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geous prospects in business, for the sake of indulging his poetical humour, we hope it is not yet too late to prevail upon him to retract his resolution. With the help of Cocker and common industry he may become a respectable scrivener; but it is not all the Zephyrs, and Auroras, and Corydons, and Thyrsises, aye, nor his junketing queen Mab, and drudging goblins, that will ever make him a poet.

SILVA, No. 66.

Tenent media omnia silvae.

Virg. vi. En. 131.

RIDICULOUS LITERARY BLUNDERS.

MR. UPTON in his observations on Shakespeare records the following curious fact with regard to the Art of Sinking in Poetry. ""Tis pleasant enough," says he, "to consider how the change of a single letter has led learned commentators into mistakes; and a П, being accidentally altered into a B, gave rise to one of the best pieces of satire ever written in the English language, viz. Пept B×985. The blunder I mean is in the second section of Longinus, Ει εσιν υψες τις η βαθος τεχνη, instead of 985, a most ridiculous blunder, which has occasioned as ridiculous criticisms."

This mistake does not discover such gross ignorance as one which Rapin the critick fell into, and in which he was detected by the learned Warton. After repeating a story of Euphranor the painter, by way of authority for the anecdote, he says, "Apion has related it." The fact was, the critick had smuggled the story from Eustathius, who says, ao Exporter, by which he meant, that Euphranor, having heard a description of Jupiter read from Homer," went away and painted it." These can be paralleled only by a mistake in the first edition of Pope's Homer. Pope, whose acuteness as a Hellenist has been often called in question, when the 386th line of the 3d book of the Iliad was under his hands,

Грив бе

μια εικόνα παλαιγενεί προσεειπεν, etc. mistook г, a beldame, for a proper name, and most unluckily translated the passage thus:

To her beset with Trojan beauties came,

In Graea's form, the laughter-loving dame,
(Graea, her fav'rite maid, well skill'd to cull
The snowy fleece, and wind the twisted wool).

TIBULLUS,

I AM afraid, in the beginning of his tenth elegy of his first book :

Quis fuit, horrendos primus qui protulit enses?

Quam ferus, et vere ferreus, ille fuit ?

intended to pun, though Heyne does not remark it.

WIT IN SERMONS

SHOULD be very sparingly introduced, and never unless it come in naturally connected with the subject. It may be more easily tolerated on extraordinary occasions, and I am sure nobody will censure it in the following extract of a sermon preached at the consecration of the Bishop of Bangor, by the admirable Jortin. "The office of exhortation is, in a more particular manner, incumbent upon us, who are the ministers of the Gospel; and we are expressly required to exhort, warn, admonish, incite, and reprove, with humble autho rity, and modest resolution, and meek integrity, and prudent zeal. To insist upon this, will be called preaching up ourselves, and magnifying our office; and perhaps the subject might be treated to more advantage by those who are not per sonally concerned in it. But thus much, without breach of decency, we may softly insinuate,-and the sober part of the world will bear witness to it-that we usurp no dominion over men's consciences, or persons, or purses; that we pretend not to what every Priest of the Romish Church assumes, every gifted Saint, and illuminated Fanatick. And yet, for want of a better objection, we have been accused of formal state, and spiritual pride, and of bearing ourselves as Ambas sadours of heaven, a phrase which we never much affected. For this the Drunkards make songs upon us, and grimacing Ridicule aims at something that is meant for a jest. They will not grant us, it seems, what the Devil paid to Paul and Silas, when he said, These men are servants of the Most High God, which shew unto us the way of salvation. But it is to small purpose to expostulate with persons, whose Politeness hath refined away their manners, and whose Taste hath eaten

up their understanding; and it is altogether unnecessary to warn them, not to make an ill use of their Wit. Happy would theybe, if they were as secure from all other danger; for, in this respect, they may fairly claim a place amongst those, to whom little has been given; and of whom, consequently, little will be required.

DR. SYKES AND DR. BENTLEY.

THERE is a good anecdote told of Dr. Sykes when he took the degree of Doctor in Divinity at Cambridge, Eng. Dr. Bentley was then King's Professor of Divinity. "Dr. Sykes being, in the course of disputation (which is called keeping the act, and which is carried on in Latin) at a loss for a few moments for proper language in which to express his sentiments, was somewhat embarrassed; and in consequence thereof repeated with some hesitation the words, Quid si— Quid si-Whereupon the Professor (Dr. Bentley,) taking an ungenerous advantage, peevishly observed, Quid si, quid si, coelum ruat? To which his respondent instantly answered, Tum tu dignissime professor,-sublimi ferics sidera vertice. Hor. Car. 1. Lib. 1."

