and the translator is disloyal to his original. We think that Mr. Mitchell has egregiously offended in this particular. Nor did Mr. Cumberland, in his excellent translation of "The Clouds," play the metrical tricks exhibited by Mr. Mitchell, in the vain imagination of representing the unimitated and inimitable measures of the comic master in namby-pamby verse, and singing rhyme. Nor did he treat his readers with centos from Shakspeare, and other poets familiar to our ears; a practice against which we strongly protest, and for this reason:-we are willing to flatter ourselves that we are reading Aristophanes, when we read the plays translated by Mr. Mitchell; but the illusion vanishes, when we find that Shakspeare and other of our elder poets have supplied any portion of his dialogue. Memory whispers where the translator, stole his spoils; and the whole has a clumsy and patch-work appearance. Moreover, most of the passages which Mr. Mitchell by means of this larceny has taken from our great bard, are parts as it were of a consecrated edifice. The abstraction of them from their hallowed precincts is a sort of profanation. It is the dilapidation of Shakspeare to furnish brick and cement to other writers. Now, that we may not appear unjustly querulous, we will subjoin a few instances out of many in which this has been done: "Double, double, toil and trouble." Acharn. 37. Damned be he that first cries hold." Ibid. 48. Looped and windowed raggedness." Ibid. 60. "All pomp and circumstance of glorious war." Ibid. 74. "Oh for a muse of fire."

Ibid. 90. And in the Knights, p. 218,

"All these to hear

Did the grave council seriously incline."

66

Nor is it Shakspeare only on whom contributions are levied. Hudibras pays his share:

And in the same play occurs a well-known line:

"Or had practised oldest vices newest kind of ways."

Even Lord Foppington supplies his celebrated exclamation, Stap my vitals."

66

Mr. Mitchell is frequently pleased to change the figure of the poet; an arbitrary and lawless procedure in our opinion, unless there exists an absolute necessity for it. Thus in the Acharnians, Dicæopolis sums up his plagues, and contrasts them with his pleasurable sensations. Talking of the former, he says,

σε Α' δ' ωδυνήσθην ψαμμοκοσι γαργαρα !”

a figure, of which the literal meaning is, that his afflictions equalled in number a mountain of sand. Mr. Mitchell paraphrastically substitutes a metaphor and a simile:

"But for my plagues, they come in whole battalions,

In numbers numberless, like ocean's waves."

With these exceptions, and others upon which we are unwilling to dilate, we gladly bear our testimony to the general spirit which characterizes these translations, and to the skill and versatility with which the chorusses and parabases are rendered. We are not indeed much enamoured of such metres as

"Double, double, toil and trouble, quickly step and change

your plan,

Inquisition or petition must arrest the shameless man."

But the sum of our opinions upon Mr. Mitchell's work is this; that they are only fragments of translations; scenes and dialoges being sometimes omitted, and supplied by a prose narration, often much longer than the passages that are not translated, in which Mr. Mitchell kindly undertakes the office of interlocutor, and, like Mr. Bayes," insinuates the plot into the boxes; " that his notes are valuable elucidations of his author, and that some of the scenes are rendered with great felicity of execution. We shall conclude this article with a few extracts as specimens.

In the Acharnians, there is a paraphrastic but elegant transfusion into English verse of the hymn to Phales, beginning Φαλης, εταιρε βακχει8, with which we would willingly have treated our readers, were not the mysteries of the god somewhat too much revealed, in spite of the skill with which the grossness of the original is avoided. We insert the following translation of the exquisite Invocation to Peace, in the Acharnians, which the poet put into the mouth of Dicæopolis, the chorus having already invoked the God of War:

Dic. "Maid, whate'er thy appellation,
TRUCE, OR RECONCILIATION,

Thee, I mean, whose fitmost place is
With fair Venus and the Graces,
(With them was thy earliest dwelling);-
Lovely charmer! all excelling,
Did I see thee, nor discover
Gifts that might have won a lover
In that forehead op'ning fair,
In that boon and buxom air?
But the dull delusion's over-
Call me instant from above
Him the winged child of love;

Him that's drawn by painter's hand
Weaving roses in a band:
He the holy priest shall be
(Worthy thy fair self and me)
To bind fast the chains, which never
May our fates and fortunes sever.-
Perchance you think my heart is cold,
And mark my hairs, and say I'm old.
Old I own me, yet kind fate
Triple blessings did me wait,
If my lot be join'd with thine-
To plant in lengthen'd ranks the vine,
To graft the fig-tree's tender shoots,
To pluck the vineyard's purpling fruits;-
And olive-trees in many a row
Around our farm shall circling grow,
Fragrant oil and juice supplying
To anoint our limbs at will,
When yon moon but lately dying
Once more begins her lamp to fill."

(P. 113-115.)

