In HERCULES the LION-SLAYER there is this passage:
…….. Tad epaeluthe piona maela,
Ech soianaes anionia mei aulia ie saechsie,
Ayiar epeiia soes, mala muriai, akkai ep allais
Erchomenai phainonth, osei NEPHE HYDATOENTA
'Hossat' en thrano eisi elaunomena prolepose
Aee Noloioio ziae ae Thraekos Boreao.
Ton meni thlis arithmos en aeeri ginei ionion,
Oui anusis lisa gar ie meia proloioi chulindei
Is anemth, iade i alla chorusselai authis ep allois
Toss aiei melopisthe zoon epi zthcholi aeei.
Pan dar eneplaesthae pedion, pasaile cheleuthai,
Aaeidos erchomenaes.
HAERAKL. LEONTOPH.
Idyll. Theocrito adscriptum. Brunckii Analect. I. 360.
…….. On came the comely sheep,
From feed returning to their pens and fold.
And these the Kine, in multitudes, succeed;
One on the other rising to the eye;
As watery CLOUDS which in the Heavens are seen,
Driven by the south or Thracian Boreas,
And, numberless, along the sky they glide:
Nor cease; so many doth the powerful Blast
Speed foremost, and so many, fleece on fleece,
Successive rise, reflecting varied light
So still the herds of Kine successive drew
A far extended line: and fill'd the plain,
And all the pathways, with the coming troop.
* * * * *
I may possibly enlarge these Remarks in a future Edition. At present I am happy to be stopt here, by so good a cause as the urgency of the Publishers to complete a Third Edition; they informing me that the second is entirely out of print. But it is pleasant to see these Coincidences with CLASSIC POETS of other days and Nations in a CLASSIC of our own, of the best School:
"The fields his study, Nature was his book."
C.L.
TROSTON, 22 Aug. 1800.