ent in wisdom and activity. We are improperly referred (Vol. II. p. 186.), for a passage, to Tacitus's history: it should be to his annals, 1. 4. 33. We think falcarios (Vol. II. 190, 191.) should not be rendered ironmongers, but cut-throats, assasins; that is, Catiline's profligate associates.

In the translation of the following sentence from Cicero de Oratore, Sed tamen ita solet narrare Scævola, conchas eos, et umbilicos, ad Cajetam, et ad Laurentum, legere consuesse, et ad omnem animi remissionem ludumque descendere' (1.2.6.), we are at a loss for the Latin words of delighted with throwing them on the smooth surface of the waters.' (Vol. I. p. 519.)

We have consulted all the passages referred to (Vol. II. p. 531.), on the subject of King Solomon's fleets; but in none of them do we find it made out to our satisfaction, that one of the voyages accomplished by this navy was to the coast of Guinea; nor are we less sceptical on this point, after the perusal of the following argument. For although gold made a part of each return, yet some of the articles composing the cargoes, such as ivory, apes, and peacocks, were certainly not imported on both occasions. (p. 531.) We shall afflict the patience of our readers with the investigation of only two more of Dr Steuart's mistakes.

With the usual partiality of editors, he thinks fit to depreciate the merits of Livy, in order to exalt those of his own author. We do not, however, look on this circumstance as a very decided proof of bad literary taste, as we think it likely that Dr Steuart might admire this historian more, if he was better acquainted with him. In the following pleasant tale, any deficiency of knowledge is amply atoned for by ingenuity.

Among the declaimers at Rome, in the time of Auguftus, Livy, in a letter, as it is fuppofed, addreffed to his fon, celebrates one teacher in particular, who used to recommend to his scholars to difguife or darken their meaning as much as poffible (core was the Greek word he used to exprefs his idea); thus intending that they fhould obtain the highest poffible excellence of ftyle. On one of his scholars, accordingly, who had been fuccefsful at his exercise beyond the reft, he bestowed this incomparable eulogium. Tanto melior; ne ego quidem intellexi!' -"Moft excellent!" fays the master; "fo very good, that I am even unable to understand it myself." Vol. I. 399.

Whether Dr Steuart dreamed this, invented it waking, or from whence he got it, we are utterly at a loss to divine. He cites, indeed, a passage from Quintilian, which contains a part of the story, but nothing, certainly, which connects it with the style of Livy. We subjoin it; but we imagine the reader will not find in it one syllable of Livy's celebrating this delightful teacher, or concerning a letter to his son: indeed, from the five first words of the sentence, we should rather be led to conclude,

that

that Livy was censuring the practice, which he recorded.Neque id novum vitium est; cum jam apud Titum Livium inveniam fuisse præceptorem aliquem, qui discipulos obscurare, quæ dicerent, juberet, Græco verbo utens, XI. Unde illa scilicet egregia laudatio, tanto melior: ne ego quidem intellexi (Quint. de Inst. Orat. 1. 8. 2.) The three following passages of this same historian are, in Dr Steuart's opinion, uncommonly dark and unintelligible; and a learned and ingenious friend of his (vol. I. 400.) could not explain them in less than several closely written quarto pages. Injurias, et non redditas res ex fædere, quæ repetitæ sint, et ego regem nostrum Cluilium, causam hujusce esse belli, audisse videor: nec te dubito, Tulle, eadem præ te ferre.' (lib. I. 23.) In hâc tantarum expectatione rerum, sollicitâ civitate, dictatoris primum creandi mentio orta; sed nec quo anno, nec quibus consulibus, quia ex factione Tarquiniâ essent (id quoque enim traditur) parum creditum sit, nec quis primum dictator creatus sit, satis constat.' (lib. II. c. 18.) Dr Steuart should not here have omitted to state, that in the Bodleian manuscript of the first Decad of Livy, the words from quia to nec quis, which assuredly contain the only difficulty, are not found: but even if we retain them, we have nothing more than one sentence within another, not at all harder to be explained than the multis sibi quisque imperium petentibus' of Sallust, which, on another ocsasion, Dr Steuart is at no loss to understand (Vol. I. 289.), and which he will not suffer honest Roger Ascham to stumble at.

But one of the most extraordinary paffages in all Livy is (Vol. I. p. 4cc.) where the hiftorian fays, Augebatur ferox Tullia, nihil materiæ in viro neque ad cupiditatem, neque ad audaciam effe,' (). 1. 46.); and then adds of her, fpernere fororem, quod virum pacta muliebri ceffaret audacia.' (Ibid.)

