The Lay of the Niebelungs. Metrically translated by Alice Horton,
and edited by Edward Bell, M.A. (G. Bell and Sons.)— Miss Alice Horton has translated the Lay with fluent and easy verse, not very striking, nor, indeed, intending or pretending (observe the modest " metrically ") to be so, but distinctly pleasant and easy to read. Possibly a little more labour of cor- rection, expended on certain places where the metre halts or the rhymes creak, would have been an improvement. But these 2,379 stanzas, each of four thirteen-syllabled verse, must have cost no little pains, as it is, and we are much obliged to the translator for presenting the old epic in a shape which makes it easy to assimilate. Here is a specimen, where Siegfried sees Kriemhilda for the first time :- " Then came the lovely maiden: even as morning-red From sombre clouds outbreaking. And many a sorrow fled From him whose heart did hold her, and eke so long had held: When thus the winsome fair one lactose him he beheld.
Just as the moon in brightness rxcels the brightest stars, And suddenly outshining athwart the clouds appears, So seemed she now, compared with dames of fairest guise. Then did our gallant hero feel his bold spirits rise."
An index of names follows the translation, a useful addition in so complex a tale. Carlyle's admirable essay, written when his style was at its best (in 1831), is prefixed.
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