Henriade: An Epick Poem. In Ten Canto's. Translated from the French Into English Blank Verse. To which are Now Added, the Argument to Each Canto, and Large Notes Historical and Critical

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C. Davis, 1732 - 311 pages
 

Contents

70
263
95
271
117
281
138
290
163
301

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Page xvii - The birds their quire apply ; airs, vernal airs, Breathing the smell of field and grove, attune The trembling leaves, while universal Pan, Knit with the Graces and the Hours in dance, Led on the eternal Spring.
Page xvii - Flowers of all hue, and without thorn the rose : Another side, umbrageous grots and caves Of cool recess, o'er which the mantling vine Lays forth her purple grape, and gently creeps Luxuriant; meanwhile murmuring waters fall Down the slope hills, dispersed, or in a lake, That to the fringed bank with myrtle crown'd Her crystal mirror holds, unite their streams.
Page viii - The French have set up purity for the standard of their language; and a masculine vigour is that of ours. Like their tongue is the genius of their poets, light and trifling in comparison of the English; more proper for sonnets, madrigals, and elegies than heroic poetry.
Page 240 - ALL were attentive to the god-like man, When, from his lofty couch, he thus began : Great queen! what you command me to relate, Renews the fad remembrance of our fate...
Page xxiii - Tis true, composing is the nobler part, But good translation is no easy art : For tho' materials have long since been found, Yet both your fancy, and your hands are bound , And by improving what was writ before, Invention labours less, but judgment more.
Page xiii - Idol Oak, In Double Rhymes our Thor and Woden Spoke; And by Succession of unlearned Times, As Bards began, so Monks Rung on the Chimes. But now that Phoebus and the sacred Nine With all their Beams on our blest Island shine, Why should not We their ancient Rites restore, And be what Rome or Athens were Before?
Page xxiv - But (laves we are, and labour on another man's plantation : we drefs the vineyard, but the wine is the owner's : if the foil be fometimes barren, then we are fure of being fcourged : if it be fruitful, and our care fucceeds, we are not thanked ; for the proud reader will only fay, the poor drudge has done his duty. But this is nothing to what follows ; for, being obliged to make his fenfe intelligible...
Page xvii - Thus was this place, A happy rural seat of various view : Groves whose rich trees wept odorous gums and balm, Others whose fruit, burnisht with golden rind, Hung amiable (Hesperian fables true, If true, here only) and of delicious taste ; Betwixt them lawns, or level downs, and flocks Grazing the tender herb, were interpos'd, Or palmy hillock, or the...
Page xxiv - If the soil be sometimes barren, then we are sure of being scourged; if it be fruitful, and our care succeeds, we are not thanked; for the proud reader will only say — the poor drudge has done his duty.
Page 283 - We had once in France the fame happinefs, and the fame privileges which you have; our laws were made by...

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