During the whole of this period, his main strength was devoted to Latin and Greek philology. Some of the results of this labour were published in the Classical Museum. One of the contributions to that journal was published separately—"On the Rhythmical Declamation of the Ancients." It is a clear exposition of the principles of accentuation, drawing accurately the distinction between accent and quantity, and between the accents of common talk and the musical accents that occur in poetry. It is the best monograph on the subject, of which we know. Another article, "On Prometheus," clears Æschylus from the charge of impiety, because he appears to make Zeus act tyrannically towards Prometheus in the "Prometheus Vinctus." He also gave the results of some of his classical studies, in lectures in Edinburgh and Glasgow on Roman history and Greek literature. The principal works on which he was engaged at this time were translations of Horace and Æschylus. Translations of several odes of Horace have appeared in various publications. The translation of all the dramas of Æschylus appeared in 1850. It was dedicated to the Chevalier Bunsen and Edward Gerhard, Royal Archæologist, "the friends of his youth, and the directors of his early studies." This work is now universally admitted to be the best complete translation of Æschylus in English.
In 1852 he was elected to the chair of Greek in Edinburgh University. In that position he has carried on the same agitation in behalf of educational and university reform, which characterised his stay in Aberdeen. His last brochure on the subject is a letter to the Town Council of Edinburgh "On the Advancement of Learning in Scotland." Having made this matter a work of his life, he takes every opportunity to urge it, and, notwithstanding that he has got many gratuitous rebuffs, continues on his way cheerily, now delivering a lecture or speech on the subject, now writing letters in reply to this or that assailant, and now giving a more complete exposition of his views in the North British Review.
His first publication after his election to the Greek professorship was "The Pronunciation of Greek; Accent and Quantity. A Philological Inquiry:" 1852. In this work he sought to shew what authority there is for the modern Greek pronunciation of Greek, advocating a return, in the reading of prose, to that pronunciation of Greek which was the only one known in Europe anterior to the time of Erasmus. This method is consistently carried out in the Greek classes. In 1853 he travelled in Greece, living in Athens for two months and a-half, and acquiring a fluent use of the living Greek language. On his return, he gave the results of his journey in various articles, especially in one in the North British on Modern Greek Literature, and in another in the Westminster on Greece. He also expressed some of them in an introductory lecture "On the Living Language of Greece." Since that time he has written principally in Blackwood and the North British, discussing subjects of general literature, and introducing any new German book which he considers of especial interest. Among his papers may be mentioned his reviews, in the North British, of his friend Bunsen's "Signs of the Times," and of Perthos' Life. His articles more especially relating to his own department are Æschylus and Homer, in the Encyclopædia Britannica, an article on accents in the Cambridge Philological, and an essay on Plato in the "Edinburgh Essays."
In 1857 was published the work which brings him into the list of Scottish poets—"Lays and Legends of Ancient Greece, with other Poems." The Lays and Legends are the work of the scholar, who, believing verse to be the proper vehicle for an exposition of these beautiful myths, gives them that form, instead of writing learned dissertations about them. The miscellaneous poems shew more of the inner man than any of his other works—deep religious feeling, great simplicity, earnestness, and manliness, confidence in the goodness of men, and delight in everything that is pure, beautiful, and honest, with thorough detestation of all falsehood.
SONG OF BEN CRUACHAN.
Ben Cruachan is king of the mountains
That gird in the lovely Loch Awe;
Loch Etive is fed from his fountains,
By the streams of the dark-rushing Awe.
With his peak so high
He cleaves the sky
That smiles on his old gray crown,
While the mantle green,
On his shoulders seen,
In many a fold flows down.
He looks to the north, and he renders
A greeting to Nevis Ben;
And Nevis, in white snowy splendours,
Gives Cruachan greeting again.
O'er dread Glencoe
The greeting doth go
And where Etive winds fair in the glen;
And he hears the call
In his steep north wall,
"God bless thee, old Cruachan Ben."
When the north winds their forces muster,
And ruin rides high on the storm,
All calm, in the midst of their bluster,
He stands with his forehead enorm.
When block on block,
With thundering shock,
Comes hurtled confusedly down,
No whit recks he,
But laughs to shake free
The dust from his old gray crown.
And while torrents on torrents are pouring
Down his sides with a wild, savage glee,
And when louder the loud Awe is roaring,
And the soft lake swells to a sea,
He smiles through the storm,
And his heart grows warm
As he thinks how his streams feed the plains
And the brave old Ben
Grows young again,
And swells with his lusty veins.