I think Le Poete Mourant, if my translation has done any justice to its merits, may safely be left without comment to speak for itself. I cannot, however, refrain from pointing out the 4th, 8th, and 10th stanzas: the indignant transition in the last has a noble effect. My limits compel me to abstain from many references to the original; I prefer therefore confining my extract to the following-not consecutive-stanzas, which I have omitted to translate. Ah! donnez a la mort un espoir moins frivole. J'en atteste les dieux! depuis que je respire, Que nos levres pressent en vain. I conclude for the present with the following passage from an Epic fragment-the Angel. The Almighty is described as summoning to his presence one of the Guardian Spirits of man, and despatching it with the Divine command to the tent of Clovis. Lamartine touches with much beauty upon the offices of these angelic watchers of mortality. O guardian Angel! round each lonely hearth Upon a lion's skin, whose rich folds swept 3 Y So with the summons of the Lord on high (To be continued.) SACRED POETRY. THOUGHTS FOR TROUBLOUS TIMES. I. THERE is a path of peace-mid tangled grove, Bright holydays that form a galaxy To make a road to heaven-streams from above, Ancient of Mothers, in parental love Daily unwinding from thine annual maze Treasures that grow not old,-whence still may grow Fresh adoration! On thy face (of thee Praying to be more worthy) as we gaze, Thy soul comes forth in beauty, and thy brow II. And let me, loving still of thee to learn, Thy weekly collect on my spirit wear, Like strain which pleased our childhood's pensive ear, And sweetness new unwinds from out its olden chain. III. No! I have guilt enough-I wash me clear In public things or men, shall urge me on, A spur in sides of duty; for I fear From earth, sick with our varied crimes, ascend Those vapours, which now throng heaven's lowering roof Dread pause! and now he is his country's friend, THE CHURCH. WHAT though winds and waves assail thee, 'Mid the sheeted lightning's glare, Shalt thou breast the stormy sea! Thy true course shall ne'er deceive thee, Music soft when winds are loud, His sure word is on the blast. Where Monsoon his wing is folding, Where the moon her court is holding 'Mid stern winter's palaces; Where Ohio rolls his pride, There thy faithful dove hath hied, And hath sought thy sheltering side, By his dying promise given, Let the wild winds tell their tale; By the hearts in his command, Lift aloft the solemn sail! W. Clouds afar thy course are bounding, W. TO MY SISTER, ON HER TWENTIETH BIRTH-DAY. My gentle Mary, twenty years To-day have flitted by Since first thou cam'st, a helpless thing, We welcom'd thee, as best we might, With mingled smiles and tears, And poured-we could no more—our prayers For blessings on thy years. And, sister sweet, our prayers were heard ; God's blessed one thou art : Not with the rich, or proud, or gay, But with the pure in heart. His gifts to thee in gentleness And piety are given; The treasures that endure on earth, And never fail in heaven. My gentle Mary, thou hast been E'en as a child to me, Since first thy new-born helplessness And stretched upon some shady bank, And watch'd as with a father's joy Thy happy infant play. And still the holy bond endures, Makes tenderer, deeper, more intense, It grows with years, with cares it grows, In joy and sorrow, hope and fear, My gentle Mary, may the years That yet remain to thee Be spent, as all the past have been, In tranquil piety! May Heaven, in mercy, spare thee long, To all who share thy love; And faith and peace prepare thee here For endless joy above! G. W. D. NOTICES OF THE OLDEN TIME. PRONUNCIATION AND RHYME.* THE changes of a literary language, or that used by the refined and educated, are in continual progress, and that progress is often so imperceptible that we never become fully aware that it has taken place. We are, indeed, aware when different words are employed; but differences of pronunciation, being submitted only to the living ear, and not to the eyes of posterity, and being difficult to describe in words, are apt to be much underrated. It rarely happens that accidental circumstances call into notice the varying modes of pronunciation at various periods; but some such instances will shew that, within no distant period, there has arisen a remarkable difference in that respect. The Rev. J. Walters published his Welsh Dictionary a little after the middle of the eighteenth century; and he mentions that the Welsh y is pronounced as u in burn, or i in bird, except in the last syllable of a word, and then it is pronounced as i in birth, girth, mirth, sin, &c. From hence it appears that bird and birth were by him, and in his time, pronounced in two different ways; that the latter was pronounced like sin, and that the i in birth, girth, and mirth, was very similar to the Italian i in mirto or virtù. I am not aware whether the traces of such a pronunciation remain, but it has certainly ceased to prevail. Sir William Jones, in his Dissertation on Asiatic Orthography, suggested a new mode of spelling English which he tried upon some verses of Addison. The only inference I will draw from the following couplet is that he pronounced perform and storm quite differently, and regarded them as faulty rhymes: "And pliz'd dh' ālmaitiz ārders tu perfórm, Raids in dhi hwerlwind and dairects the stärm.” He seems to have expressed the or in perform like ore, and not as in storm. The whole is such an indifferent specimen of philology, that it may be doubtful how far his new symbols are real or conventional. But such a notation as raid, almaiti, and "bai divain camand," leads one to conjecture that he so expressed himself, instead of saying as we do, reid, meiti, bei, &c., and that he said cam instead of cum in command. If he did, and was in the habit of hearing the like from others, we can more easily understand what is told us of the similar pronunciation of the infamous Dr. Titus Oates. Either he indulged himself in an affectation which was only beginning to come into vogue in his time, and only beginning to decline sixty years ago; or he exaggerated a little the mode of pronouncing which was usual. But he was not that solitary instance of a puerile and unaccountably ridiculous con Though the following paper is not strictly antiquarian, every reader will thank the Editor for inserting it. |