This really appears to us infinitely ridiculous. We remember construing these passages, and perfectly comprehending them, at least a year before we left school. Nor can we believe, that any moderate scholar can fix his eye on them for five minutes, without most satisfactorily apprehending the meaning of the historian. But Dr Steuart has not yet done with Livy; nor have we quite done with Dr Steuart on the same subject.

The great peculiarity' he tells us, (Vol. I. p. 397-) in the ftyle of Livy feems to be this, that whilft his narrative is graceful and flowing, far more fo, indeed, than that of either Salluft or Thucydides, he de viates into an abrupt and affected manner in the fpeeches, of which the very reverfe was rather to have been expected. Take, for example, the fpeech of Junius Brutus in an affembly of the people after the fall of Tarquin, when he endeavours to perfuade the dethroned prince to go. exile, (1. 2. c. 2.); the fpeech of Mucius Scævla to Porfenna the Etruf

into

сап

can king, 1. 2. c. 2. (it should be c. 12.); the fpeeches against the de cemvirs, l. 3. c. 52. &c. They are by far too long to be quoted in this place.

After the specimens we have already seen of Dr Steuart's moderation as to the length of his quotations, we should not have suspected him of delicacy on this head we are therefore half inclined to suspect, that he may not very lately have seen the speeches referred to; as, when taken all together, they do not amount to much more than fifty lines in an octavo page. But if, by this insinuation, we slander his character as a scholar, he can doubtless set himself fair again with the world by pointing out the speech of Junius Brutus, in an assembly of the people, after the fall of Tarquin, when he endeavours to persuade the dethroned prince to go into exile!' Our Journal is liable to fall into the hands of mere English readers, or we would not insult those of another description by informing them, that by this nonsense, Dr Steuart évidently demonstrates his utter ignorance of the latter part of the first, and the former part of the second book of Livy. The Romans rose against the regal government, whilst Tarquin was absent from Rome at the siege of Ardea; nor was he ever afterwards admitted within the gates. Consequently, he never could have been in an assembly of the people; and, had he contrived to get amongst them, they most likely would have torn him to pieces. Neither, after the first rising of the people, did Brutus ever come to a personal conference with the dethroned prince. The speech which is the subject of this lamentable blun der, is made by Brutus to Collatinus, his colleague in the consulship; of whom, as allied to the blood-royal, the people, though probably with little cause, entertained a jealousy, which compelled him to quit not only his office, but his country.

Thus much for Dr Steuart's pretensións as a critic upon Livy. Let us now see how far he atones for this ignorance of so celebrated a Latin classic, by a more accurate acquaintance with a Greck historian. In Vol. II. p. 531, we have the following quotation from Herodotus.

"Except in that particular part which is contiguous to Afia, the "whole of Africa is furrounded by the fea. The first perfon who "proved this, was, as far as we are able to judge, Necho, king of "Egypt. When he had defifted from his attempt to join, by a canal,` "the Nile with the Arabian Gulph, he defpatched fome veffels, under

the conduct of Phoenicians, with directions to pass by the columns of "Hercules, and, after penetrating the northern ocean, to return to Egypt. "Thefe Phoenicians, taking their courfe from the Red-fea, entered the. "fouthern ocean. On the approach of autumn, they landed in Libya,

and planted fomé corn in the place where they happened to find "themselves: when this was ripe, and they had cut it down, they again "departed. Having thus confumed two years, they, in the third, paf

YOL. II. NO. 22.

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fed

fed the columns of Hercules, and returned to Egypt." (Beloe's Trauflation, Vol. II. p. 215-217.)

With this Mr Beloe we have fortunately no immediate concern. It is the forfeiture of Dr Steuart's claims as a Greek scholar, in adopting this piece of choice translation, which we have to lament. Now, the only meaning which the exceptionable part of this version bears, is this:-that Necho ordered the Phoenicians to pass the columns of Hercules, and, after penetrating the Northern (which might with more propriety be termed the Western or Atlantic) ocean, to sail southward down the western side of Africa, till they doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and thus to return by the eastern side. Now, it is certainly rather remarkable, that the Phoenicians, in receiving these orders from an absolute monarch, whose nod would probably have been a sufficient signal for taking their heads off, should immediately set out in their voyage precisely the contrary way; namely, sailing first southwards down the eastern coast of Africa, and then returning northwards by the western, till they came to the columns of Hercules, which they passed, and finished their course to Fypt by the Mediterranean. It remains to be inquired, if this rash and pervicacious conduct of these Phoenicians, appears in the original Greek. It runs thus ;

