who had each lost an eye; and it is curious to observe how easily the same idea is modified by a different poet into a satire or a panegyric.” The epigram alluded to is that on Acon and Leonilla by Amaltheus. The one on Taher might have been given under that singularly elegant piece, but the want of harmony between the two would injure both if brought into juxta-position.

TO A FRIEND UPON HIS BIRTHDAY.
When born, in tears we saw thee drown'd,
While thine assembled friends around,

With smiles their joy confest;
So live, that at thy parting hour,
They may the flood of sorrow pour,

And thou in smiles be drest!

It may interest some readers to see a translation of this very beautiful epigram, which is attributed to Sir William Jones:

On parents' knees, a naked new-born child,
Weeping thou sat'st, while all around thee smiled:
So live, that sinking to thy life's last sleep,

Calm thou may'st smile, while all around thee weep. It can hardly be supposed that the old epigrammatist, Hayman, knew anything of Arabian poetry. The similarity, therefore, of the following distich, found among his "Quodlibets,” may be considered as a coinci. dence of ideas (Book I. Quod. 55):

When we are born, our friends rejoice; we cry:
But we rejoice, our friends mourn when we die.

ON LIFE.
Like sheep we're doom'd to travel o'er

The fated track to all assign'd,
These follow those that went before,

And leave the world to those behind.
As the flock seeks the pasturing shade,

Man presses to the future day,
While death amidst the tufted glade,

Like the dun* robber, waits his prey.

An epigram by Samuel Wesley shows how the generations of men live and pass away :

Some laugh, while others mourn;

Some toil, while others play ;
One dies, and one is born :

So runs the world away. The sentiment of the Arabian epigram is similar to that of a Greek one by Palladas, thus freely translated (Jacobs III. 141, cxxx.):

To Death's dark home our wand'rings lead ;

To Death we all are born :
As sheep, who safely o'er night feed,

Unthinking die at morn.

TO A LADY UPON HER REFUSAL OF A PRESENT OF

MELONS, AND HER REJECTION OF THE ADDRESSES

OF AN ADMIRER.
When I sent you my melons, you cried out with scorn,
“They ought to be heavy, and wrinkled, and yellow :"
When I offer'd myself, whom those graces adorn,
You flouted, and call’d me an ugly, old fellow.

It was well that it was one of the opposite sex whom this lady designated “ugly." Had it been one of her own sex, the epithet would have been unpardonable, according to the following anecdote. Two French ladies had a violent quarrel. As it proved inconvenient, a gentleman, a mutual friend, was asked to arbitrate between them. He consented upon one condition—that both the ladies could solemnly assure him that neither of them had called the other “ugly.” On receiving a satisfactory reply, he said, “ In that case the quarrel can be ed.”

The lady and gentleman of the epigram change places in the following distich of Martial (Book is. 6), thus translated by Hay:

That you would wed Sir John is very wise :
That he don't care to wed is no surprise.

MEDIÆVAL AND EARLY MODERN LATIN

EPIGRAMMATISTS.

A.D. 1265-A.D. 1678.

DANTE ALIGHIERI.
Born, 1265. Died, 1321.

HIS OWN EPITAPH.
Translated by Hackett, in “ Select and Remarkable Epitaphs,” 1757.

Whilst Fate allow'd I sung of kings and gods,
Of Lethe's lake and Pluto's dire abodes.
But now the better part has wing’d its flight
To its great Author, and the realms of light.
Dante my name; my birth fair Florence gave,
But exil'd thence, a foreign clime's my grave.

Poccianti says that Dante wrote these lines for his own epitaph, when at the point of death. (Hackett.)

Leonidas of Tarentum, who is believed to have died in exile, having been carried captive from Tarentum by Pyrrhus, King

of Epirus, wrote an epitaph for himself, which is singularly suitable to Dante (Jacobs I. 181, C.). The translation is by Merivale :

Far from Tarentum's native soil I lie,
Far from the dear land of my infancy.
'Tis dreadful to resign this mortal breath,
But in a stranger clime 'tis worse than death!
Call it not life, to pass a fever'd age
In ceaseless wanderings o'er the world's wide stage.
But me the muse has ever lov'd and giv'n
Sweet joys to counterpoise the curse of Heav'n,
Nor lets my memory decay, but long
To distant times preserves my deathless song.

JANUS PANNONIUS, Or Jean de Cisinge, was a poet of Hungary, born in 1434. When only twenty-six years of age he was nominated by Pope Pius II., Bishop of Cing-Eglises in Lower Hungary. He died in 1472.

ON AURISPA (“Delitiæ Delitiarum,” 240).

Translated by James Wright.
Aurispa nothing writes though learn'd, for he

By a wise silence seems more learn'd to be.
From this Swift may perhaps have taken the following sarcasm :

Arthur, they say, has wit; for what?

For writing? No; for writing not. In “ The Greek and Latin Prize Poems of the University of Cam. bridge from 1814 to 1837,” there is a Latin epigrain by Dr. Kennedy, which closes with this distich :

“Quid faciam ut propria decorem mea tempora lauru ?
Dio mihi, quid faciam ?”—dixit Apollo,—“tace!"

TO SEVERUS (“Delitiæ Delitiarum,” 242).
A learned work, Severus, where you teach
To spurn vain glory, tho' within our reach :
But if 'tis really vain, as you have said,
Why in the title is your name display'd,

With rich vermilion more conspicuous made ?
So, Lord Byron, satirizing a noble earl's tragedies, which were
resplendently bound in morocco and gold, says in "English Bards and
Scotch Reviewers":

Yes ! doff that covering where morocco shines,

And hang a calf-skin on those recreant lines. Disraeli, in his “ Curiosities of Literature," 1st Series, Art. “Fame contemned,” says: “All men are fond of glory, and even the philosophers who write against that noble passion, prefix, however, their names to their own works !"

MARTIALIS MONERIUS.

A French Poet of the fifteenth century, born in Patis. Died 1508. ON MACHON AND HIS WOODEN LEG

(“ Delitiæ Delitiarum,” 24).

Translated by D.
When 'gainst Calès the Gallic forces drove,
Machon, a soldier, raw, but smart by Jove,
To the tall rampart's height most boldly dash'd,
When thro' his wooden leg a bullet cra-h'd ;
“All right,” he cried, “I am not hurt a peg,

At home I've got in store another leg.” Butler, in “Hudibras” (Part I. Canto ü. 921), describes the wooden. leggud Crowdero fighting with the Knight and Ralpho:

In haste he snatch'd the wooden limb
That hurt i' th' ankle lay by him,
And fitting it for sudden fight,
Straight drew it up, t' attack the knight.

*

But Ralpho

flew
To rescue knight from black and blue;
Which ere he could achieve, his sconce
The leg encounter'd twico and once;
And now 'twas rais'd to smite again,
When Ralpho thrust himself between ;
He took the blow upon his arm,
To shield the knight from further harm,
And joining wrath with force, bestow'd
On th' wooden member such a load,
That down it fell, and with it bore
Crowdero, whom it propp'd before.

TO SORBICUS (“Delitiæ Delitiarum,” 26).

Translated by D.
Th' incentive of duty urg'd him long,

Sorbicus stoutly declares;
But study's too hard he complains,—and strong

The dread of failure, he swears.