"So the mother's fair renown The child with dignity, As we read in stories old Of Telemachus the bold, (pp. 465-6. Catull. Ixi. 211-230.) In the same poem are many other stanzas equally fresh and good indeed, one lesson, which those who may read Frere's works with a view to ascertaining the secret of his admitted pre-eminence as a translator can scarcely fail to learn, will be the need of discerning how far the process of transmutation will bear the sacrifice of even the unpleasant features of the original author. Frere's system of compromise was a nearly perfect reflection of the author he translated, as free as he could consistently make it from indelicacy and repulsiveness. Another lesson, too, he may teach to some modern translators, for which the mass of English readers will thank his memory. Success in metrical translation depends not, as some fancy, on the cleverest reproduction of the original metres so much as on embodying the words and spirit of the translated author in an approximately equivalent English measure. No ear could desire truer presentments of the lyrics of Aristophanes than are found in many of Mr. Frere's choruses, where, however, the likeness to the originals is the very reverse of servile. So, too, with the ode of Catullus, just quoted. Which version is likelier to please an English ear, or to find a place in an English reader's memory—that in which Mr. Frere has moulded his transcript of the Glyconics of Catullus to a downright English metre, or the dance-in-chains, of which all must be conscious who read Mr. Robinson Ellis's fac-simile version, and of which this that follows is a sample? "Some Torquatus, a beauteous Babe on motherly breast to thee, Lips half open a blessing." (Ellis's Catullus, p. 45.) We need hardly press the question to an issue. To Englishmen of his own condition Hookham Frere's life and works should point a lesson which, except by a chosen few, runs the risk in the present age of being overlooked; that of the embellishment added to a public position and a part in the conduct of affairs by the highest culture and scholarship. It might be urged that Frere's premature withdrawal from the public service points to the incompatibility of a scholar's habits with administrative powers. But this is not proven. He had to be sacrificed to popular clamour, and, like a true and noble Englishman, he acquiesced in a sacrifice But this sacrifice was which prevented damage to his party. lightened, even as his active life was diversified, by the studies which made him a delightful companion, a well-informed public servant, and the possessor of the secret of contentment in active life or in retirement. Tastes like those of Hookham Frere conduce to independence, self-resource, and self-respect. There may not be in his published works much evidence of the originality which goes to the making of a first-rate poet, though none will deny to him the gifts of a bright fancy, a correct ear, an abundant flow of lyric power. His classical predilections and the bent of his humour disposed him to content himself with the praise of complete mastery of Aristophanes, and successful efforts in the region of burlesque. Referable indeed to this taste and aim are almost all of his best and happiest literary efforts. The "Monks and Giants" would not entitle him to rank high among original poets, but as an outcome of the same vein of humour which we trace in the Anti-Jacobin and in the Aristophanic free translations, they claim a place of honour amid the writings of English humorists. This in fact was his métier. It was because his fancy saw the best chance of developing this in rendering the Aristophanic comedies in an English dress, that the name, which the volumes before us cannot fail to revive, will, as long as our language lasts, be associated with Aristophanes and his dramas. JAMES DAVIES. IT T is a confusing thing to many candid persons to read the statements which are often put forth, exhibiting the contrast between the English life of to-day and that of the last century, or the last century but one. Setting aside the large number of men whose constitution inclines them to a violently peculiar view of the past in its comparison with the present, there are always to be found a good many open-minded thinkers who ask for nothing but facts to guide them in forming their conclusion. They neither depreciate nor glorify that extinct state of affairs, of which all they really know is, that it no longer exists. They believe neither in the superlative wisdom nor the lamentable ignorance of their ancestors. They are quite ready to believe anything whatever concerning the past in its contrast with the present, which can be established by real proofs. All that they require is that the question shall not be settled by à priori hypotheses, or by any assumption of the existence of some mysterious law which condemns the English people to continuous degradation, or which confers on them the blessing of irresistible progress. That unprejudiced and truth-seeking persons of this class should at the same time be bewildered and almost awe-struck by the social phenomena of to-day, is not, I think, to be wondered at. These phenomena are, in some respects, nothing less than appalling. Moreover, there often seems to be no way out of our present difficulties. Every agency that is brought to bear upon these gigantic evils seems to fail. Philanthropy and benevolence appear sometimes to be the most mischievous of all elements in English social life. Theological teaching has failed, and now simple