*O, there is much that never can be spoke
By a poor client in a threadbare cloak.

But fhould fome god, or man of godlike foul, The malice of your niggard fate controul, And bless you with a knight's eftate; how dear Would you be then! how wondrous great appear From nothing! Virro, so reserved of late, Grows quite familiar: "Brother, fend your plate : Dear brother Trebius! you were wont to say You liked thefe dainties; let me help you, pray." You, riches, are his "brother; " and to you This warmth of friendship, this refpect, is due.' Giff. Juv. V. 193. In the following lines, which conclude the 4th Satire, Mr Hodgson has surpassed all his predecessors.

And oh ! that ever in fuch idle sport

Had liv'd the lord of that obfequious court;
Nor worfe employ'd in favage fcenes of blood
That robb'd the city of the brave and good-
While high-born cowards faw their brothers' doom,
And vengeance flumber'd o'er the Lamian tomb.
But when he dar'd affail a vulgar tread,

Up rose the people, and the tyrant bled. '

The two translators are very seldom at variance in the meaning of Juvenal. He has been sifted and conned over by so numerous a tribe of commentators, that almost every possible reading and signification has been forestalled; and in doubtful passages, it is mere matter of opinion which of their various interpretations we adopt. Mr Gifford's intimate acquaintance, too, with all they had written, enabled him to collect their scattered rays, and bring them, to bear so well upon his author, that nothing was left to any future translator but to follow in his steps. In one or two of the few passages where there is a difference, we are disposed to agree with Mr Hodgson; e. g. in thinking that the expression Prosit mihi vos dixisse Puellas,' applies to the youth, not the virginity, of the Muses; and in considering the line, Imponit finem sapiens et rebus honestis,' VI. 444., as meaning that a prudent woman sets bounds even to laudable pursuits, and

See in Sat. XI. 85. Gifford, another inftance of this clofe coinci dence of couplets.

Bawl for coarfe pottage that my friends may hear,
But whisper" fweetmeats" in the servant's ear.'

Mr Hodgson flightly alters it into

Cry out for "cabbage foup" when friends are near,
But whisper" turtle" in my fervant's ear.'

and not, as Gifford explains it, She lectures too in ethics, And declaims on the chief good.' At other times, he seems to differ from his predecessor merely for the sake of variety and novelty of version. Thus he continues, with Holiday, to apply the passage (Sat. III. 168.) beginning Fictilibus coenare pudet,' &c. to Curius Dentatus, though Mr Gifford has clearly shown, in a note, that the observation is general, and directed against those who pinch and starve themselves in the country for the sake of a short splendour in town.

Both the translators agree in referring the expressions, Sat. II. 159. Illuc heu! miseri traducimur,' to the certainty of a future state; but, viewing them in connexion with what follows, we cannot help coinciding with those who think, that the patriotic poet is here lamenting the bloated extent and corruption of the empire; and that, in the midst of conquests abroad, profligacy is preying on its vitals, and undermining its greatness.

Our author commits some mistakes against grammar and good English, which, trifling as they are, we should scarcely have expected from the verbal accuracy of an Etonian. • Each thought their native gods,' &c. XV. 58. Sooner than me, shall these. vile Syrians sign?' II. 130. A single sheave' is written instead of sheaf, from the dire necessity of rhiming. 'Boyish gold,' and dog-like offals,' by the figure catachresis, express resemblance instead of fitness. Dumb-founders, p. 114. and stingo, p. 282, are below the dignity of heroic verse.

We were most pleased with Mr Hodgson's translations of the Eleventh and Fourteenth Satires; partly from their intrinsic excellence, and partly, we think, from the superiority of execution, especially in the latter, which is the only one which we feel no hesitation in preferring to its rival. The Tenth has also great merit, of which we should be more sensible, if all the translations of it were not thrown into the back-ground by Johnson's imitation. No management can reconcile us to the detestable grossness of the Sixth. The Eighth and Thirteenth would have been better translated by Mr Hodgson than by those to whom indolence or the partiality of friendship has consigned the task. The former is a very close and very dull version, greatly inferior to Mr Gifford's. The latter contains a few good passages; but there are more weak lines in it than in all the rest of the book.

Upon the whole, we think Mr Hodgson has accomplished his aim of giving to Juvenal a more uniformly mellifluous cadence than he ever had before. He has dressed him, if we may be allowed the metaphor, in a suit which does not fit quite so well as the former, but shows a glossier nap, and has a finer, though flimsier

flimsier texture. He possesses great powers of easy and elegant versification. Had the public been in want of a translation of Juvenal, the present would have amply supplied it; but Mr Hodgson has directed his intellectual labour to a department that was already overstocked; and he must not be surprised, nor discouraged, if his returns be but small, either in profit or in fame. There were no errors of the public to be corrected, no important lights to be thrown on a favourite classic. The task he undertook was little more than a mere balancing of syllables, and steering clear of preoccupied rhimes.

We have certainly no right to interfere with any man in the application he chooses to make of his talents; yet we may be allowed to regret, that those which Mr Hodgson possesses had not been directed to a less hackneyed subject. Many others might have been found, more interesting to the world, and better suited to his own powers. The charm of his versification is chiefly perceptible in the descriptive parts, where the poet dwells on natural scenery, or the primitive simplicity of ancient manners. Hence the superiority we ascribed to the Eleventh Satire, and the pleasure we receive from such lines as the following.

