Hector, returning from the field of battle, to vifit Helen his fifter-in-law, and his brother Paris, who had fought unfuccessfully hand in hand with Menelaus, from thence goes to his ova palace to see his wife Andromache, and his infant fon Aftyanax. The description of that interview is the fubject of this tranflation.
THUS having faid, brave Hector went to fee
His virtuous wife, the fair Andromache.
He found her not at home; for the was gone,
Attended by her maid and infant fon,
To climb the steepy tower of Ilion:
From whence, with heavy heart, fhe might furvey
The bloody bufinefs of the dreadful day.
Her mournful eyes fhe caft around the plain,
And fought the lord of her defires in vain.
But he, who thought his peopled palace bare,
When the, his only comfort, was not there,
Stood in the gate, and afk'd of every one,
Which way the took, and whither the was gone;
If to the court, or, with his mother's train,
In long proceffion, to Minerva's fane?
The fervant's anfwer'd, Neither to the court,
Where Priam's fons and daughters did refort,
Nor to the temple was fhe gone, to move
with prayers the blue-ey'd progeny of Jove;
But, more folicitous for him alone,
Than all their fafety, to the tower was gone,
There to furvey the labours of the field,
Where the Greeks conquer and the Trojans yield;
Swiftly fhe pafs'd, with fear and fury wild;
The nurse went lagging after with the child.
This heard, the noble Hector made no stay; Th' admiring throng divide, to give him way; He pafs'd through every ftreet, by which he
Action's heir, who on the woody plain
Of Hippoplacus did in Thebe reign.
Breathlefs the flew, with joy and paffion wild;
The nurse came lagging after with the child.
The royal babe upon her breast was laid;
Who, like the morning ftar, his beams difplay'd.
Scamandrius was his name, which Hector gave,
From that fair flood which Ilion's wall did lave:
But him Aftyanax the Trojans call,
From his great father, who defends the wall.
Hector beheld him with a filent fmile:
His tender wife ftood weeping by the while :
Prefs'd in her own, his warlike hand fhe took,
Then figh'd, and thus prophetically spoke :
Thy dauntless heart (which I foresee too late)
Too daring man, will urge thee to thy fate:
Nor doft thou pity, with a parent's mind,
This helpless orphan, whom thou leav'st behind;
Nor me, th' unhappy partner of thy bed;"
Who muft in triumph by the Greeks be led :
They feek thy life, and, in unequal fight
With many, will opprefs thy fingle might:
Better it were for miferable me
To die, before the fate which I foresee.
For ah! what comfort can the world bequeath
To Hector's widow, after Hector's death?
Eternal forrow and perpetual tears
Began my youth, and will conclude my years:
I have no parents, friends, nor brothers left;
By ftern Achilles all of life bereft.
Then when the walls of Thebes he overthrew,
His fatal hand my royal father flew;'
He flew Aetion, but defpoil'd him not;
Nor in his hate the funeral rites forgot;
Arm'd as he was he fent him whole below,
And reverenc'd thus the manes of his foe:
A tomb he rais'd; the mountain nymphs around
Enclos'd with planted elms the holy ground.
My feven brave brothers in one fatal day
To death's dark manfions took their mournful way;
Slain by the fame Achilles, while they keep
The bellowing oxen and the bleating theep.
My mother, who the royal fceptre fway'd,
Was captive to the cruel victor made,
And hither led; but, hence redeem'd with gold,
Her native country did again behold,
And but beheld; for foon Diana's dart
In an unhappy chace transfix'd her heart.
But thou, my Hector, art thyfelf alone
My parents, brothers, and my lord in one:
O kill not all my kindred o'er again,
Nor tempt the dangers of the dusty plain;
But in this tower, for our defence, remain.
Thy wife and fon are in thy ruin loft:
This is a husband's and a father's poit.
The Scaan gate commands the plains below;
Here marfhal all thy foldiers as they go;
And hence with other hands repel the foe.