charitableness has failed also; and what more remains? The old organic system which existed a hundred years ago, and has come down even to our own time, is breaking up in all quarters, and what is to take its place? It is all chaos and confusion, and the shattering of landmarks, and the uprooting of habits, and the rending of ties, and what is to come of it all? It is not, therefore, surprising that the most prudent thinkers should be sometimes led to accept the dogmatic assertions of those who believe in the existence of a bygone golden age, which, according to their temperaments, they fix either in the middle ages, the renaissance period, the Commonwealth, the revolutionary epoch, the earlier days of George III., or even the days of George IV. himself. Nor do I for a moment pretend that this question of the comparative happiness of the present, and let us say, the last century, is one that is easy of solution. The popular cant about the blessedness of the English life of to-day is as odious to me as it is to the most irrational believer in an extinct period of perfection. Of all the rubbish that has been uttered, none is more worthless than the current praises of our modern civilization, and no word is more grossly abused than this very word "civilization" itself. I cannot see that we are anything more than a semi-civilized people up to this day; or, to use the word which is precisely identical in meaning, but more unpleasant in the sound, we are nothing more than a semi-barbarous people, judging by any rational standard of civilization and barbarism. Morally, religiously, æsthetically, in politics, in diplomacy, in legislation, in administration, in education, in our amusements, in our very dress and our dinners, we are still but half civilized, or semi-barbarous, choose whichever form we will. If, then, I venture upon giving some reasons why I think that we are not worse than our fathers, it is from no absurd belief in the nineteenth century, as an age in which self-glorification may be tolerated, or as an age, indeed, which is not full of perils, and in which the evils which were generated in the past may not be tending to some tremendous crash at some not far distant period. The social atmosphere is, indeed, filled with explosive materials, and it is simply absurd to assume that because we have hitherto escaped any tremendous convulsion, we are, therefore, secure for the future. There is an unquestionable political and economical truth in the old Hebrew saying, that "the fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge," which may be pre-eminently appli cable to ourselves. The mistakes, whether selfish or unselfish, of one generation are often as slow as they are prolific in bearing their natural fruits; and it is quite possible that it may be our lot to suffer through the operation of social and economical laws, whose revolutionary work is really due to the follies, the ignorance, or the vices of our ancestors. The organic life of a people is continued from generation to generation, and it is no more possible to avert the effects of past errors, by simply opening our eyes to their existence, than it is for an old debauchee to enjoy the blessings of a vigorous old age by simply avowing and lamenting the excesses of his youth. At the same time the difficulty of instituting any comparison between the operation of the social forces of to-day, and that of those which were at work at the beginning of the present century, or a hundred years ago, is very great. It is difficult enough to form a fair estimate of the tendencies of the life in which we are ourselves taking an active part. But when the inquiry is transferred some two or three generations backwards, the scarcity of trustworthy materials is doubly striking. The moment we apply ourselves in a thoroughly critical spirit to test the value of the records of the English life of the latter half of the eighteenth century, and of the beginning of our nineteenth, the visionary character of the popular ideals is irresistibly apparent. Whether those ideals are true or false, the fact is undeniable, that to a large extent they are the result of unmitigated guess-work. The very statistics of the period are not to be relied on, our present system of statistics-gathering being then unknown. Statistics in those days were the work of a few isolated individuals, urged on by a scientific instinct, and altogether in advance of their age. The figures they got together were, therefore, drawn from most limited areas, and even as far as they went, were often extremely partial and misleading. And seeing how hard it is to interpret the full significance of the carefully-sought statistics of to-day, it needs no words to prove that when the statistics themselves were fragmentary and incorrect, they can serve scarcely any purpose beyond that of giving hints to the cautious and acute inquirer. But it is not merely in the matter of formal statistics that we are at a loss for materials for comparing our own life with that of our recent forefathers. Wherever we turn in examining the records of their personal and social history, we are struck with the absence of the two characteristic phenomena of the English life of to-day. They knew nothing of our intense self-consciousness, and of our passion for decorum. Surely never before, since men became civilized, was there an age which so fondly cherished this habit of selfinspection, in which we now delight. Everybody now is a critic of something or other, and has his views of the internal condition of |