Milton, in "Comus," has an exquisite song to Echo, which com mences: Sweet Echo, sweetest nymph, that liv'st unseen Within thy aery shell, By slow Meander's margent green, Where the love-lorn nightingale Nightly to thee her sad song mourneth well. ON BISSULA, A GERMAN CAPTIVE (Edyll. VII. 2). Oh my joy, my charm, my treasure, My love, my pastime, and my pleasure! Love, it appears, can make the harshest name agreeable; but one of soft sound is generally thought to awake the gentler feelings. As in a passage in Otway's tragedy of " Caius Marius": Lavinia! O there's music in the name, That, softening me to infant tenderness, Makes my heart spring like the first leap of life. Yet Shakespeare, in oft-quoted words, asks ("Romeo and Juliet," Act II. sc. 2): What's in a name? that which we call a rose, By any other name would smell as sweet. ON DIDO (Epitaphia Heroum, 30). Translated in "Collection of Epigrams," 1735. Poor Queen! twice doom'd disastrous love to try! There is an allusion to Dido's flight, on account of her husband's murder, in the first book of the Eneis, 340, which Dryden translates Phoenician Dido rules the growing State, Who fled from Tyre, to shun her brother's hate. And in the fourth book, 630, her death, on account of Eneas' departure, is described: This said, within her anxious mind she weighs The means of cutting short her odious days. EPITAPH ON HIS SISTER, JULIA DRYADIA (Parentalia, 12). Is there a virtue which the prudent fair Of similar character is an epitaph on a maiden by Marvell, which, though rather long, is too beautiful to be omitted (“Miscellaneous Poems by Andrew Marvell," 1681, 71): Enough; and leave the rest to fame; That her soul was on heaven so bent ARABIAN EPIGRAMMATISTS. A.D. 719-A.D. 988. ARABIAN EPIGRAMS. The following translations of Arabian epigrams are taken from a volume published in 1796, entitled, "Specimens of Arabian Poetry, from the earliest times to the extinction of the Khaliphat, with some account of the authors, by J. D. Carlyle, B.D., F.R.S.E., Chancellor of Carlisle, and Professor of Arabic in the University of Cambridge." The sentiments of many of the epigrams and poems are exceedingly beautiful, and the English dress in which they are clothed is very graceful. IBRAHIM BEN ADHAM. A hermit of Syria, equally celebrated for his talents and piety, born about the 97th year of the Hegira, i.e., A.D. 719. TO THE KHALIPH HAROUN ALRASHID, Upon his undertaking a Pilgrimage to Mecca. Thrice happy they who seek th' abode The following, by an uncertain author of James I.'s reign, is taken from Ellis' "Specimens of the Early English Poets," 1803, III. 143: Happy, oh happy he who, not affecting The endless toils attending worldly cares, Deeming his life a scene, the world a stage, The danger and short-lived happiness of mere pleasure are as expressively as elegantly portrayed in Dr. Johnson's translation of some French lines written under a print of persons skating: O'er crackling ice, o'er gulphs profound, This translation, which was not the first he made, was repeated by Johnson extempore, after reading one by Mr. Pepys, a friend of Mrs. Piozzi, who tells us in her " Anecdotes," that the Doctor was exceedingly angry when he found she had asked several of her acquaintances to translate the lines, declaring "it was a piece of treachery, and done to make everyone else look little when compared to my favourite friends the Pepyses, whose translations were unquestionably the best," as the Doctor acknowledged. The following is the one upon which he founded his extempore: Swift o'er the level how the skaters slide, And skim the glitt'ring surface as they go: Thus o'er life's specious pleasures lightly glide, But pause not, press not on the gulph below. Though this surpassed Johnson's first translation, that it is not equal to his second all must acknowledge. ALY BEN AHMED BEN MANSOUR. A poet and historian, who excelled and delighted in satire. He died at Bagdad, in the year of the Hegira 302, i.e., a.d. 924. TO THE VIZIR CASSIM OBID ALLAH, ON THE DEATH OF ONE OF HIS SONS. Poor Cassim! thou art doom'd to mourn By destiny's decree; Whatever happen it must turn To misery for thee. Two sons hadst thou, the one thy pride, The other was thy pest; Ah, why did cruel death decide To snatch away the best? No wonder thou should'st droop with woe, Of such a child bereft; But now thy tears must doubly flow, For ah!-the other's left. |