By yon wild fig-tree lies their chief afcent,
And thither all their powers are daily bent:
The two Ajaces have I often seen,
And the wrong'd husband of the Spartan queen : With him his greater brother; and with thefe Fierce Diomede and bold Meriones:
Uncertain if by augury or chance,
But by this eafy rife they all advance;
Guard well that pass, fecure of all befide.
To whom the noble Hector thus reply'd :
That and the reft are in my daily care;
But fhould I fhun the dangers of the war,
With fcorn the Trojans would reward my pains.
And their proud ladies with their fweeping trains.
The Grecian fwords and lances I can bear:
But lofs of honour is my only fear.
Shall Hector, born to war, his birth-right yield,
Belie his courage, and forfake the field?
Early in rugged arms I took delight,
And ftill have been the foremost in the fight:
With dangers dearly have I bought renown,
And am the champion of my father's crown.
And yet my mind forebodes, with fure prefage,
That Troy fhall perish by the Grecian rage.
The fatal day draws on, when I must fall;
And univerfal ruin cover all.
Not Troy itself, though built by hands divine,
Nor Priam, nor his people, nor his line,
My mother, nor my brothers of renown,
Whofe valour yet defends th' unhappy town;
Not thefe, nor all their fates which I forefee,
Are half of that concern I have for thee.
I fee, I fee thee, in that fatal hour,
Subjected to the victor's cruel power;
Led hence a flave to fome infulting fword,
Forlorn, and trembling at a foreign lord;
A fpectacle in Argos, at the loom,
Gracing with Trojan fights a Grecian room;
Or from deep wells the living ftream to take,
And on thy weary shoulders bring it back.
While, groaning under this laborious life,
They infolently call thee Hector's wife;
Upbraid thy bondage with thy husband's name;
And from my glory propagate thy fhame.
This when they fay, thy forrows will increase
With anxious thoughts of former happiness;
That he is dead who could thy wrongs redress.
But I, oppreis'd with iron fleep before,
Shall hear thy unavailing cries no more.
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Then, holding forth his arms, he took his boy,
The pledge of love and other hope of Troy.
The fearful infant turn'd his head away,
And on his nurse's neck reclining lay,
His unknown father fhunning with affright,
And looking back on fo uncouth a fight;
Daunted to fee a face with steel o'erfpread,
And his high plume that nodded o'er his head.
His fire and mother fmil'd with filent joy;
And Hector haften'd to relieve his boy;
Difmifs'd his burnish'd helm, and fhone afar,
The pride of warriors, and the pomp of war:
Th' illuftrious babe, thus reconcil'd, he took :
Hugg'd in his arms, and kifs'd, and thus he
That, when hereafter he from war shall come,
And bring his Trojans peace and triumph home,
Some aged man, who lives this act to fee,
And who in former times remember'd me.
May fay, the fon in fortitude and fame
Outgoes the mark, and drowns his father's name:
That at these words his mother may rejoice,
And add her fuffrage to the public voice.
He firft with fuppliant hands the Gods ador'd:
Then to the mother's arms the child restor'd;
With tears and fmiles she took her fon, and prefs'd
Th' illuftrious infant to her fragrant breast.
He, wiping her fair eyes, indulg'd her grief,
And eas'd her forrows with this last relief.
My wife and mistress, drive thy fears away,
Nor give fo bad an omen to the day;
Think not it lies in any Grecian's power,
To take my life before the fatal hour.
When that arrives, nor good nor bad can fly
Th' irrevocable doom of destiny.
Return, and, to divert thy thoughts at home,
There task thy maids, and exercise the loom,
Employ'd in works that womankind become.
The toils of war and feats of chivalry
Belong to men, and most of all to me.
At this, for new replies he did not stay, But lac'd his crefted helm, and ftrode away. His lovely confort to her house return'd, And looking often back in filence mourn'd: Home when the came, her fecret woe fhe vents, And fills the palace with her loud laments; Thofe loud laments her echoing maids restore, And Hector, yet alive, as dead deplore.
