metus has secured, in common with all good men, a certainty of future happiness, however dark the present may appear.

Sure trust is seated in my heart
That prosperous will be his part

Who doth the gods revere. 684-7.

Again the chorus, in predicting immortality for Alcestis, touches on the eternal blessedness of the gods above, in language, which, though brief, savours of any thing rather than the atheism which has been imputed to Euripides: (vid. last chorus) as does also that exhortation to patience which it administers to the bereft king in the words—

But all should meekly bear the gods behests.

The last words of Admetus bid his subjects offer sacrifices, as well as prayer and thanksgiving, for his happy change of fortune. And the conclusion in the mouth of the chorus, repeated as it is in at least three other dramas, sets a seal to the proof afforded that the poet delighted not in scoffing at divine things and persons, but rather strove in his compositions to make it clear that he loved to honour virtue, to exalt piety, and to ascribe to the gods generally the divine attributes of might, mercy, and justice. And here I may be pardoned by the reader, if I observe (with the utmost reverence, and with the most shrinking sense of the danger of approaching such holy ground except with timidity and reserve :) that there seem to exist in the Alcestis strange shadowy embodyings of some vague tradition respecting the true light of the world," the Lord of life," who was to come upon the lower earth, taking upon himself the form of a servant, and, in due time, to rob the grave of victory and take the sting from death. I will not say more on this subject, which indeed can hardly be handled by men far more experienced, far more deeply versed in sacred learning, far more competent to decide the bounds, beyond which it is hazardous to proceed, without incurring the risk of being betrayed into unintentional irreve

rence.

One of the peculiarities of this play is the introduction of children on the Greek Stage. This was more common with Euripides than with his predecessors: though, even by him, they are not introduced speaking or singing, except in this play, and in the Andromache; on account of the tedious arrangements which this entailed. He seems to have brought them on, with a view to moving the hearts of his audience, and winning them to applause, by the sight of such innocence and helplessness. Whilst I think it needless to go through the history of the Dramatis Personæ in this preface, because those who are inclined to read

it, may find it in Lempriere or elsewhere, I may still mention one or two points which may not be so easily reached. Among these is the fact, that Admetus is represented as having been one of the heroes engaged in the Argonautic expedition, notwithstanding the general lack of heroism in his character as depicted in this play. (Apoll Rhod. T. 49.) Eumelus, his son, who also appears on the stage in this drama, figures in the 2nd Book of the Iliad, as bringing to Troy steeds, which Apollo had kept for him, probably in the house of Admetus, whilst he was his servant. In the dispute between the Furies and Apollo in the Eumenides of Eschylus we have these lines, alluding to the subject of this play,

FURIES. IN Pheres' halls thou didst the same of old,
Winning the fates to grant men endless life.
APOLLO. Why! is't not fair to favour worshippers,
At other times, and chiefly in their need?

FURIES. Thou didst corrupt those elder deities

With wine, and thus their awful might beguile,

where Herman alters the original, so that "sleep" is substituted for "wine;" in which case the last two lines do not refer to the Fates, who suffered Admetus to live: to which otherwise they do.

It may be added, that the date of this drama must be fixed before 426 B. C.; that being the date of the Acharnians of Aristophanes; in which comedy that poet parodies one or two passages of the Alcestis; as indeed he does in the "Birds," the " Ecclesiagusæ" and others. It is fixed by the Didascalia above referred to, as having been first performed B.c. 438, being the first in order of time, of the extant plays of Euripides.

And now I commend to the reader this attempt to give in English a truthful rendering of the "Alcestis." It appears in an age, which, (while there exists in it a strong tendency in many quarters to undervalue the study of classical literature, and its purifying influences,) still affords hope to the scholar in that increasing supply of poetical translations of Greek and Roman poets, which is the fairest evidence of an increased demand. To linger awhile amidst the undying memories of ancient Greece or Rome can never be a waste of time and trouble: and, in a member of either of our great universities, it is but an expression of affectionate regard for "Alma Mater," to endeavour to prove that, even in these lighter portions of the academic course, her teaching has not been bestowed in vain.

Graver studies, heavier duties, have left the writer of these pages but little leisure for such pursuits: and the humble fruit of his stolen communings with the tragic poets of Greece is doubtless full of imperfection. It was never intended for the public, until, when yet unfinished, it caught the eye of some

kind friends, whose taste and judgment he had long learned to value. To them it owes its publication. Whatever may be the judgment of critics upon the execution of the task undertaken, it will at any rate console the translator, that his design has been in the right direction: and to him, whatever may be its fate, it can never be matter of regret that he has bestowed on the Alcestis such attention as he could spare: sufficient, at any rate, to enable him to renew his converse with that Muse, which of old came to him, as a welcome visitant-receiving from him a more willing homage than Philosophy or History; alluring him insensibly to dwell upon the rugged grandeur of Eschylus, the calm and finished elegance of Sophocles, and the "linked sweetness" of Euripides; and connecting to his mind all that is beautiful in art, all that is perfect in conception, with the most glorious legends of Poetic Hellas.

(Concluded from page 77, in last number.)

Admetus. Chorus.

