Hos super advenit Volsca de gente Camilla,
Agmen agens equitum et florentes ære catervas,
Bellatrix: non illa colo calathisve Minervæ
Fœmineas assueta manus; sed prælia virgo
Dura pati, cursuque pedum prævertere ventos.
Illa vel intactæ segetis per summa volaret
Gramina: nec teneras cursu læsisset aristas:
Vel mare per medium, fluctu suspensa tumenti,
Ferret iter; celeres nec tingeret æquore plantas.
Æneid vii. 803.
This example is copied by the author of Telemachus:
Les Brutiens sont legeres à la course comme les cerfs, et comme les daims. On croiroit que l’herbe même la plus tendre n’est point foulée sous leurs pieds; à peine laissent ils dans le sable quelques traces de leurs pas.
Liv. 10.
Again,
Déja il avoit abattu Eusilas si léger à la course, qu’à peine il imprimoit la trace de ses pas dans le sable, et qui devançoit dans son pays les plus rapides flots de l’ Eurotas et de l’ Alphée.
Liv. 20.
Fourthly, In narration as well as in description, facts and objects ought to be painted so accurately as to form in the mind of the reader distinct and lively images. Every useless circumstance ought indeed to be suppressed, because every such circumstance loads the narration; but if a circumstance be necessary, however slight, it cannot be described too minutely. The force of language consists in raising complete images[32]; which cannot be done till the reader, forgetting himself, be transported as by magic into the very place and time of the important action, and be converted, as it were, into a real spectator, beholding every thing that passes. In this view, the narrative in an epic poem ought to rival a picture in the liveliness and accuracy of its representations: no circumstance must be omitted that tends to make a complete image; because an imperfect image, as well as any other imperfect conception, is cold and uninteresting. I shall illustrate this rule by several examples, giving the first place to a beautiful passage from Virgil.
Qualis populeâ mœrens Philomela sub umbrâ
Amissos queritur fœtus, quos durus arator
Observans nido implumes detraxit.
Georg. lib. 4. l. 511.