THEOCRITUS, LUCRETIUS, AND
PREFACE, CONCERNING MR. DRYDEN'S
TRANSLATIONS.
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For this last half year I have been troubled with | nity, than to pretend that I have at least in some the disease (as I may call it) of tranflations: the places made examples to his rules. Yet, withal, cold profe fits of it, which are always the most I must acknowledge, that I have many times extedious with me, were spent in the history of the ceeded my commiffion; for I have both added League; the hot, which succeeded them, in verfe and omitted, and even fometimes very boldly mifcellanies. The truth is, I fancied to myself a made fuch expositions of my authors, as no Dutch kind of cafe in the change of the paroxyfm; ne- commentator will forgive me. Perhaps, in fuch ver fufpecting but the humour would have wafted particular paffages, I have thought that I discoitself in two or three paftorals of Theocritus, and vered fome beauty yet undiscovered by thofe peas many odes of Horace. But finding, or at least dants, which none but a poet could have found. thinking I found, fomething that was more pleaf- Where I have taken away fome of their exprefing in them than my ordinary productions, I en- fions, and cut them shorter, it may poffibly be on couraged myself to renew my old acquaintance this confideration, that what was beautiful in the ¡ with Lucretius and Virgil, and immediately fixed Greek or Latin, would not appear fo fhining in upon fome parts of them which had most affected the English: and where I have enlarged them, I me in the reading. These were my natural im- defire the falfe critics would not always think,pulfes for the undertaking. But there was an ac- that those thoughts are wholly mine; but that cidental motive, which was full as forcible. It either they are fecretly in the poet, or may be was my Lord Roscommon's Essay on Translated fairly deduced from him; or at least, if both Verfe; which made me uneafy, till I tried whe- thofe confiderations fhould fail, that my own is of ther or no I was capable of following his rules, a piece with his; and that, if he were living, and and of reducing the fpeculation into practice: an Englishman, they are fuch as he would proba For many a fair precept in poetry is, like a feem- bly have written. ing demonftration in the mathematics, very fpecious in the diagram, but failing in the mechanic operation. I think I have generally obferved his inftructions: I am fure my reafon is fufficiently convinced both of their truth and usefulness; which, in other words, is to confefs no less a va
For, after all, a tranflator is to make his author appear as charming as poffibly he can, provided he maintains his character, and makes him not unlike himself. Tranflation is a kind of drawing after the life; where every one will acknowledge there is a double sort of likeness, a good one and
tion, of Virgil and Ovid are very different. Yet
I fee, even in our beft poets, who have tranflated
fome parts of them, that they have confounded
their feveral talents; and, by endeavouring only
at the sweetness and harmony of numbers, have
made them both so much alike, that, if I did not
know the originals, I fhould never be able to
judge by the copies, which was Virgil, and which
was Ovid. It was objected against a late noble
painter (Sir P. Lely), that he drew many grace-
ful pictures, but few of them were like: and this
happened to him, becaufe he always ftudied him-
felf more than those who fat to him. In fuch
tranflators I can easily distinguish the hand which
performed the work, but I cannot diftinguish
their poet from another. Suppose two authors
are equally fweet, yet there is a great diftinction
to be made in fweetnefs; as in that of sugar, and
that of honey. I can make the difference more
plain, by giving you (if it be worth knowing)
my own method of proceeding, in my tranflations
out of four several poets; Virgil, Theocritus, Lu-
cretius, and Horace. In each of thefe, before I
undertook them, I confidered the genius and dif-
tinguishing character of my author. I looked on
Virgil as a fuccinct, grave, and majestic writer;
one who weighed not only every thought, but
every word and fyllable; who was ftill aiming to
crowd his fenfe into as narrow a compass as poffi-
bly he could; for which reason he is fo very figu
rative, that he requires (I may almost fay) a
grammar apart to conftrue him. His verfe is
every where founding the very thing in your ears
whose fense it bears: yet the numbers are perpe-
tually varied, to increase the delight of the read-
er; fo that the fame founds are never repeated
twice together. On the contrary, Ovid and Clau-
dian, though they write in ftyles differing from
each other, yet have each of them but one fort of
mufic in their verfes. All the verfification and
little variety of Claudian is included within the
compafs of four or five lines; and then he begins
again in the fame tenour; perpetually closing his
fenfe at the end of a verfe, and that verfe com-
monly which they call golden, or two substan-
tives and two adjectives, with a verb betwixt
them to keep the peace. Ovid, with all his sweet-
nefs, has as little variety of numbers and found as
he he is always, as it were, upon the hand-
gallop, and his verfe runs upon carpet-ground.