The lines in italics seem to have been suggested by Cowley's Ode of Anacreon,

"Oft I'm by the women told," &c. We close our specimens of Mr. Mitchell's work with the following speech of Demosthenes, from the Knights, because it paints the sovereign people with admirable force and humour, and it is rendered with great spirit:

"With reverence to your worships, 'tis our fate
To have a testy, cross-grain'd, bilious, sour
Old fellow for our master; one much giv'n
To a bean-diet; somewhat hard of hearing:
Demus his name, sirs, of the parish Pynx here.
Some three weeks back or so, this lord of ours
Brought home a lusty slave from Paphlagonia,
Fresh from the tan-yard, tight and yare, and with
As nimble fingers and as foul a mouth

As ever yet paid tribute to the gallows.
This tanner-Paphlagonian (for the fellow
Wanted not penetration) bow'd and scrap'd,

And fawn'd and wagg'd his ears and tail, dog-fashion;
And thus soon slipp'd into the old man's graces.
Occasional douceurs of leather-parings,

**

With speeches to this tune, made all his own.

"Good sir, the court is up,-you've judg'd one cause,—
'Tis time to take the bath; allow me, sir,-

This cake is excellent-pray sup this broth

This soup will not offend you, tho' cropfull

You love an obolus; pray take these three-
Honour me, sir, with your commands for supper.
Sad times meanwhile for us!-with prying looks,
Round comes my man of hides, and if he finds us
Cooking a little something for our master,
Incontinently lays his paw upon it,

And modestly in his own name presents it!
It was but t'other day these hands had mixt
A Spartan pudding for him; there at Pylus:
Slily and craftily the knave stole on me,
Ravish'd the feast and to my master bore it.
Then none but he, forsooth, must wait at table:
(We dare not come in sight) but there he stands
All supper-time, and with a leathern fly-flap
Whisks off the advocates; anon the knave
Chants out his oracles, and, when he sees
The old man plung'd in mysteries to the ears,
And scar'd from his few senses, marks his time,
And enters on his tricks. False accusations
Now come in troops; and at their heels the whip.
Meanwhile the rascal shuffles in among us,
And begs of one,-browbeats another, -cheats
A third, and frightens all. 'My honest friends,
These cords cut deep, you'll find it-I say nothing,—
Judge you between your purses and your backs;
I could, perhaps.'-We take the gentle hint,
And give him all; if not, the old man's foot
Plays such a tune upon our hinder parts,
That flogging is a jest to't, a mere flea-bite-
Wherefore, (turning to Nicias) befits it that we think what

Course

To take, or where to look for help.” (P. 161-164.)

ART. III The Life of Voltaire, with interesting Particulars respecting his Death, and Anecdotes and Characters of his Contemporaries. By Frank Hall Standish, Esq. 8vo. pp. 393. Andrews. London, 1821.

THIS is a panegyric on Voltaire, in which just so much of his wickedness is exhibited as was necessary to give some verisimilitude to the portrait; while most of the dark lines are softened off, and the whole is coloured with the glowing tints of philanthropy, philosophy, and lofty independence of character. A few examples of the author's own sentiments will be sufficient to show our readers how capable he is of doing justice to his hero.

Of the frequent obscenity of the volume we give no example; the biographer of Voltaire ought to be allowed some latitude in this respect, or his book would not be worthy of its subject. Mr. Standish's impurity has, however, the superadded merit of not being always necessary to his narrative; it is often gratuitous— he appears anxious to prove how well he has succeeded, not as a mere imitator or servile copyist, but in imbibing the true spirit of the author of "La Pucelle," whom Rousseau himself could not tolerate within the limits of his republic, " because his plays corrupted the manners of the people.'

We

The following are Mr. Standish's mature ideas on the subject of love, friendship, marriage, and the female character. quote some of the least licentious passages:

"A matrimonial alliance is generally formed for mutual convenience: the pure passion of love is debased by that of interest; but sincere friendship is a reciprocal interchange of benefits unmixed with any sordid consideration of advantage or requital." (P.93.)

"There are few women, of any temperament, who are not addicted to some vice, or to some pleasure. Though the Marquise du Châtelet loved celebrity and literature by profession, these were, even with her, secondary passions to intrigue and gambling. The former rendered her unfaithful to her husband, and afterwards to her lover; and the latter disturbed their mutual peace by embarrassing their fortune. No woman, however, united the power of pursuing dissipation and study at the same time, with so much success; and beholders saw with astonishment the commentatrix of Newton, after leaving a cardtable, instruct, and converse with the learned and the gay. Her attachment to Voltaire added to the happiness of his life; and, though she occasionally provoked his jealousy, he loved her the better when it passed away; for, if any thing real, or which exists in this world, can at all approach to the representations of poetical love, or imaginary affection, it is a connexion of this nature, unmixed with interest, and unfettered by restraint." (P. 163, 164.)

For a specimen of this writer's view of Divine Providence we give the following passage:

"Voltaire having been ordered by the king to select for him a public lecturer, recommended the Abbé de Prades. This is the same Abbé, who, being desirous of taking the title of doctor in theology, maintained, with the greatest intrepidity, at a full meeting in the Sorbonne, at Paris, the following doctrines: That our soul is nothing more than an igneous fluid, after the opinion of the old fathers; that Moses is the most impudent of all historians, after some more learned men; and, lastly, that the miracles of Jesus Christ resembled those of Esculapius upon his own authority. This boldness in the promulgation of what were judged to be such detestable principles, gained the Abbé a great reputation over all Europe, and a small fortune at Berlin. Fre