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Leader (1850-1860), 17th March 1860, Edition 2 of 2, Page 14, * Vrawfurmatlon f or, T/io Eomanoo of Ma...

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      Mmitial.* Rpiiw World", As It Grows Olde...

      have no such hideous enormities to be gibbeted for ; but still we have bur vices and follies , as edifying , we rciay . be sure , to the advanced races who shall succeed to our inherence , as those of the Romans are to us . What , however , we can gather from Martial and Jttvenaz , —tog-ether only matter for one pocket volume—they will have to extricate with intense labour from law reports and parliamentary debates , should newspapers , annual registers , and sfets of Mansard be preserved in the confusion which will attend our decline and fall .

      Mabtiai is not only facile jprtncejas amongst the epigrammatists , but has attained an absolute , unapproachable pre-eminence which he owes not so much to his own powers as to the material upon which , and the tools with which , he worked . Others may emulate , although it is little likely , the pungent wit , the keen observation , the graceful turn of thought , and the out-spoken severity which constitute his chief merits as a writer ; but none , we may hope , will have a society like that which served for the subject of his attacks to deal with , and none , certainly , will have a language of such admirable fitness for their work . The marvellous power and terseness of the "Latin is , perhaps , ' nowhere so evident as in Maetiai . He savs in one line what it would take at least two of

      English ( which has this terseness , m the hands of its masters , more than any other tongue ) to express ; and although ; of course , much of this rare merit is due to bis own peculiar epi grammatical genius , the example . of some of his countrymen , Saxlust—to give but one instance—shows , if need were , that the genius of the language was his great strength . If brevity be really the soul of .. ' . tj . and certainly it : goes . so far to . make it up , the wit of Maetial is supreme . He is always . brief and pointed , the . wonder being that any man could always keep up to such a level . Of course his epigrams are not of equal merit ; whilst some once read can never be forgotten , others appear lame arid halting . He says himself of them—¦ . ' ¦ ¦ Sunfc bona , sunfc quajdam mediocria , sunfc inala plura . And every writer , from his days down to ours / has agreed with him that ¦

      ' Aliter non fit liber , Yet it is by no means fair to set down those epigi'ams which appear to us pointless , as really devoid of the true salt . We can no more understand the puns and jests upon individuals which told well at Home in the days of Mabtial , ' than the imaginary race of whom we have spoken willappreciate Mr . Punch ' s , fun about Palmekston the bottleholder , Russell upsetting the coach , Mr . Cox ' s historical abilities , or the jokes of the -burlesque writers about crinoline and pegtops . When we can understand his allusions , they are almost always telling . Even the'dnllest verses give us . : i singular insight into the morals of Rome , morals so detestable that is impossible to imagine worse . It is in this depravity that we find the sufficient causu of that

      gross indelicacy and impurity which , in the judgment of our times , disfigures so . many of MAiiTrAL ' s unequalled sarcasms . His attacks are mainly levelled at vices . of an infamous nature , which are not only unmentionable , but even unknown now . Attacking the sinner , he describes the shv plainly ; and in doing , so , piily did what his contemporaries did . We cannot try tlie writers of earlier ages by standards formed either upon the morality or squeauiislmess of our own . The same . licence which disgusts xis m Martial , is to be found in greater or less degree in Catullus , IIokage , and Juvenal ; and eithqr of that great triumvirate , denouncing the men

      and women of whom Martial wrote , would have spoken as plainly as he has done . Not that this grossness in Martial , is merely tho result of honest indignation ; he does not sooui'ge vice as vice , with the earnestness with which . Juvenal assailed it . He attacks unsparingly some infamous vices ; but for others , which we should now deem infamous , he had evidently a sneaking kindness . ' What the man wus himself , wo do not care to inquire . He tries to make out , as Catullus—all the while accumulating what appears to us proofs to the ' contrary—did before him , that however impure his book , his lii ' e was chaste , '

      Lasciva esb nobis pagina , vita proba estj or , . as Mr . Bohn ' s old MS . of translations has it —< " 3 \| y lines are -wanton , but my life is ohftsto . " " Perhaps it was according 1 to the notions of the time , and it must always bo reinembered that 'Maktial has often written with singular elegance , delicacy , and grace . The influence of Mammal is to be traced almost everywhere in the older literature of Kuropo . Many ft smart saying * of » n ojld author , made to do duty by a modern one as his own , voully owes its paternity to the Spanish poet who made Rome his homo . Naturally , the looser writers of tho sixteenth , seventeenth , and eighteenth

      centuries have borrowed from his filthiest epigrams ideas which they clothed in theiv own lang-uago , and then given « n air of novelty and » n extra spiqe of interest to them by applying 1 tho story or satir * o to some eminont personage of their own times ; but he has not been less drawn upon by staid , sober ,. and even ctavout writers . Whether they went to him as a fount of pure lalinit , y , a source of sparkling 1 wife , or drawn by that strange attraction which these wanton books , when redeemed by any genius , seem to have for grave tind reverend eeignorB , we cannot see j but in old , history , philosophy , and even divinity , one often stumbles across Martial , sometimes quoted by name— -fbv the men of old were generally honoBt in those matterssometimes translated into tho vernaoulaiv—or rather his idea expressed in the vernacular , for translation of Mabtiax is out of tho question ; the man who undertakes , it must bo a Martial lumeeU , and then ho must have a languioere as suitable for tho purpose as Mabviax . had . Of course the attempt has often been made ,

