FROM THE GREEK ANTHOLOGY. BY THE LATE REV. ROBERT BLAND, AND OTHERS. A NEW EDITION; COMPRISING THE FRAGMENTS OF EARLY LYRIC POETRY, WITH SPECIMENS BY J. H. MERIVALE, Esq. F.S.A. ΗΜΙΣΥ ΜΕΥ ΨΥΧΗΣ ΕΤΙ ΤΟ ΠΝΕΟΝ. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, REES, ORME, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMAN; AND Ga 64.74.76 HARVARD COLLEGE NOV 11 1925 LIERARY Substituted for a copy last. (Mrs. E. D. Brande gee] ADVERTISEMENT. IN giving to the world a new series of Translations grounded on a work published many years ago, to which I was a principal contributor, in partnership with my lamented friend, the late Rev. Robert Bland *, it will not perhaps be regarded as altogether superfluous to prefix a short notice relative to the former publication. *The Rev. Robert Bland, who was also author of "Edwy and Elgiva” and “Sir Everard," and of "The Four Slaves of Cythera," besides other poetical works, died, curate of Kenilworth, in 1825, when little more than forty years old, leaving a widow and several children to mourn his irreparable loss—a circumstance which I may be allowed to mention, as affording a motive to the present publication, in the hope of its proving a source of profit, however inconsiderable, intended to be applied exclusively in aid of the eldest son on his approaching removal to College from the Charter House. That, among other attainments of a more solid nature, my young friend inherits at least a portion of his father's talents in the art of versification, will, I trust, be made evident from a few pieces in the last division of the present volume, to which the signature R. B. is attached. The design of exhibiting in an English version some of the most beautiful, or otherwise remarkable, of the pieces ascribed to the Minor Poets of Greece, more especially the writers of the Anthology, originated at a very early period with my deceased friend. deceased friend. He commenced the execution of his plan by the publication of two or three papers in the Monthly Magazine, beginning in March, 1805; and these became subsequently the groundwork of a Preface, reprinted without alteration in the present volume. The series thus commenced was continued at intervals during the remainder of the year 1805 and part of 1806, under the title of "Epigrams, Fragments, and Fugitive Pieces, from the Greek," to which was affixed the signature "Narva ;" and in the course of the last-mentioned year, the greater part of those contributions, with some additions, were collected together and published in a small octavo volume, entitled, "Translations, chiefly from the Greek Anthology; with Tales and Miscellaneous Poems," (Phillips, 1806.) The arrangement of Brunck and Jacobs, according to the names of authors, was here followed, with a short appendix of "Fragments from the Comic Poets," and with notes following the translation. I was myself a contributor to this volume, in about equal partnership; and we enjoyed the valuable accession of three pieces (The Complaint of Danaë, and Two Versions of the Hymn to Harmodius,) from the pen of the present Lord Chief Justice Denman, and of a few from that of our mutual friend the Rev. Francis Hodgson, which in the later edition were distinguished by his initial. Of the success of the small volume thus ushered into the world, it does not become me to say more than that it received from Lord Byron, in his "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers," first published not long after it made its appearance, the compliment of a few lines, beginning, "And ye, associate Bards," &c. Between the time of this first publication and that of the second, the joint authors, besides having been emboldened by the recommendation of the noble poet, separately, on various occasions, to encounter the risk of original composition, were prevented by other circumstances, arising out of occupations and engagements of the most |