Beneath huge Etna vanquish'd Typhon lies,

And vomits fmoke and fire against the darken'd skies.
Here seems the pictur'd wall poffefs'd of life;
Two Gods contending in the noble strife,
The choiceft boon to human kind to give,
Their toils to lighten, or their wants relieve:
While Pallas here appears to wave her hand,
The peaceful olive's golden boughs expand:
Here, while the Ocean's God indignant frown'd,
And raised his trident from the wounded ground,
As yet intangled in the earth appears

The warrior horfe, his ample cheft he rears,
His wide red noftrils fmoke, his eye-balls glare,
And his fore-hoofs, high pawing, lafh the air.'

Then follows a droll defcription of one of the lords of the bedchamber:

Triton, who boafts his high Neptunian race,

Sprung from the God by Salace's embrace,
Attendant on his fire the trumpet founds,

Or through the yielding waves, his herald, bounds:
Huge is his bulk deform'd, and dark his hue;
His bushy beard and hairs that never knew
The fmoothing comb, of fee-weed rank and long,
Around his breaft and fhoulders dangling hung,
And on the matted locks black muffels clung;
At thell of purple on his head he bore,
Around his loins no tangling garb he wore,

But

Two Gods contending-According to fable, Neptune and Minerva difputed the honour of giving a name to the city of Athens. They agreed to determine the contest by a display of their wisdom and power, in conferring the most beneficial gift on mankind. Neptune ftruck the earth with his trident and produced the horse, whose bounding motions are emblematical of the agitation of the fea. Minerva commanded the olive tree, the symbol of peace and of riches, to fpring forth. The victory was adjudged to the goddefs, from whom the city was named Athens. As the Egyptians and Mexicans wrote their history in hieroglyphics, the taste of the ancient Grecians cloathed almost every occurrence in mythological allegory. The founders of Athens, it is moft probable, difputed whether their new city fhould be named from the fertility of the foil or from the marine fituation of Attica. The former opinion prevailed, and the town received its name in honour of the goddess of the olive tree.'

↑ While Pallas bere appears to wave ber band—As Neptune struck the earth with his trident, Minerva, fays the fable, ftruck the earth with her lance. That the waved her hand while the olive toughs fpread, is a fine poetical attitude, and varies the picture from that of Neptune, which follows."

A fell of purple on his bead be bore—In the Portuguese,

Na cabeça por garra tinha pafla

Huma mui grande cafca de lagofta.

Thus rendered by Fanshaw,

He had (for a Montera) on his crown

The thell of a red lobfter overgrown.

The description of Triton, who, as Fanshaw says,

Was a great nafty clown

is in the ftyle of the claffics. His parentage is differently related. Hefiod makes

But all was cover'd with the flimy brood,

The fnaily offspring of the unctuous flood.'

This book affords us a pleafing and gallant account of a piece of chivalry between twelve Portuguese and twelve Englifh knights, for the honour of as many English ladies. The apparatus is nobly exhibited, and the intereft of fuch an affair ftrongly fuftained.

The defcription of a dreadful storm, à business that had been fettled in the palace of Neptune, fucceeds. It is, indeed, horribly fublime. The following lines are a part of it:

The fhriek fhrill rolling on the tempeft's wings:
Dire as the bird of death at midnight fings
His dreary howlings in the fick man's ear,
The answering fhriek from ship to fhip they hear.
Now on the mountain-billows upward driven,
The navy mingles with the clouds of heaven;
Now rufhing downward with the finking waves,
Bare they behold old Ocean's vaulty caves.
The eastern blast against the western pours,
Against the fouthern ftorm the northern roars :
From pole to pole the flashy lightnings glare,
One pale blue twinkling fheet enwrap, the air,
In fwift fucceffion now the volleys fly
Darted in pointed curvings o'er the sky;
And through the horrors of the dreadful night,
O'er the torn waves they shed a ghaftly light;
The breaking furges flame with burning red,
Wider and louder ftill the thunders spread,
As if the folid heavens together crush'd,
Expiring worlds on worlds expiring rush'd,
And dim brow'd Chaos ftruggled to regain
The wild confufion of his ancient reign.
Not fuch the volley when the arm of Jove
From heaven's high gates the rebel Titans drove;
Not fuch fierce lightnings blazed athwart the flood,
When, faved by heaven, Deucalion's veffel rode

