in the printer, not in the poet; and perhaps the line originally stood thus : Ilion shall perish whole, unbury'd, all. If so, both my objections vanish: and those who are conversant with the press, will not think this supposition improbable; fince much more unlikely mistakes often happen by the carelessness of compofitors. But tho I am willing to make all the allowance poffible to an author, who raifes our admiration too often not to have a right to the utmost candor, wherever he fails; yet I can find no excuse for an unaccountable absurdity he has fallen into, in translating a passage of the tenth book. Diomedand Ulyfses, taking advantage of the night, set out in order to view the Trojan camp. In their way they meet with Dolon, who is going from thence to the Grecian, upon an expedition of the fame kind. After having seized this unfortunate adventurer, and examined him concerning the situation and designs of the enemy; Diomed draws his sword, and strikes off Dolon's head, in the very instant that he is fupplicating for mercy: Φθεγδομθυε δ' αρα το γε καρη κονιησιν εμιχθη. Χ. 457. Mr. Pope has turned this into a most extraordinary miracle, by assuring us that the head spoke after it had quitted the body: The head yet fpeaking, mutter'd as it fell. This puts me in mind of a wonder of the same kind in the Fairy Queen, where Corflambo is represented as blafpheming, after his head had been struck off by prince Arthur: He fmote at him with all his might and main So furiously, that, ere he wist, he found His head before him tumbling on the ground, The whiles his babbling tongue did yet blaf pheme, And curs'd his God, that did him fo con- But Corflambo was the son of a giantess, and could conquer whole kingdoms by only looking at them. We may, perhaps, therefore allow him to talk, when every other man must be filent: whereas there is nothing in the history of poor Dolon, that can give him the leaft pretence to this fingular privilege. Mr. Pope seems to have been led into this blunder by Scaliger, who who has given the same sense to the verse, and then with great wisdom and gravity observes, falfum eft a pulmone caput avulfum loqui poffe. THE most pleasing picture in the whole Iliad, is, I think, the parting of Hector and Andromache: and our excellent tranflator has, in general, very successfully copied it. But in some places he seems not to have touched it with that delicacy of pencil, which graces the original; as he has entirely loft the beauty of one of the figures. Hector is represented as extending his arms to embrace the little Aftyanax, who being terrified with the unusual appearance of a man in armor, throws himself back upon his nurse's breast, and falls into tears. But tho the hero and his fon were designed to draw our principal attention, Homer intended likewife that we should cast a glance towards the nurse. For this purpose, he does not mark her out merely by the name of her office; but adds an epithet to shew that she makes no inconfiderable figure in the piece: he does not simply call her τιθηνη, but εύζωνα τιθηνη. This circumstance Mr. Pope has entirely overlooked : Ως Ως ειπων, ε παιδος ορεξαθαι φαιδιμος Εκλωρ. Thus having faid, th' illustrious chief of Troy I was going to object to the glittering terrors, in the last line but one: but I have already taken notice of these little affected expreffions, where the substantive is set at variance with its attribute. It is the observation of Quinctilian, that no poet ever excelled Homer in the fublimity with which he treats great fubjects, or in the delicacy and propriety he always difcovers discovers in the management of small ones. There is a passage in the ninth Iliad, which will justify the truth of the latter of these observations. When Achilles receives Ajax and Ulyffes in his tent, who were sent to him in the name of Agamemnon, in order to prevail with him to return to the army, Homer gives a very minute account of the entertainment, which was prepared for them upon that occasion. It is impossible, perhaps, in modern language to preserve the same dignity in descriptions of this kind, which so considerably raises the original: and indeed Mr. Pope warns his readers not to expect much beauty in the picture. However, a translator should be careful not to throw in any additional circumstances, which may lower and debase the piece; which yet Mr. Pope has, in his version of the following line : |