      but as rnuch of course it has failed . The only chance of success is to give up the notion of translating , and talcing the idea of the poet , put it in another framework , a course which has been not unfrequently adopted in this and other countries . Mr . BoHN having determined to give a translation of this author , has undoubtedly done well to let it be in prose . The poetical versions , although collected with great industry , are not very good . Those by Fletcher are the best , and are sometimes singularly happy . So far as we hav 6 examined the prose , the translation seems good enough , and we can quite recognise the expediency of its ceasin ^ to be literal , when it had to render words which , cannot

      be printed in these days . That question , indeed , has been Mr . Boiikt ' s great difficulty , and we cannot say that his solution of it is the best . He has given the epigrams which are absolutely untransliiteable in . tlie original Latin , and appended an Italian translation by Graglia . In other words , he has . marked out for the benefit of the lovers of dirt the really dirty epigrams , and given such assistance in the translation of their difficult Latin as Italian would render . It must be said , however , that Gkaglia has managed his translation by the very easy course of giving the most indecent Latin words in ' , an Italian form . So far so good . We confess we think it would have been much better to have left these

      epigrams completely out , and have plainly , stated the reason . Nor do we see any very good ground for the publication of the translation , except , Mr . Bohn's natural desire to have his classical library perfect . The wit and point of Martial , as we have said , cannot be given in another tongue ; and valuable as may be the information which he gives of the life of Imperial Home , it is scarcely appreciable , except by those who have studied its history well .

      .258 Theleader And Saturday'analyst* [Ma...

      . 258 TheLeader and Saturday ' Analyst * [ March 17 , 1860 .

      Art And Life Romance.* T He Author Of " ...

      ART AND LIFE ROMANCE . * T HE author of " The Scarlet Letter" has , after a considerable lapse of time , added another to the list of ids world-famed productions . The Romance of Monte Beni doubtless owes its birth to the author ' s evident enthusiasm for the works of genius and art . The effect produced . upon his fertile brain by drawing aside the curtain which shrouds the masterpieces of Home , sacred relios of those mighty intellects long since departed into the shades of the Eternal City , lias led to the composition of three singularly eloquent volumes , teeniing with the most fanciful creations of one of the most fanciful and crea-tiye of iniugihatious . Mr , Hawthorne ' s exposition of tlie . individual and artistic meaning couched Ju each senseless Mock of sculptured marble , and the elevating 1 influence which a due

      appreciation of art must necessarily exercise over the educated and inquiring' inind , is at once chaste , comprehensive , and instructive ; lie has in fact left nothing unsaid that could be said upon the subfeet . Nor does he confine himself solely to sculpture ; he delights in expatiating on the beauties of Raphael , Leonardo da Vinci , and the master spirits of many a past generation , when t ) ie genius of painting was at its height . There is something fascinating- in the smthor ' s mode of . treating these and all other subjects , appealing tlireotly to the higher capabilities of our intellectual faculties . The reader ' finds himself wafted onwards in a perfect stream of calm spiritual enjoyment , and does not become conscious of any feeling of impatience in consequence of the delay thus occasioned in the

      progress of tlie story . The story itself , however , is open to some criticism . The Count of Monte Beni , a young man of slender intellect , but of a ' singularly vivacious temperament , and whose miraculous resemblance to the Faun of Praxitoles lias been discovered by a company of friendly artists during a visit to the sculpture gallery ut Rome , is introduced as a friend and companion of Miriam , a lady artist , who is endowed by nature with the most brilliant intellectual capacities , and whose power over tho youngArcadian '( as mind will sometimes exercise a magnetic influence over the mere animul propensities of ia lower order of beings ) is entire and , absolute . Led away by this fatal passion , and under the spell of'an electric glance from his mistress ' s eye , this poor fawn-like creature commits a , dreadful

      crimp—murder , in fact ; . The author now proceeds to extract good out of evil . Tlie death of a human being , the result of his own violence , developed faculties that from his birth had lain dormant in the breast of Monte Boni . Remorsp , the offspring- of guilt , becomes at onc 6 tho instructor and imoml ' rog ' jQnorator of fcho young Count , Hitherto , ho has had no perception of right and wrong ; if he chanced by aoeidont to follow in . Uiq right track , it was not the result of carefully treasured precepts and ennobling principles , but , the consequence of mere instinct—such instinct as belongs more or less to ovory species of the brute creation . He now becomes conscious of ft new life Hooding' in upon his awakening / acuities , and

      Ins inner nature is exalted in proportion as he inhales the heavenborn treasure , so that from the bitter ordeal of blood and sorrow lie emerges a wiser and u butter man ; Thus far wo have no objection to make . Wo thoroughly coincide with Mr . Hawthornu ' s theory of an originally apathetio and unreasoning mind receiving tiio revelation of profound truths through tho medium of crime and remorso . But when ho leads us into a labyrinth of mystery , from which he allows us no apparent outlet ; when his heroine , Hilda , who is he ' re represented as a personification of innocence a-nd . purity , is suddenly spirited avyay , for no palpable reason , nobody boing able to conjecture tho how or wherefore j and when , moreover ,

      * Vrawfurmatlon F Or, T/Io Eomanoo Of Ma...

      * Vrawfurmatlon f or , T / io Eomanoo of Manlo Bant . By JSAVnANiEU Hawtoounb . Three vols . Smith , Moor , and C [ o , Which /« IHitvh ? or , Miloa Oaes !< h /' s Contract , A Piotwxo Story . By JtoBEHT B , Brouoii . Two vole . W . Kent and Oo , JNWo . y Hall / m ; Tho W \ fo \ SMer . Smith , Bldor , and Oo ,

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), March 17, 1860, page 14, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_17031860/page/14/