He avoids, like the other, all Synalæpha's, or cut-
ting off one vowel when it comes before another,
in the following word. But to return to Virgil;
though he is smooth where fimoothness is required,
yet he is fo far from affecting it, that he seems
rather to difdain it, frequently makes ufe of Syna-
læpha's, and concludes his fenfe in the middle of
his verfe. He is every where above conceits of
epigrammatic wit, and grofs hyperboles: he
maintains majefty in the midft of plainnefs: he
fhines, but glares not; and is ftately without am-
bition, which is the vice of Lucan. I drew my
definition of poetical wit from my particular con-
fideration of him; for propriety of thoughts and
words are only to be found in him; and where
a bad. It is one thing to draw the out-lines true,
the features like, the proportions exact, the co-
louring itself perhaps tolerable; and another
thing to make all these graceful, by the pofture,
the fhadowings, and chiefly by the spirit which
animates the whole. I cannot, without fome in-
dignation, look on an ill copy of an excellent ori-
ginal. Much less can I behold with patience Vir-
gil, Homer, and fome others, whofe beauties 1
have been endeavouring all my life to imitate, fo
abused, as I may say, to their faces, by a botching
interpreter. What English readers, unacquainted
with Greek or Latin, will believe me, or any
other man, when we commend those authors,
and confefs we derive all that is pardonable in us
from their fountains, if they take those to be the
fame poets whom our Ogilby's have tranflated?
But I dare affure them, that a good poet is no
more like himself, in a dull tranflation, than his
carcafe would be to his living body. There are
many who understand Greek and Latin, and yet
are ignorant of their mother tongue. The pro-
prieties and delicacies of the English are known to
few: it is impoffible even for a good wit to un-
derstand and practise them, without the help of a
liberal education, long reading, and digefting of
thofe few good authors we have amongst us, the
knowledge of men and manners, the freedom of
habitudes and converfation with the best of com-
pany of both fexes; and, in short, without wear-
ing off the ruft which he contracted while he was
laying in a stock of learning. Thus difficult it is
to understand the purity of English, and critically
to difcern not only good writers from bad, and a
proper style from a corrupt, but also to diftin-
guilh that which is pure in a good author, from
that which is vicious and corrupt in him. And
for want of all thefe requifites, or the greatest
part of them, most of our ingenious young men
take up fome cry'd-up English poet for their mo-
del, adore him, and imitate him, as they think,
without knowing wherein he is defective, where
he is boyish and trifling, wherein either his
thoughts are improper to his subject, or his ex-
preffions unworthy of his thoughts, or the turn of
both is unharmonious. Thus it appears neceffary,
that a man fhould be a nice critic in his mother-
tongue, before he attempts to tranflate a foreign
language. Neither is it fufficient, that he be able
to judge of words and ftyle; but he must be a
mafter of them too: he muft perfectly understand
bis author's tongue, and abfolutely command his
own. So that, to be a thorough tranflator, he
must be a thorough poet. Neither is it enough
to give his author's fenfe in good English, in po-
etical expreffions, and in mufical numbers: for,
though all thefe are exceeding difficult to per-
form, there yet remains an harder tafk; and it is
a fecret of which few translators have fufficiently
thought. I have already hinted a word or two
concerning it; that is, the maintaining the cha-
racter of an author, which diftinguishes him from
all others, and makes him appear that individual
poet whom you would interpret. For example,
But only the thoughts, but the ftyle and verfifica-
|