neither chooses to draw a beauty in a ruff, or a Frenchhead; but with its neck uncovered, and in its natural ornament of hair curled up, or spread becomingly ;· fo may a writer choose a natural manner of expreffing himself, which will always be in fashion, without affecting to borrow an odd folemnity and unintelligible pomp from the paft times, or humouring the prefent by falling into its affectations, and those phrases which are born to die with it.

I asked him, laftly, whether he would be frictly literal, or expatiate with further licenses? I would not be literal, replies he, or tied up to line for line in fuch a manner, wherein it is impoffible to exprefs in one language what has been delivered in another. Neither would I fo expatiate, as to alter my author's fentiments, or add others of my own. These errors are to be avoided on either hand, by adhering not only to the word, but the spirit and genius of an author; by confidering what he means, with what beautiful manner he has expreffed his meaning in his own tongue, and how he would have expressed himself, had it been Thus we ought to feek for HOMER in a verfion of HOMER other attempts are but transformations of him: fuch as Ovid tells us, where the name is retained, and the thing altered: this will be really what you mentioned in the compliment you began with, a tranfmigration of the poet from one country into an

in ours.

other.

Here ended the ferious part of our conference. All I remember further was, that having asked him, what

he

he defigned with all thofe editions and comments I obferved in his room? He made answer, that if any one, who had a mind to find fault with his performance, would but ftay till it was entirely finished, he bould have a very cheap bargain of them.

Since this difcourfe, I have often refolved to try what it was to tranflate in the spirit of a writer, and at last, chofe the Battle of the Frogs and Mice, which is afcribed to HOMER; and bears a nearer refemblance to his Iliad, than the Culex does to the Eneid: of Virgil. Statius and others think it a work of youth, written as a prelude to his greater poems. Chapman thinks it the work of his age, after he found men ungrateful; to fhew he could give ftrength, lineage, and. fame as he pleased, and praise a moufe as well as a: man. Thus, fays he, the poet profeffedly flung up the world, and applied himself at laft to hymns. Now, tho' this reafon of his may be nothing more than a Scheme formed out of the order in which HOMER'S works are printed, yet does the conjecture that this poem was written after the Iliad, appear probable, because of its frequent allufions to that poem. and particularly that there is not a frog or a moufe killed, which has not its parallel inftance there, in the death of fome warrior or other.

The poem itfelf is of the epic kind; the time of its action the duration of two days; the fubject, however in its nature frivolous, or ridiculous, raised, by having the most fining words and deeds of gods and heroes accommodated to it; and while other poems often com

pare

pare the illuftrious exploits of great men to those of brutes, this always brightens the subject by compariJons. drawn from things above it. We have a great character given it with respect to the fable in Gaddius de fcript. non ecclef. It appears, fays he, nearer perfection than the Iliad or Odyfes, and excels both in judgment, wit, and exquisite texture, fince it is a poem, perfect in its own kind. Nor does Crufus fpeak less. to its honour, with respect to the moral, when he cries out in an apostrophe to the reader; "Whoever you are, "mind not the names of these little animals, but look "into the things they mean; call them men, call them "kings or counsellors, or human polity itself, you have "here doctrines of every fort." And indeed, when I bear the frog talk concerning the mouse's family, I learn equality should be observed in making friendships; when I hear the moufe answer the frog, I remember, that a fimilitude of manners fhould be regarded in them; when I fee their councils affembling, I think of the buftles of human prudence; and when I fee the battle grow warm and glorious, our ftruggles for honour and empire appear before me.

This piece had many imitations of it in antiquity, as the fight of the Cats, the Cranes, the Starlings, the Spiders, &c. That of the cats is in the Bodlean library, but I was not fo lucky as to find it. I have taken the liberty to divide my tranflation into books, though it be otherways in the original, according as the ·fable allowed proper refling-places, by varying its fcene, or nature of action: this I did, after the ex

ample

ample of Ariftarchus and Zenodotus in the Iliad. I then thought of carrying the grammarians example further, and placing arguments at the head of each, which I framed as follows, in imitation of the fhort antient Greek infcriptions to the Iliad.

BOOK I.

In Alpha the ground
Of the quarrel is found.

BOOK II..

In Beta, we
The council fee..

BOOK III..

Dire Gamma relates
The work of the Fates.

But as I am averse from all information which' leffens our furprize, I only mention these for a handle to quarrel with the custom of long arguments before a poem. It may be neceffary in books of controverfy or abftrufe learning, to write an epitome before each part; but it is not kind to foreftal us in a work of fancy, and make our attention remifs by a previous account of the end of it.

. The next thing which employed my thoughts was the heroes names. It might perhaps take off fomewhat from the majesty of the poem, had I caft away fuch noble founds as, Phyfignathus, Lycopinax, and

Gram

Crambophagus, to fubftitute Bluff-cheek, Lick-difb, and Cabbage-eater, in their places. It is for this reafon I have retained them untranflated: however, I place them in English before the poem, and fometimes give a fhort character extracted out of their names; ass in Polyphonus, Pternophagus, &c. that the reader may. not want fome light of their honour in the original.

But what gave me a greater difficulty was, to know. how I should follow the poet, when he inferted pieces of lines from his Iliad, and ftruck out a sprightlinefs by. their new application. To fupply this in my tranflation I have added one or two of HOMER's particularities and ufed two or three allufions to fome of our English poets who most resemble him, to keep fome image of this. Spirit of the original with an equivalent beauty.

To

ufe more might make my performance Jeem a cento rather than a tranflation, to those who know not the neceffity I lay under.

I am not ignorant, after all my care, how the world: receives the best compofitions of this nature. A man need only go to a painter's, and apply what he hears faid of a picture to a translation, to find how he shall be ufed upon his own, or his author's account. There one Spectator tells you, a piece is extremely fine, but he fets. no value on what is not like the face it was drawn for ;. while a fecond informs you, fuch another is extremely like, but he cares not for a piece of deformity, though its likeness be never fo exact.

Yet notwithstanding all which happens to the best,. when I tranflate, I have a defire to be reckoned a

mongst