UNEXPECTED REPLY.

"How shameful is it that you should fall asleep," said a dull preacher to his drowsy audience, "whilst that poor creature" (pointing to an idiot who was leaning on his staff and staring at him) "is both awake and attentive!" "Perhaps," replied the fool, "I should have been asleep too, if I had not been an ideot."

PARALLEL TRANSLATIONS.

Or one of the noblest descriptions which the Greek, or any other language affords :

Η, και κυανέησιν ἐπ ̓ όφρυσι νευσε Κρονίων

Αμβρόσιαι δ' άρα χαῖται ἐπεῤῥωσαντο άνακτος
Κρατος ἀπ' ἀθανάτοιο, μεγαν δ ̓ ἐλελιξεν ὀλύμπον.

Iliad. I. 528.

the translation of Hobbes that was so popular as to pass through, I think, three editions, and was published little more than forty years before Pope's, will afford us an example of the meanness with which our poetical translations began.

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This said, with his black brows he to her nodded,
Where with displayed were his locks divine;
Olympus shook at stirring of his godhead;

And Thetis from it jump'd into the brine.

The lines of Pope are so well known, that I would not transcribe them, were it not proper to add how much they differ from the original.

He said; and awful bends his sable brows,
Shakes his ambrosial curls, and gives the nod,
The stamp of fate and sanction of the god.
High heaven with trembling the dread signal took,
And all Olympus to its centre shook.

The majesty of Homer is here preserved in spite of paraphrase and misrepresentation; but who can believe that the hemistick of the Greek is not injured by the two whole verses of the translation ?

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF ANDRE MICHAUX.

(Translated for the Anthology, from the French of Mons. Deleuze.)

[We think the following biographical notice of the elder Michaux, translated from the French of Mons. Deleuze, will not be unacceptable to our readers. We have long felt our obligations to him, for the knowledge he has afforded us of the plants of the southern parts of our country; and our interest in his history is of late much increased by his son, who has been for several years engaged in an investigation of the vegetable productions of the northern and middle states, and who will speedily publish the result of his labours.] ED. ANTH.

THE plants that enrich our country are mostly the reward of industry. Our vegetables and fruits were brought from va rious countries, and in their natural state were very inferiour to what they are in our gardens. Successively discovered in their native soil, they have been greatly improved by cultiva tion, and have been transported by commerce from one coun try to another. After various experiments, the most productive kinds, and those best adapted to the different soils, have been selected; and thus districts, where a few persons could barely find subsistence, now yield abundant harvests to a numerous population.

Of about 250 kinds of trees that now grow abundantly in France, more than three-fourths are of foreign origin. Some of these exoticks produce delicious fruit, some are employed in building and mechanick arts, and others decorate our gardens or adorn our parks with the picturesque scenery of the countries most favoured by nature. The walnut comes from Pontus, the cherry from Cerasus, the olive from Athens, the almond from the East Indies, the peach from Persia, the mulberry from China, the fig from Syria, the apricot from Armenia, the pomegranate from Carthage, and the orange from the West Indies. It is the same with our plants. The country of wheat is unknown; but many of our vegetables and some of our best fodders originally came from Asia. The discovery of America has given us maize, which is the principal food of many parts of our continent; the potatoe, which has increased the population of Ireland and Switzerland, and furnishes such a resource to the north of Europe; besides a variety of useful trees, such as the acacia, the tulip tree, the fir, the ash, the maple, &c.

These treasures may be continually increased, but to procure them we should no longer depend upon persons engaged in trade, who only send what is to be found upon the coast, but have recourse to naturalists, who will explore the interiour country, and who are capable of distinguishing and selecting what will be most useful.

We have indulged ourselves in these reflections to show what gratitude we owe to those courageous men, who to benefit society give up its pleasures, and travel into wild and desert countries in search of the hidden treasures of nature. Nor are they foreign to our subject. The man of whom we are to speak, ought to be numbered among the benefactors of mankind; and in giving a sketch of his laborious life, we shall show how a passion for the sciences and for agriculture, united to the most ardent patriotism, made him conceive the most extensive plans, and gave him for their execution that courage, which braves danger, and that strength, which despises fatigue and conquers difficulties.

André Michaux was born at Satory, an estate of the king (of France) situated in the park at Versailles, the 7th of March, 1746. At ten years of age he was sent to school with his younger brother, where they remained only four years. Their father destined them to succeed him in the cultivation

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