Japanese Odes translated into English. By F. V. Dickins, M.B.
(Smith, Elder, and Co.)—This is a curiosity of literature, and is quite as worthy of a place on a drawing-room table as a Japanese tray or 'workbox. All the odes are short—most of them do not exceed six lines— and many of them, though popular among the natives, are to us abso- lutely pointless. No doubt the Japanese would say the same of Dr. Watts or Mr. Tapper, if they were rendered into that ancient dialect from which these have been translated. In one place, too, we stumbled on a graceful turn which is beyond either of those poets:—
" And still my love for thee as yet I have forgotten to forget."
But without Mr. Dickins's valuable notes and elucidations the collec- tion would have been a mere toy, and a quaint toy rather than one of intrinsic beauty.
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