The critic appears never to have heard of our Bryant, Dana, Halleck, Poe, Longfellow, or Maria Brooks, any one of whom is certainly superior to some of the poets mentioned in the above paragraph; and his doctrine that a great poem must necessarily be a long one—that poetry, like butter and cheese, is to be sold by the pound—does not altogether commend itself to our most favorable judgment.
THE REAL ADVENTURES AND ACHIEVEMENTS OF GEORGE BORROW.
Generally, we believe, Lavengro, though it has sold well everywhere, has not been very much praised. It has been conceded that the author of "the Bible in Spain" must be a Crichton, but his last performance looked overmuch like trifling with the credulity of his readers. We find in Colburn's New Monthly Magazine for April a sort of vindication of Borrow, which embraces some curious particulars of his career, and quote the following passages, which cannot fail to interest his American readers:
"We have yet to learn where our author was during the years intervening from the epoch of the dingle to the date of Spanish travel; that he was neither in mind nor body inactive, ample testimony may be adduced, not only in the form of writings made public during that interval, but in the internal evidence afforded by them of laborious research. In a work published at St. Petersburgh in 1835, known but to few, entitled "Targum; or, Metrical Translations from Thirty Languages and Dialects, by George Borrow," we find indications of how those intervening years were spent. He says, in the preface to this work, "The following pieces, selections from a huge and undigested mass of translation, accumulated during several years devoted to philological pursuits, are with much diffidence offered to the public," &c. These translations are remarkable for force and correct emphasis, and afford demonstration of what power the author possesses over metre. We shall cite but few examples, however, for it is believed that not only that huge mass, but many an additional song and ballad now is digested, and lies side by side with the glorious "Kæmpe Viser," the "Ab Gwilym," and other learned translations, by means of which it may be hoped that the gifted Borrow will ere long vindicate his lasting claim to scholarship—a claim to which it is to be feared he is indifferent, for he is no boaster, and does himself no justice; or, if he boasts at all, prefers, as with a species of self-sarcasm, the mention of his lesser, on which he dwells with zest, to that of his greater and more enduring triumphs. The "Targum" consists of translations from the following languages: Hebrew, Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Tartar, Tibetian, Chinese, Mandchou, Russian, Malo-Russian, Polish, Finnish, Anglo-Saxon, Ancient Norse, Suabian, German, Dutch, Danish, Ancient Danish, Swedish, Ancient Irish, Irish, Gaellic, Ancient British, Cambrian British, Greek, Modern Greek, Latin, Provençal, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Rommany. A few specimens from this work may be acceptable to the English reader—a work so rare, that the authorities of a German university not long ago sent a person to St. Petersburgh to endeavor to discover a copy:"
ODE TO GOD.
FROM THE HEBREW.
Reign'd the Universe's master ere were earthly things begun;
When his mandate all created, Ruler was the name he won;
And alone He'll rule tremendous when all things are past and gone;
He no equal has, nor consort, He the singular and lone
Has no end and no beginning, His the sceptre, might, and throne;
He's my God and living Saviour, rock to which in need I run;
He's my banner and my refuge, fount of weal when call'd upon;
In his hand I place my spirit, at nightfall and rise of sun,
And therewith my body also;—God's my God,—I fear no one.