ADм. Thanks, kindly presence of Pheræans! thanks! Ye see my servants bear aloft the corpse,

With every honour, to the funeral pyre.

Do ye, as is your wont, while forth she fares

On her last road, salute the noble dead.

CHOR, LO! here thy sire comes forth with aged step: Attendants too bear presents in their hands

For thy lost wife: meet honours for the shades.

(Enter Pheres.)

PHERES. I come to join my sorrow with my son's:
For thou hast lost a wife both good and pure,
Let none gainsay it. Yet, tho' hard to bear,
These things must needs be meekly, calmly borne.
Accept these deckings for the corpse. Let earth
Receive them with her. She is worth such meed,
For that she died to save thy life, my son.
She did not leave me childless, nor permit
My wasting sadly in bereft old age.
No, she gave fame untold to woman's name
For ever, when she dared this noble deed,
Preserver of my son, restorer blest

Of this our falling house! Farewell! Good luck
February, 1849.-VOL. LIV.-NO. CCXIV.

X

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700

Be thine with Hades! wives like thee are gain
To men. But others 'tis not meet to wed.

ADм. Thou com'st unbidden to these obsequies,
And I thy presence, sir, unpleasant deem.
Think not she e'er shall wear these ornaments :
She shall not be entombed in debt to thee.
Then, when I died, was time for sympathy:
Thou stood'st aloof. A youthful life, not thine,
Old man, paid forfeit. Dost thou wail this corse?
Thou wast no father, rightly named, to me.
And she who saith she bare me, bare me not.
Call me no mother: say that, slave by birth,
I secretly drew milk at thy queen's breast.
Brought to the test, thou provest what thou art,
Nor can I ever deem myself thy son:
Else art thou prov'd exceeding base in soul,
Who, thus in years, nd verging on life's term,
Hadst neither will, nor courage to endure
Death for thy son. But thou didst leave to die
This foreign lady, whom I well may think
Father, and mother, in good truth, to me.
Yet gloriously hadst thou clos'd thy race
By dying for thy son. Life's residue
Was any-wise of small account to thee;
And I had liv'd with her, my length of days,
Nor had been groaning now, bereft of her.

Yet hast thou fared as happy men should fare;
Thy bloom of life was spent in sovran sway,
And I thy son was to succeed thee born,
So that thou wast not childless doom'd to die,
And leave thy house for others to lay waste.
At least thou canst not say, for disrespect
To thine old age, thou gavest me to death
For I was most respectful: such return
Thou and my mother pay for this to me.
Go then! raise children with no loss of time,
To succour thine old age, and deck thy corse,

:

And lay thee out, when death hath seized his prey;
Since with this hand I ne'er will bury thee.

For I was dead, as far as lay with thee:
But if, by other sav'd, I view this light,
Him will I call my sire, to him be son,
And to his grey hairs kindly comforter.
Tis idle talk, when old men pray for death,
And blame old age and life's protracted span :
Let death come near, not one of them consents

710

720

730

740

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To die, for age is no more burdensome.

CHOR. Cease, for the present woes are woes enough.
Do not, my son, provoke thy sire to wrath.

PHERES. Son! is it Lydian hireling, whom with taunts
Thou dost presume to gibe, or Phrygian slave?
What! Know'st thou not, that I am truly free
By country and by sire, Thessalian born?
Thou insolent! Thou castest youth's high words
'Gainst me yet think not with impunity.
Go to by birthright lord of all mine house
I rear'd thee. Was I bound to die for thee?
No law like this my sire bequeathed to me,
Nor Hellas taught "that sire should die for son."
Born wast thou to thyself, for weal or woe:
And all that is thy right, thou hast from us.
Wide is thy sway: broad acres fall to thee
At my decease. I held them from my sire.
How have I wrong'd thee? Prythee state my fraud?
Die not for me! ask of me no such task!

760

770

What! Dost thou love the light? why should not I?
In truth I count the life below full long,

But here, though brief, yet life is still most sweet.
Unblushingly didst thou retreat from death,
And livest now beyond thy destined span,
By thy wife's death; and dost thou charge on me
Mean spirit, worst of men, thou slave to her
Who died for thee, her young, her noble spouse?
O sage discov'ry! Thou shalt never die,

If thou canst coax thy wives, each in her turn,
To die instead! Dost thou reproach thy friends,
Who shrink from death, which thou thyself dost shun?
For shame! bethink thee, all men love their lives
Not less than thou. Speak not then ill of me,
Or thou shalt hear reproach not brief, nor smooth.

CHOR. More taunts have fallen from you than is meet:
Cease then, old man, thus to revile thy son.

ADм. Speak, I have spoken. But if thou art grieved
To hear the truth, thou shouldst not err 'gainst me.

PHER. I had err'd more, if I had died for thee.
ADM. What! Is't the same for youth and age to die?
PHER, 'Tis ours to live with one life, not with two.
ADM. Oh! mayst thou live a longer life than Jove!
PHER. Dost curse thy parents, meeting nought unjust?
ADм. Why I perceived thou wast in love with life.
PHER. Did not the corpse, thou buriest, die for thee?
ADм. Proof of thy meanness this, most base of men.

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790