GREEK ANTHOLOGY.—No. II.

Honest Friend—

I call theehonest, because thou needs must be such, since thou art reading what neither toucheth thy cupidity, nor enkindleth a flame of self-dedicated love. I call theefriend, as in common courtesy I should, till I perceive some demonstrations of enmity.

It is deep night. I have trimmed my lamp, taken aturnacross the room, and am again seated at my pleasing toil. The Anthology lies open before me—a brown, German page, rough, but scholarlike. I have pondered each word and phrase, till they all bear a distinct and tangible significance. I have been striving to draw forth the beauty that lies locked in the cold, dead arms of an unspoken language. It requires a mightier magician, and a more prevailing charm. Lines, that are instinct with holy feeling, I have turned and labored with fruitless minuteness. I can transcribe the form—but thelife—where is it? My spirit weepeth over its own stupidity. Yet not utterly am I in fault. I am a modern, and an American, and almost—butnot quite—a Yankee. I have breathed a dollar-and-cent atmosphere. There is no soul—no enthusiasm in the land. Utility—cold, base utility is the all-in-all. Money is the shibboleth of rank and influence.

O cives, cives, quærenda pecunia primum.

Every thing is reduced to a standard of rationality, as if it were not the most irrational thing that ever sickened a liberal eye, to bind down passion, and poetry, and the “life of life,” by the frigid rules of mathematical exactness. It is my solemn belief, that within fifty years a double-track rail-road will run through the very vale of Tempe, and a steam-engine be propelled by the waters of Arethusa. Improvement! By the little toe of the Great Mogul, may the wheels of such improvement “long tarry in their coming!” Reader, I will not fret. My profit therefrom would be about as much asthy pleasure. But thou knowest not the feelings with which I uncork a bottle of pure Samian wine; and, in transferring it into an American jug, behold its strength and fragrance evaporate—the body swelling with dropsical inflation, while the spirit is oozing away through each treacherous pore.Sed satis. “Quid me querelis exanimas tuis?”

Behold! an enigmatic squib from Euclid, the geometer—him, whose labors I was wont to burden with “the mountain of my curse.” He was, probably, the first to solemnize a marriage so unnatural as that of Geometry and Poetry—January and May.

An ass and mule were bearing wine one day:Hard on the ass the vinous burden lay;When thus the mule her fainting dam addressed—“Why, like a maiden’s, pants thy groaning breast?Should’st thougiveme one portion of thy share,Then I should double of thy burden bear.Should’st thoutakeone, alike are our conditions.”Solve me this problem, ye arithmeticians.

An ass and mule were bearing wine one day:

Hard on the ass the vinous burden lay;

When thus the mule her fainting dam addressed—

“Why, like a maiden’s, pants thy groaning breast?

Should’st thougiveme one portion of thy share,

Then I should double of thy burden bear.

Should’st thoutakeone, alike are our conditions.”

Solve me this problem, ye arithmeticians.

If the reader be at all skilled in threading the labyrinths of Algebra, he may discover that the ass bore five, and the mule seven measures. (Vide Day’s Alg. passim.)

Here we have a compliment to a beautiful girl, from Plato, even from the veritableIpse Dixithimself, whose frosty philosophy thawed before the fire of love.

Thou gazest at the stars, my star,And would I were the sky,That I might view thee from afarWith many a glowing eye.

Thou gazest at the stars, my star,

And would I were the sky,

That I might view thee from afar

With many a glowing eye.

By Theodorus, to Harmocrates, whose nasal developement was uncommonly huge.

Thy nose, my friend, is so excessive,To call itthinewould be a wrong to’t,But ratherthatis the possessive,And we should judge that you belong to’t;And having met thee, properly I say,Nose’s Harmocrates I saw to-day.

Thy nose, my friend, is so excessive,

To call itthinewould be a wrong to’t,

But ratherthatis the possessive,

And we should judge that you belong to’t;

And having met thee, properly I say,

Nose’s Harmocrates I saw to-day.

Ammianus gives quite a caustic turn to the common wish, that the earth may lie lightly on the breast of the departed.

Light lie the earth, Nearchus, on thy breast,That dogs may tear thee from thy place of rest.

Light lie the earth, Nearchus, on thy breast,

That dogs may tear thee from thy place of rest.

Here follows a little thing, replete with that still despair, so natural to a thoughtful Heathen.

By Archias.

I praise the Thracians, since for those they mourn,Whose eyes are opening to the light of day,But joy, when Death, the slave of Fate, has tornTheir sons and daughters from their arms away.For we, the living, through each cruel illWith painful steps continually go,While they, who sleep beneath the grave’s green hill,Have found, at last, a refuge from their wo.

I praise the Thracians, since for those they mourn,

Whose eyes are opening to the light of day,

But joy, when Death, the slave of Fate, has torn

Their sons and daughters from their arms away.

