POETS AND POETRY.

DR. LEAF AND THE GREEK ANTHOLOGY.* Dn. LEAP in these translations again proves himself what his friends knew him—a fine scholar and a man of great taste. He has very wisely not tried to reproduce the metre of the original poems of the Anthology, i.e., the elegiac couplet. He gives his reasons for this in the preface :— " English has neves produced a metre which holds in literature such a dominant position as the elegiac couplet in Greek. The nearest approach is the heroic couplet' of Pope and the eigh- teenth century, with its variation, the metre of Gray's Elegy.' But to the invariable use of this there are many objections, not the least being that the eighteenth-century atmosphere is not one that one wishes to introduce into the Greek Anthology ' • and one has to be carefully on guard against the mock-heroic. There is another mechanical obstacle. English, as measured by syllables, the only applicable test, is more concise than Greek, but not generally to the extent of reducing the average twenty- eight syllables of the Greek couplet—which may be as many as thirty-one—to the invariable twenty of the English. It is often impossible to do it without undue compression or omission, but by no means always."

I think that some of his readers may even wish that Dr. Leaf had taken greater metrical liberties than he has, for his invariable use of some regular and generally rhymed metre has often involved him in uncomfortable inversions. The following translation of Tymes' " Epitaph on a Maltese Dog " will give the reader an idea of what I mean :— " A Maltese lies this stone below, Eumelus' watch-dog, Bully' bight, Most trusty friend; his barking now Is for the silent ways of night. '

- But this is typical only of Dr. Leaf's faults and his virtues are very many. For example, in the following he has surely caught exactly the right tone for the translation of Meleager.. Here : the Elizabethanism does not let the honey cloy our tongues :- " Lost a boy ! A runaway ! Raise the hue and cry 0 ! From his bed at break of day, Naughty Love did fly 0 • 1.4We Poems from the Greek. Translated by Walter Loaf. London : Grant Ritharde. Os. net.) Fleet he is, a quiver bears,

Wings upon his shoulder ;

Saucy laugh and dainty tears ; None can chatter.bolder. '

What his country none can tell, Nor his sire before him ;

Land and sea and heaven and hell, Swear they never bore him.' All disown him, all detest !

Hurry 1 While you're staying, Sure the rascal in some breast Other snared is laying. Ho, you rogue ! I spy your lair ! Now you cannot fly, sir, ' Lurking with your arrows there, In my Zeno's eyes, sir 1 "

Another happy rendering is " On a Gem representing Cupid Ploughing," by Moschus

" Love laid aside his torch and bow,

And grasped a goad to guide the plough, Two sturdy bulls beneath the yoke ; A wallet on his back he bound,

And set himself to till-the ground,

And looked to Jove aloft, and spoke : . ' Jove, you must give me harvest full, Or I shall yoke Europa's bull.' "

These two poems will give the reader the keynote of Dr. Leaf's methods of translation. Occasionally he drops into a not quite appropriate eighteenth centuryism—he will " crave a boon," or the like—but for the most part he gives us delightful limpidity, while for comedy his touch is admirably light : - " Go, Dorcas, tell Lycainis her veneer Of love is sham ; and time makes all shams clear. Go, tell her, Dorcas—tell it, tell it twice : Mind, tell it all ; be off, and tell it thrice. No lingering, fly I Here! Stop a minute. Hold !

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Why hurry off before the whole is told ? Just add that—no, I mean that—I don't know — Don't say a word—but just—tell all. So go ! Be sure you tell it au! But why send, you, Dorcas, when I myself am going too ' The reader will probably be struck afresh by the wonderful sense of distillation which the poems of the Anthology give. This art of verbal gem cutting is almost uncanny. Every other sort of verse, except perhaps that of the incomparable Po Chii I (in Mr.Waley's translations), showe blowsy beside the Anthology's exquisite small elegance. It is attar of rose. Dr. Leaf has done modern poetry a service in producing his book, as does everyone who sets a classical model before English writers. English poetry never rises to the greatest heights, of which it is capable unless it is influenced by the classics and, if possible, by the Greeks. Keats and James Elroy Flecker are typical children of the union of the English and the Greek spirit, and we owe a debt to those who help to keep the Greeks before us. If the reader will turn to our correspondence columns he will find a pleasant interchange of wit between another banker poet and Dr. Leaf.

A. Wrutems-Exsas.