The Odes of Horace, Books I. and II. Done into
English verse by J. Howard Deazeley. (Henry Frowde.)—Mr. Deazeley has not solved, or even come near to solving, the problem of adequately rendering Horace. He presumes that he knows how to construe his original, but he certainly lays himself open to doubt. In i. 16, for instance, we find " quern criminosis cunque voles modum Pones fambis " translated by:— "To lines that bring but blame and shame Can set a limit' In English, to "set a limit" is not the same as to "make an end of." " Olentis mariti " is a difficult phrase, but " a strong mate" will not do, and the "wild Liburnian throng" is mis- leading for " saevis Liburni*." This ode (i. 37) is about as good as anything that Mr. Deazeley has done, and we will quote a part of it, to show his high-water mark:— "Her madness was allayed When by flame was left uninjured scarce a ship of all her fleet, And her mind by wine distracted saw the terror of defeat : While she fled, and Cresar followed with his oarsmen's rapid beat, As the falcon prwses onward in the timid stock-dove's train, As the hare the hunter chases on Memo: dies snowy plain,
That the doomful source of ruin ho might capture and enchain.
But she pummel by a nobler than the common doom to d'e, Not at sabre did she tremple with a woman's tearful eye, Nor escape on shipboard sought she where the hidden havens lie."
There is a certain swing about this, but it has many blemishes.
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