For we, the living, through each cruel ill

With painful steps continually go,

While they, who sleep beneath the grave’s green hill,

Have found, at last, a refuge from their wo.

Here is a most beautiful epitaph upon Sophocles, composed by Limmias, the Theban. In the first place, I will render it literally and consecutively into plain English, although, reader, thou knowest that—saving only in the Bible—the life and loveliness of all poetry dies under thisossifyingprocess. “Gently over the tomb of Sophocles, gently, oh! ivy, mayst thou creep, pouring thy green curls abroad; and all about it may the petals of the rose bloom, and the grape-loving vine, scattering its moist branches around, on account of the wise docility, which he of the honey-tongue displayed, among the Muses and the Graces.”

It was thus elegantly translated many years since:

Wind, gentle evergreen, to form a shadeAround the tomb where Sophocles is laid:Sweet ivy, wind thy boughs, and intertwineWith blushing roses and the clustering vine;Thus will thy lasting leaves, with beauties hung,Prove grateful emblems of the lays he sung,Whose soul, exalted like a god of wit,Among the Muses and the Graces writ.

Wind, gentle evergreen, to form a shade

Around the tomb where Sophocles is laid:

Sweet ivy, wind thy boughs, and intertwine

With blushing roses and the clustering vine;

Thus will thy lasting leaves, with beauties hung,

Prove grateful emblems of the lays he sung,

Whose soul, exalted like a god of wit,

Among the Muses and the Graces writ.

Beautifully done—yet somewhat marred by the incongruous idea ofa soul writing. For my own attempt, I claim no merit, save something of fidelity.

Gently, oh! ivy, gently curl thy tresses,Where the cold bones of Sophocles repose;May thy young tendrils clasp in soft caressesThe bursting petals of the blushing rose.May the green vine, its dewy branches flinging,A lasting bower above thy grave entwine,For the deep wisdom thou didst show, when singingAmong the Graces and the heavenly Nine.

Gently, oh! ivy, gently curl thy tresses,

Where the cold bones of Sophocles repose;

May thy young tendrils clasp in soft caresses

The bursting petals of the blushing rose.

May the green vine, its dewy branches flinging,

A lasting bower above thy grave entwine,

For the deep wisdom thou didst show, when singing

Among the Graces and the heavenly Nine.

Thou knowest how the cruel Acrisius committed his daughter Danaë, with her infant Perseus, to the protection of a small ark, and the mercy of a raging sea. In this—certainly one of the most touching fragments of all antiquity, and written by Simonides, the Ceian, a poet, heart and soul—Danaë is introduced, alone and cheerless, yet watching, with a mother’s tenderness, over her sleeping son.

Round the frail boat the wild winds, roaring, swept,And shook the heart of Danaë with fear,While from her cold, pale cheek, as Theseus slept,Dropt the fast tear.And round her little boy, with closer strain,Her folding arm the desolate mother flung,And to the heedless winds her humble plainHalf said, half sung.“Sweetly thou restest in thy joyless dwelling,And slumber sealeth up thy spirit mild,Though the dark waves be far around thee swelling,Perseus, my child.O’er thy bright locks while angry winds are lashingThe storm-chafed spray, still sleeps thy careless eye:Little thou heedest, though the waves be dashingInsanely by.Wrapped in thy purple cloak—my breast thy pillow—Thou driftest helplessly—the ocean’s toy—Rocked in thy slumbers by the rolling billow—My little boy!Did not this peril at thy heart lie lightly,Unto thy little ear my words would creep:Butnowthy face even through the gloom shines brightly—Oh! Perseus, sleep.And may the waves, and may our sorrows slumber,And may all snares be broken in our path;And on our foes, great Jove, for Perseus numberThy tenfold wrath.”

Round the frail boat the wild winds, roaring, swept,

And shook the heart of Danaë with fear,

While from her cold, pale cheek, as Theseus slept,

Dropt the fast tear.

And round her little boy, with closer strain,

Her folding arm the desolate mother flung,

And to the heedless winds her humble plain

Half said, half sung.

“Sweetly thou restest in thy joyless dwelling,

And slumber sealeth up thy spirit mild,

Though the dark waves be far around thee swelling,

Perseus, my child.

O’er thy bright locks while angry winds are lashing

The storm-chafed spray, still sleeps thy careless eye:

Little thou heedest, though the waves be dashing

Insanely by.

Wrapped in thy purple cloak—my breast thy pillow—

Thou driftest helplessly—the ocean’s toy—

Rocked in thy slumbers by the rolling billow—

My little boy!

Did not this peril at thy heart lie lightly,

Unto thy little ear my words would creep:

Butnowthy face even through the gloom shines brightly—

Oh! Perseus, sleep.

And may the waves, and may our sorrows slumber,

And may all snares be broken in our path;

And on our foes, great Jove, for Perseus number

Thy tenfold wrath.”

“Solventurfletutabulæ: tu,lector, abibis.”

Hermeneutes.

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