σε Λιβύη μεν γαρ δηλοῖ ἑωυτην, εέσα περίφυτος, πλην όσον αυτής προς την Αστην αξίζει Νικω τε Αιγυπτίων βασιλεος πρώτο, των ημείς ίδμεν, κατα δέξαντος· ὃς επει τε την διωρικα επαίτατο ορύσσων, την εκ τε Νειλος διέκεισαν ες του Αραβίον κολπον, απέπεμψε Φοινικάς άνδρας πλοίοισι, εντειλαμένος ες το απίσω δι Ηρακληίων στηλέων εκπλέειν έως ες την Βορητην θάλασσαν, και εται ες Αίγυπτον απικνέεσθαι. ὁρμηθεντες ων οι Φοινικές, εκτης Ερυθρής καλεομένης. θαλασσης, επλέον την Νοτιην θαλασσαν. όπως δε γενοιτο φθινόπωρον, προσκον τις αν σπείρίσκον την γην, ίνα εκαστοτε της Λιβύης πλέοντες γενοίατο, και με Νέσκεν τον αμητον θερίσαντες δ' αν τον σιτον επλέον. ώστε δυο ετέων διεξελθον των, τρίτω ετει καμψαντες Ηρακληίας στήλας, απίκοντο ες Αίγυπτον. (Herod. Melpom. 42. Sat.)

The literal English of the words which cause the blunder, is this-He (viz. Necho) sent away some Phoenicians (of course, from the place where, in the words immediately preceding, he is stated to have been, i. e. from the Arabian Gulph), ordering them to make their homeward voyage, or, in their return home, to sail (ES TO OTTION EXTRE) through the columns of Hercules, till they got into the northern sea, that is, the Mediterranean, which bounds Egypt on the north, and thus to return to that country.

Though there are some passages of the translation expressed with neatness and animation, we cannot help saying, that Dr Stuart's general style is very far from attractive. Sometimes it is rendered ridiculous by a sort of counterfeit grandeur; at others, it is extremely deficient in perspicuity; whilst its general diffu

siveness

siveness is but ill adapted to convey to an English reader an idea, of that nervous brevity, which is the peculiar characteristic of his original author. We shall give a few examples. The pompous verbosity of the following passage is quite ludicrous.

A few days after the debarkation of the troops, intelligence being brought that a valuable magazine of corn and other ftores had been formed at Corcina, then in the hands of the enemy, Saluft was defpatched with a detachment of the fleet, and peremptory orders to make bimfelf mafter of the island. "As to the poflibility of the attempt," faid Cæfar, to his lieutenant in giving him his inftructions, "it is needlefs to deliberate: our circumftances are fuch as admit of no room for delay, and no excufe for disappointment." The vigorous character of Salluft was not calculated to disappoint the confidence thus repofed in him; and he executed the fervice with equal celerity and fuccefs.' (Effay I. Vol. I. p. 56.

The reader, we presume, would hardly guess, that the whole of the vigour displayed upon this occasion, consisted in peaceably landing upon the island, from whence the former commander had as vigorously run away, and where the inhabitants, who were favourably disposed to the dictator's interests, received his lieutenant with open arms. Our next extract is a description of a garden which, we think, would do full as well for the gardens of Alcinous, or of Babylon, or indeed for any garden that was ever described.

The other front of Salluft's house looked to the gardens. Here, every beauty of nature, and every embellishment of art, feein to have been affembled, which could delight or gratify the fenfes. Umbrageous walks, open parterres, and cool porticoes, difplayed their various attractions. Amidft fhrubs and flowers of every hue and odour, interfperfed with ftatues of the most exquifite workmanship; pure ftreams of water preserved the verdure of the earth, and the temperature of the air; and while on the one hand the diftant profpect caught the eye, on the other the clofe retreat invited to repofe or meditation. Vol. I. p. 64.)

(Effay I.

Of the three passages which immediately follow, the two first are, to us, unintelligible; and, in the feeble periphrasis of the last, it is with difficulty that we recognize the meaning of the original.

Concerning your munificence and liberality, what further need I fay, than is fo fully attefted by the world, whofe applaufe is unable to keep pace with your me its; whofe diligence fhall fooner fick under the labour of commendation, than your efforts relax in the career of glory?' (Vol. I. p. 450. I. Epift. to Cæf.)

On due confideration, notwithstanding, we fhall find, that man; above all creatures, is gifted with excellence and energy; although the one he degrades, and the other he mifapplies; in his purfuits far more frequently without diligence, than talents to direct it, or time for their exertion. (Vol. II. p. 323-)

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