lelism which has led Eustathius, when commenting on the passage just quoted, to remark, that the poet was certainly, in this instance, drawing from himself, who might be truly said indeed to be inspired; " from such scanty materials has he formed so beautiful a story, interweaving them with incidents so various, and with such an air of verisimilitude, that knowing, as we do, he was not present at the scene, nor had conversed with others who were, we are induced to conclude that the muse must have prompted him in all things.

So thought Ulysses with respect to the blind bard of Phoacia, a belief which induced him to request of Demodocus to sing the fall of Troy, as effected through the stratagem which he had himself been the principal means of contriving for its destruction. "Come then," he says, "proceed,"

Αἴκεν δή μοι ταῦτα κατὰ μοῖραν καταλέξης,
Αὐτίκ ̓γώ πᾶσιν μυθήσομαι ἀνθρώποισιν,
Ως άρα τοι πρόφρων Θεὸς ὤπασε θέοπιν ἀοιδήν.

ΟΔΥΣ. Θ. 496.

Sing but this theme as sweetly, and thenceforth I will proclaim thee in all ears, a bard

Of powers divine, and by the gods inspir'd.

COWPER.

The effect of this exertion of the skill of the rhapsodist, of the happy combination of music and poesy on the mind of Ulysses, is the highest compliment, in short, which Homer could pay to Demodocus, and to their mutual art; one, indeed, which we may certainly conceive him to have frequently experienced in his own person, and which, at the same time, exhibits the vast influence of such an union on the then state of society in Greece. I must also add, that it is one of the not unfrequent passages in the version of Cowper, which make ample atonement for the many prosaic parts with which that version unfortunately too much abounds. Than the picture, indeed, in the lines which I have distinguished by italics in the subsequent quotation, I know few things in any poet more deeply pathetic, or more powerfully expressed. Ταῦτ ̓ ἄρ ̓ ἀοιδὸς ἄειδε περικλυτός· αυταρ Οδυσσευς. 521.

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Ως Οδυσεύς ελεεινὸν ὑπ' οφρύσι δακρυον εἶδεν.

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ΟΔΥΣ. Θ.

So sang
the bard illustrious, at whose song
Ulysses melted, and tear following tear
Fell on his cheeks. As when a woman weeps
Her husband fall'n in battle, for her sake,
And for his children's sake, before the gate
Of his own city; sinking to his side
She close infolds him with a last embrace,
And, gazing on him as he pants and dies,
Shrieks at the sight; meantime, the ruthless foe
Smiting her shoulders with the spear, to toil
Command her, and to bondage far away,

And her cheek fades with horror at the sound;
Ulysses, so, from his moist lids let fall

The frequent tear.

Cowper.

From the whole character of Demodocus, in fine, as it is delineated in the eighth book of the Odyssey, we may acquire, not only an accurate idea of what was the condition of the bardic profession in the heroic ages of Greece, but of what precisely was the treatment which Homer himself experienced, when aged and deprived of sight, from the feelings of his countrymen and contemporaries.

That the picture was designed for himself, has been, as we have seen, the opinion of his

best commentators; and the mode, indeed, in which it is executed, the sensibility and deep interest with which it seems to have been touched into beauty and effect, almost necessarily lead to such a conclusion. It is a picture also, which cannot but be dear to every great and benevolent mind, as it places before us, one of the most soothing and consolitary of all spectacles,-genius, under adversity, fostered and protected by the sympathy of a whole people; and as it includes the further belief, that the poet had sustained his calamity in a manner that added to the pity which his talents and his privations had called forth, the highest possible admiration of his fortitude and resignation.

No. XIII.

Th' embattled tower, o'ergrown with bearded

moss,

And by the melancholy skill of time,

Moulded to beauty, charms my bosom more
Than all the palaces of princes.

BUCKE.

No sooner had the party re-assembled in the book-room of Mr. Walsingham, after their hurried return to the cottage, than Llwellyn expressed his sense of obligation to him for the narrative which he had been so good as to communicate. It had, indeed, produced a considerable effect on the feelings of his auditors, and had thrown a corresponding shade of gloom and anxiety over their very appearance. Edward remained thoughtful, abstracted, and, in some degree yet agitated; a melancholy, sweet, and full of sensibility, stole over the fine countenance of Hoel, as he cast a look of sympathy and solicitude on the person of his young friend;