polite Literature,' which first introduced him to the acquaintance of Dr. Smollett."-AIKIN.] XIII.-MARRIOTT'S "FEMALE CONDUCT; AN ESSAY ON THE ART OF PLEASING." [From the Critical Review, 1759. "Female Conduct; being an Essay on the Art of Pleasing. To be practised by the Fair Sex, before and after Marriage. A Poem, in two books. Inscribed to Plautilla. By Thomas Marriott, Esq." 8vo.] THIS performance is dedicated to her royal highness the Princess of Wales, as the distinguished patroness of female virtue. In the preface, the author gives some account of the poem, and endeavours to anticipate the malevolence of the critics. He expresses apprehension on one subject, which, however, we will venture to say is groundless; that is, "some people will say he is too much a poet." He might also have spared his apology, for having used “every art of persuasion and argument, either by repetition, amplification, tale, fable, example, or allegory, and every pleasing manner of conveying precepts, and enforcing doctrines.” Mr. Marriott needs no excuse for that which cannot be displeasing. This poem, we are informed, is intended for the use and amusement of the female sex only; and the author hopes the salutary precepts and precautions it contains, may prove an antidote to the poison of Ovid, and all modern productions of the like pernicious nature. We hope so too, and commend the author for the morality of his undertaking. Prefixed to the poem we find an ode on the death of the Duke of Marlborough, together with an imitation of the eighth ode of the fourth book of Horace, intended to be sent to his grace at the beginning of the new year.(1) In this piece, the most remarkable circumstance is this: Mr. (1) [Charles Spencer, second duke of Marlborough. He died at Munster, in Westphalia, in October 1758.] |