Cowper is better than Pope here; but Lord Derby is the most literal and by far the best of the three. His lines have a dignified simplicity not unworthy the father of poetry himself; yet the translation is nearly verbatim:
"Thus as he spoke, the white-armed goddess smiled,
And smiling from his hand received the cup,
Then to th' immortals all in order due
He ministered, and from the flagon poured
The luscious nectar; while among the gods
Rose laughter irrepressible, at sight
Of Vulcan hobbling round the spacious hall.
Thus they till sunset passed the festive hours;
Nor lacked the banquet aught to please the sense,
Nor sound of tuneful lyre, by Phoebus touched,
Nor muses' voice, who in alternate strains
Responsive sang; but when the sun was set,
Each for his home departed, where for each
The cripple Vulcan, matchless architect,
With wondrous skill a noble house had reared.
To his own couch, where he was wont of old,
When overcome by gentle sleep, to rest,
Olympian Jove ascended; there he slept,
And by his side the golden-thronèd queen."
If our space permitted we might easily extend these comparisons, and show that Lord Derby excels other translators in every phase of his undertaking—in the rude shock of war, the touching emotions of human sentiment, the debates of the gods, and the beauties and phenomena of nature. We cannot refrain, however, from quoting a few passages of conspicuous excellence.
Hector's assault on the ships in the fifteenth book is thus spiritedly rendered:
"Fiercely he raged, as terrible as Mars
With brandished spear; or as a raging fire
'Mid the dense thickets on the mountain side.
The foam was on his lips; bright flashed his eyes
Beneath his awful brows, and terribly
Above his temples waved amid the fray
The helm of Hector; Jove himself from heaven
His guardian hand extending, him alone
With glory crowning 'mid the host of men,
But short his term of glory; for the day
Was fast approaching, when, with Pallas' aid
The might of Peleus' son should work his doom.
Oft he essayed to break the ranks, where'er
The densest throng and noblest arms he saw;
But strenuous though his efforts, all were vain;
They, massed in close array, his charge withstood;
Firm as a craggy rock, upstanding high
Close by the hoary sea, which meets unmoved
The boist'rous currents of the whistling winds,
And the big waves that bellow round its
So stood unmoved the Greeks, and undismayed.
At length, all blazing in his arms, he sprang
Upon the mass; so plunging down as when
On some tall vessel, from beneath the clouds
A giant billow, tempest-nursed, descends:
The deck is drenched in foam; the stormy wind
Howls in the shrouds; th' affrighted seamen quail
In fear, but little way from death removed; [Footnote 113]
So quailed the spirit in every Grecian breast."
[Footnote 113: We are particularly struck with the excellence of Lord Derby's translation of this magnificent image when we contrast it with Mr., Munford's:
"As on a ship a wat'ry mountain falls,
Driven from the clouds by all the furious winds;
With foam the deck is covered, pitiless
The deafening tempest roars among the shrouds;
The sailors, whirled along by raging waves.
Tremble, confused and faint; immediate death
Appears before them."
Yet, no less an authority than the late President Felton, of Harvard, pronounced Munford's the best of all English metrical versions of the Iliad.]
In book sixth Hector is accosted by his mother on his return from the battle-field. She offers him wine, wherewith to pour a libation to Jove and then to refresh himself. Lord Darby's translation of his answer is very neat and very close to the original: