"In Bibliothecam Bodleianum. "Barbara Pyramidum silent miracula Memphis, "Ad Bodleium. "Hic ubi triste Chaos quondam crassæque tenebræ Et fœdum visu, et nil nisi squalor erat. Conspicui & varii pulchro stant ordine libri, Disposita in classes quæque Camæna suas.- Reddita Musa sibi est BODLA a Præside, fiunt "Ad Eundem. "Quæ tam seposita est, quæ gens tam barbara voce, Aut olim Hebræi, aut Syri, quodcunque Vetustas, Eternumque tuum resonabunt mænia nomen, ROB. BURTON, Art. Mag. ex Æde Christ." “ Εις ΘΩΜΑΝ ΒΟΔΛΕΙΟΝ, Ιππεα επιφανεσταίον, ος την εν Οξονία Βιβλιοθηκην ανασκευασας, και αυξησας βίβλες αριθμο κρείτες εις αυτην ανέθηκε. 6.6 « Τον μεγαν ενταυθοι μικρα κονις αμφικαλύπτει Νυν απεχεις μισθον, χ' α χαρις εκ αχαρις. ISAACUS CASAUBONUS scribebam in inclytâ Academia Oxoniensi, & in ipsa Bibliotheca Bodleiana.” H. E. ART. CLXVI.-The Life and Death of Hector. One and the first of the most puissant, ualiant, and renowned monarchies of the world, called the Nyne Worthies. Shewing his jrvincible force, together with the marvailous, and moste famous acts by him atchieved and done in the great, long, and terrible siege which the Princes of Greece held about the towne of Troy, for the space of tenne yeares. And finally his unfortunate death after hee had fought a hundred mayne battailes in open field against the Grecians: the which heerein is all at large described. Wherein there were slaine on both sides fourteene hundred, and sixe thowsand, fourscore, and sixe men. Written by John Lidgate, Monke of Berry, and by him dedicated to the high and mighty Prince Henrie the Fift, King of England. At London printed by Thomas Purfoot. 1614.* Folio. pp. 318. Double columns. In the preceding article the works of a popular poet, universally sought for, being construed from the language of a sister kingdom into the vernacular tongue, for more general comprehension and accommodation of the English reader, seem a consistent labour, and the editor probably invited to it by the public voice: but in the present article a poem *This title is in the centre of a wood cut, size of the page, the royal arms in an arch at top, with head, border of roses, and thistles; at the corners the four quarters of the globe represented with usual names and animals on escutcheons; on pedestals of each side wholelength figures of "Wisedome" and "Science." In a small compartment at top the figure of Fame, and in another at the bottom the author in his study writing, table, books, &c. Q. If same ornament was not used by an earlier printer, and described by Herbert; in whose work it cannot be easily referred to, from the want of a more copious index? printed above a century, with a subsequent edition, not simply modernized, but transposed, and new modelled, from the heroic couplet into six-line stanzas, extending to the incredible number of above thirty thousand lines,† appears the most extraordinary instance of useless patience, unwearied perseverance, and distorted taste in an editor that can be recorded in our language, for which scarce any popularity of the author could furnish a reasonable pretence. The poem was first printed by Pinson, in 1513, under the title of "The hystory, sege, and dystruccyon of Troy;" again by Marshe in 1555. These editions supplied all demands of the public until the regeneration in the present article, which commences with “The Epistle as it was dedicated vnto the high and mightie Prince Henry the Fift," consisting of thirteen seven-line stanzas; then follows, “Lenvoy. "Go forth, my booke, vaild with the princely grace And who so ere against thee takes offence, Bee thou not stubborn with presumption; The following analysis of this perversion of genius may be worth preserving. Book 1 contains 9 chapters, 799 stanzas. 2............12............1419 3............ 7............ 967 4............ 7...........1241 5............ 2............ 599 6025 6-line stanzas. But see thou arme thyselfe with patience, "The Translator to his booke. "And sith thou art not limb'd with trees nor flowers And pray them, that they will thy faults amend." These lines may be found in Herbert, p. 258, and shew the harmony of versification possessed by the editor, or demi-author. The following is part of the invocation to the Muse from "The Preface to the Reader," in fiftysix six-line stanzas. 1 "For thou art sayd of rhetoricke to beare Thou canst direct each instrument at will: Els will the clowds of ignorance enclose, And round encampe my wits that are so bare, And cause the rude (to poets vtter foes) To laugh at me: But, such as learned are, I will intreat what faults so ere they find, And if that in my verses I have err'd, (As no man but may erre what ere he be) |