him the fon of Neptune and Amphitrité. By Triton, in the phyfical fenfe of the fable, is meant the noife, and by Salacé, the mother by fome afcribed to him, the falt of the ocean. The origin of the fable of Triton, it is probable, was founded on the appearance of a fea animal, which, according to fome ancient and modern naturalifts, in the upward parts refembles the human figure. Paufanias relates a wonderful ftory of a monftroufly large one, which often came afhore on the meadows of Boeotia. Over his head was a kind of finny cartilage, which, at a distance, appeared like hair, the body, covered with brown feales; the nofe and ears like the human, the mouth of a dreadful width, jagged with the teeth of a panther; the eyes of a greenish hue; the hands divided into fingers, the nails of which were crooked, and of a fhelly fubftance. This monfter, whofe extremities ended in a tail like a dolphin's, devoured both men and beasts as they chanced in his way. The citizens of Tanagra, at laft, contrived his deftruction. They fet a large veifel full of wine on the fea thore. Triton got drunk with it, and fell into a profound fcep, in which condition the Tanagrians beheaded him, and afterwards, with great propriety, hung up his body in the temple of Bacchus; where, fays Paufanias, it consinued a long time,'

B 4

High

High o'er the deluged hills. Along the fhore
The Halcyons, mindful of their fate, deplore;
As beating round on trembling wings they fly,
Shrill through the ftorm their woeful clamours die.
So from the tomb, when midnight veils the plains,
With Thrill, faint voice, th' untimely ghoft complains.
The amorous dolphins to their deepest caves
In vain retreat to fly the furious waves;
High o'er the mountain-capes the ocean flows,
And tears the aged forests from their brows:
The pine and oak's huge finewy roots uptorn,
And from the beds the dufky fands, upborne
On the rude whirlings of the billowy fweep,
Imbrown the furface of the boiling deep.
High to the poop the valiant GAMA springs,
And all the rage of grief his bofom wrings,
Grief to behold, the while fond hope enjoy'd
The meed of all his toils, that hope destroy'd.
In awful horror loft the hero ftands,

And rowls his eyes to heaven, and spreads his hands,
While to the clouds his veffel rides the fwell,
And now her black keel strikes the gates of hell;
Oh thou, he cries, whom trembling heaven obeys,
Whofe will the tempeft's furious madnefs fways,
Who, through the wild waves, led't thy chofen race,
While the high billows flood like walls of brass:
Oh thou, while ocean bursting o'er the world
Roar'd o'er the hills, and from the fky down hurl'd
Rush'd other headlong oceans; oh, as then
The fecond father of the race of men
Safe in thy care the dreadful billows rode,
Oh! fave us now, be now the faviour God!
Safe in thy care, what dangers have we past!
And fhalt thou leave us, leave us now at lalt
To perish here our dangers and our toils
To spread thy laws unworthy of thy files;
Our vows unheard-Heavy with all thy weight,
Oh horror, come! and come, eternal night!'

This noble prayer was heard, and the filver star of Love' appeared in the ftorm and fhewed them the coaft of India.

The feventh book celebrates the arrival of Gama in India, and here Camoëns appears to have followed Virgil more clofely than in any other part of his work. In the eighth book he pursues his original purpose of interweaving the hiftory of Portugal in his poem; and for this end the paintings on the naval enfigns are fubftituted in imitation of the hiftoric shields of Achilles and Eneas, whilft one of the heroes of the expedition explains them to the Indian king. In this book, though in general lefs interefting than the reft, we meet with many beautiful defcriptions from the original, and many ftrokes of genius from the hand of the Tranflator. Nothing can be more ele

gant

gant than the following fimile reprefenting the probable growth
and effects of the Portuguese power in India :
When foftly ushered by the milky * dawn
The fun firft rifes o'er the daified lawn
His Gilver luftre, as the fhining dew
Of radiance mild, unhurt the eye may view:
But when on high the noon-tide flaming rays
Give all the force of living fire to blaze,
A giddy darknefs ftrikes the conquer'd fight,
That dares in all his glow the Lord of light.
Such, if on India's foil the tender shoot
Of thefe proud cedars fix the flubborn root,

Such fhall your power before them fink decay'd,
And India's ftrength fhail wither in their fhade.'