And Aufter, refting in his filent cave,

Shakes from his wing the moisture of the wave.' Sat. X. Now, there are several poets of antiquity that would have opened a wider field for the display of this peculiar excellence of our author; a field where he would have been less elbowed and jostled by competitors. From the works of Statius, of whom he speaks more than once in the highest terms, and to whose merits no English translation has yet done full justice; and of Ovid, whom he denominates the most beautiful of all descriptive poets,' Mr Hodgson, we are confident, could make a selection, that would delight a much more extended circle of readers than he can expect to peruse the present volume. Our confidence is grounded on some exquisite morsels he has given in the Notes, as well from the poets above-mentioned, as from Catullus, Claudian, Martial, &c. As we look upon these translations to be not the least valuable part of the book, we shall subjoin one or two. The beautiful address to Sleep, in the Sylva of Statius (V. 4.), which is translated at p. 460, commences thus.

How have I wrong'd thee, Sleep, thou gentlest power

Of Heav'n! that I alone, at night's dread hour,

Still from thy foft embraces am reprefs'd,

Nor drink oblivion on thy balmy breast ?

Now every field and every flock is thine,

And feeming flumbers bend the mountain pine;
Hufh'd is the tempeft's howl, the torrent's roar ;

And the fmooth wave lies pillow'd on the fhore.' &c.

The

The following is a humorous description of a parasite, from Martial.

• When from the bath, or hot, or cold, you come,
The kind Menogenes attends you home;
When at the courts you ply the healthy ball,
He picks it up adroitly, fhould it fall:

Tho' wash'd, tho' drefs'd, he follows where it flies,
Recovers and returns the dufty prize,

And overwhelms you with civilities.
Call for your towel; and, tho' more defil'd
Than the foul linen of a fickly child,

He'll fwear 'tis whiter than the driven fnow ;-
Comb your lank hair across your wrinkled brow,
And with a tone of ecftacy, he'll fwear,
"Achilles had not fuch a head of hair!"
Himfelf will bring the vomit to your hand,

And wipe the drops that on your forehead stand;

Praife and admire you till, fatigu'd, you fay,

}

Do, my good friend, do dine with me to-day!' P. 415.

Or the following is a translation of that fine passage in Lueretius, (V. 1217.)

And oh! how deep our fhudderin fpirits feel

A dread of Heaven thro' every member steal,

When the ftrong lightning ftrikes the blatted ground, And thunder rolls the murmuring clouds around. Shake not the nations? And the monarch's nod, Bows it not low before the prefent God, Left for foul deeds, or haughty words, be fent His hurried hour of awful punishment?' p. 528. About half the volume is made up of Notes. They are of a character so different from the poetry, that we could scarcely believe they both came from the same pen. Mr Hodgson seems to be out of his element when he writes prose. He steps more gracefully in fetters, than at large. With a small portion of useful annotation, there is mixed up an immense mass of flippancy, shallowness and absurdity. He seems to have imagined, but we cannot conceive upon what grounds, that it must be highly gratifying to the public to know his sentiments of men and things; and he has omitted no opportunity, and created many, of procuring them that gratification. Summary judgment is passed on our furniture, our fashions, our dramatic exhibitions, our writers in prose and verse, and an endless variety of subjects, on which he pronounces with the decisiveness of age, and the petulance of youth. The small compass of a Note precludes investigation or reasoning; so that we seldom gain more than the comfortable assurance that such is Mr Hodgson's opinion. He skips with the agility of a squirrel from one topic to

another;

another; and it is not always easy to follow the rapidity of his motions. Thus, in a long Note on nullas nummorum ereximus aras,' Sat. I., we find the following passage (p. 325.) Holiday says, the temple was dedicated to the god Es-As in præsenti-Ready money at all events a scarce divinity. Talking of the god Æs, Cloacina the goddess of ease naturally suggests herself; which goddess as naturally suggests Chilo, Cleobulus, and George Colman. Surely Mr Hodgson, when he goes so far out of his way to arrive at a low and dirty allusion, forgets, that nastiness is not wit; and though not, perhaps, absolutely inconsistent with each other, he has sufficiently proved, both in this and his first Note, that they are not necessarily coexistent.

He appears to have emptied into these Notes the contents, either of his common-place book, if he has one, or of a memory full of shreds and patches, unregistered and unarranged. He not only retails all the silly stories he can remember, but he must tell us even about those he has forgotten. Thus, speaking of the Beneventanus sutor' of Juvenal, I.-46., he says (p. 405), I once heard a story of a bishop (not a prince) of Benevento, which, I believe, is in point; but from not " keeping count" of these bishops, it is erased from my memory, as Sancho's story of the goats was from his, " abiit, excessit, evasit, erupit "—" Over the hills, and far away," as Lord Kenyon translated it:' and so ends the Note. It would be difficult to point out any one sentence embracing so great a variety of topics, tacti sed non ornati; and yet, withal, so guiltless of any thing like meaning.

There is also a perpetual recurrence throughout the Notes to some favourite joke about hair; which has been allowed even to creep into the text-Worthy of all the hair of ancient times. Mr Hodgson labours, through many a dull page, to be witty on this playful' subject, as he calls it; and tells us, with masonic obscurity, that hair is the warrant of enjoyment, as well as the symbol of virtue.' We do not pretend, nor are we very anxious. to understand this joke: it is probably part of the slang which always prevails among a number of men that live much together; and many good things, we have no doubt, are sported on the subject at academical dinners: but we would advise our author, when he next appears before the public, to drop the cant phraseology and local associations of a college common-room. Let him choose a subject that has something of novelty to recommend it; banish all annotation, or confine it rigidly to the purpose of illustration; and we will venture to predict a happier result to his future labours, than is likely to follow from the present attempt. We feel considerable hesitation in recommending original composition, not merely from our sense of the superior