In the ninth book we are prefented with a most interesting engagement between the Indian fleet and the Europeans, during which Gama was treacheroufly detained a prifoner at the Indian court. The true hero, is, on this awful occafion, depictured in his conduct, and the ftupendous effect of fire arms on a people unaccustomed to them is again powerfully described.

• When foftly usher'd by the milky darn

The fun firft rifes. I deceive myself greatly, fays Caftera, if this fimile is not the moft noble and the most natural that can be found in any poem. It has been imitated by the Spanish comedian, the illuftrious Lopez de Vega, in his comedy of Orpheus and Eurydice, Act I. Scene I.

Como mirar puede fer

El fol al amanecer,

I quando fe enciende, no."

Caftera adds a very loofe tranflation of thefe Spanish lines in French verfe. The literal English is, As the fun may be beheld at its rifing, but when illuftriously kindled, cannot. Naked however as this is, the imitation of Camoëns is evident. As Caftera is fo very bold in his encomium of this fine fimile of the fun, it is but juftice to add his tranflation of it, together with the original Portuguese, and the tranflation of Fanshaw. Thus the French translator:

Les yeux peuvent foûtenir la clarté du foliel naissant, mais lorsqu'il s'eft avancé dans fa carriere lumineuse, & que ses rayons répandent les ardeurs du midi, on tacheroit en vain de l'envisager; un prompt aveuglement feroit le prix de cette audace.

And thus humbled by Fanfhaw;

Now whilft this people's ftrength is not yet knit,
Think how ye may refift them by all ways.
For when the Sun is in his nonage yit,
Upon his morning beauty Men may gaze;
But let him once up to his zenith git,

He ftrikes them blind with his meridian rays;
So blind will ye be, if ye look not too't,
If ye permit these cedars to take root

Aftor

After this the Poet, as if he wifhed at once to give fome reJaxation to his hero, his readers, and himself, fets fail for the luxurious regions of love. Whether he has not here, in fome fmall degree, deviated from the LAWS of the Epic, we shall not ftop to inquire. It is a fufficient fatisfaction to us, that, if he goes out of his way, he goes-to give us pleasure:

'Give way, ye lofty billows, low subside,
Smooth as the level plain, your fwelling pride,
Lo, Venus comes! Oh, foft, ye furges, fleep,
Smooth be the bofom of the azure deep,
Lo, Venus comes! and in her vigorous train
She brings the healing balm of love-fick pain.
White as her fwans *, and stately as they rear
Their fnowy crefts when o'er the lake they fteer,
Slow moving on, behold, the fleet appears,
And o'er the diftant billow onward fteers.
The beauteous Nereids flufh'd in all their charms
Surround the Goddess of the foft alarms:
Right to the ifle fhe leads the fmiling train,
And all her arts her balmy lips explain;
The fearful languor of the asking eye,
The lovely blush of yielding modefty,

The grieving look, the figh, the favouring smile,
And all th' endearments of the open wile,

She taught the nymphs-in willing breafts that heaved
To hear her lore, her lore the nymphs received.
As now triumphant to their native fhore
Through the wide deep the joyful navy bore,
Earneft the pilot's eyes fought cape or bay,
For long was yet the various watery way;

Sought cape or ifle from whence their boats might bring
The healthful bounty of the chryftal spring:
When fudden, all in nature's pride array'd,
The Isle of Love its glowing breast display'd.
O'er the green bofom of the dewy lawn
Soft blazing flow'd the filver of the dawn,
The gentle waves the glowing luftre share,
Arabia's balm was fprinkled o'er the air.
Before the fleet, to catch the heroes' view,
The floating ifle fair Acidalia drew:

Soon as the floating verdure caught their † fight,
She fixt, unmov'd, the island of delight.

So

White as her fans-A diftant fleet compared to fwans on a lake is certainly an happy thought. The allufion to the pomp of Venus, whofe agency is immediately concerned, gives it befides a peculiar propriety. This fimilie however is not in the original. It is adopted from an uncommon liberty taken by Fanshaw ;

The pregnant fayles on Neptune's furface creep,

Like her own Savans, in gate, out-cheft, and fether. + Soon as the floating verdure caught their fight- -As the departure of Gama from India was abrupt (fee his life) he put into one of the beautiful iflands of An

chediva