Feinberg/Whitman Notes and Notebooks Notebooks 1872 Notebooks on Homer (2U) (DCN42) Box 38 Folder 3Marble bust of Homer (imaginary) found at Baiæ, and now in British Museum. Baiæ- an ancient- town of Italy, 10 miles west of Naples- a favorite watering & bathing resort of the RomansOdyssey Male Female Ulysses Minerva Telemachus Penelope "the Gerenian Knight"} Nestor Calypso Menelaus Nausicaa the chief suitor Antinous Arete the herald Medon Euryclea, the old nurse Jupiter Mercury the bard Demodocus the swine herd Eumaeus the beggar Irus the suitor Eurymachus Melanthius father of Ulysses Laertes In Books IX, X, XI, XII, Ulysses relates his wanderings to King Alcinous + his court -- (The last book, Book XXIV is surely supererogant.)The Odyssey is compact, tells a straight story, full of wonder, variation,- & ([without] we knowing [any] nothing of its predecessors,) may be called the mother of the earlier, the middle age, & even also the modern tale or romance. It is of more absorbing interest than the Iliad. & as a mere work of construction, (good art,) it is superior (Still, the Iliad has grander passages.) Grote says, "If it had happened that the Odyssey had been preserved to us alone, without the Iliad, I think the dispute respecting Homeric unity would never have been raised." Grote p 204 vol. 2 seems to favor the theory that the Odyssey was not written by the same hand as the Iliad- but appeared during the same age. "No didactic purpose is found in the Iliad or Odyssey." I am not so sure about this Aristotle said the Iliad was for the purpose of presenting warlike types of character for the benefit of GreeceByzantine Empire = i.e. Eastern Empire Greek commenced A.D. 395 ended "" 1453 by Turk conq. Constantinople Justinian Emperor Byzantium 527-565 During his reign the latest schools of the Pagan philosophers were shut up & destroyed 2 [*Property of Homer L Frankel*] Homeros Illiad - Odyssey Trojan war - date uncertain (event itself uncertain) table quotes by Grote [*"1183, the supposed epoch of the Grecian war" Grote*] about either year 1140 or year 1180 B.C. "1183 B.C., the supposed epoch of the Trojan war." Homer flourished about 350 years after the war. vis 800 years B.C. [The best authorities] Grote (p. 181 vol. 2 - Hist. Greece), decides that the Iliad & the Odyssey were substantially possessed of the same rote & text, 776 B.C. as now & were so recited at that time at 776 B.C. commence the Olympiads, previous to this all Grecian Chronology is uncertain Greek poets, first class - Rhapsode. Bard.Translations Translation of Wm. Mumford of Richmond, VA 2 vols. 8 vv. Boston, 1846. [*praised highly in Appleton's Cyclo.-also with qualifications by Prof. Felton*] [*I have read this translation -it is only respectably good.*] trans. read at time of making the following notes. Bohn's Edition of literal prose of trans. by Theo. Alois Buckley. Oxford. - This I like best of all get when convenient "Lexicon of the Poems of Homer & the Homeridæ" trans. from the German of G.C. Crusius, G Henry Smith, Hartford, 1844. Mythic= historical acc't of the origin, [*Grote's commencement, [&] Hist. of Greece progress, &c of the Harper's ed. Trojan War, [???} vol. 1. p 287-321*] [the] characters involved, & incidents following it The Trojan war "though literally believed, reverentially cherished, & numbered among the gigantic phenomena of the past, by the Grecian public, is, in the eyes of modern inquiry, essentially a legend, & nothing more. If we are asked whether it be not a legend embodying portions of historical matter, & raised upon a basis of truth, --whether there may not really have occurred at the foot of the hill of Ilium, a war purely human, & political, without Gods, without heroes, without Helen, without Amazons, without Ethiopians under the beautiful son Eôs, without the wooden horse, without the characteristic & expressive features of the old epical war. (like the mutilated trunk of Deïphobus in the under=world,)--if we are asked whether there was not really some such historical Trojan war as this, -our answer must be, that as the possibility of it cannot be denied, so neither can the reality of it be affirmed." Grote, Vol. 1. p. 321 Grecian myths-the poets &c - tragedians - relics - interpretations Grote - vol 1 - p. 340-489-Chios in Ionia Grecian "mythes" (term often used by Grote.) (mythe-Greek-fabula-story.) first Greek poets, the old, original fellows, declaiming their pieces, at the festivals, or games, or before princes &c Rhapsodes "mythe = bearing Hellas." ancient Ionia - west coast of Asia Minor a country of some extent-- the legendary acct in that it was settled & conquered 1100 B.C. by emigration from [Attica] Attica -- 700 B.C. Smyrna was added. -there were 12 cities--Iona was early the rival of Greece in civilization & progress -Persians took it--Alexander the Great reannexed it to Macedonian rule. Ionia included the island & city of Chios. --Ionia's cities, &c. seem to have been a cluster of democractic & independent communities, having a common bond in language, contiguity &c. They [seem to have] had a general congress for mutual consultation. (From Lippincott's Gazetteer) Troy in Asia Minor. - supposed on a height at South extremity of plain of Troy, 9 miles S.S.E. of the entrance of the Hellespont from the Aegean Sea, (close to modern village of Boonarbashi.) - on its site on the height, are still ruins of walls, cisterns, mounds, &c. Plain of Troy - bet. the above, & the Hellespont - about 10 miles in length, by 3 in greatest width - watered by three rivers, two of which are the Simois and the Scamander of antiquity (The authenticity of the above exact locality is controverted - there are several theories - & the whole fact is vague & unsettled.) See new acc't of Dr. H. Schlieman in N.Y. Herald, Dec. 21, 1872, (with map) professing to have re-discovered the site & ruins of Troy, about 4 miles from the Bunarbashi, mentioned above. The scene of the Illiad is laid in Asia (it is to be remembered) though descriptive passages relating to Greece & its local peculiarities frequently occur - & most of the personnel & all the spirit are Grecian = European. [quite ?] The scene of the Odyssey, on the other hand, is chiefly in continental Greece, (European)Dorians- (Sparta was the core of the Dorian race) Grote - vol 2 - com. at p.118 & following During antiquity for several hundred years B.C. & a long time after, many other poems, works, &c. besides Iliad & Odyssey, passed generally [for] as Homer's. the collection of poems called The Epic Cycle "about the second century B.C. the Alexandrian literati selected from, & arranged, the multitude of old epic poets into a work, a series, founded on the supposed order of time in the events narrated - beginning with the intermarriage of Uranus and [Gae] Gæ, & the Theogony - & concluding with the death of Odysseus by the hands of his son Telogonus." Grote vol 2 - p. 122 The poets whose compositions were embodied in the above were called The Cyclic Poets The Iliad & the Odyssey were included in the Epic Cycle, it is generally agreed. (No, It is disputed). But who or how many were included is only conjectural - & the book is lost. Critics specify - 15 to 20 poems as probable. (Then the Epic Cycle & its contents & poems are by some critics [were] set off against Homer & his works, & were treated as an antithesis to him - which seems to infer, of course that the Iliad & Odyssey were not in the Cycle.)Homerids - or Homeridae 650 yrs B.C. - down to 350 B.C An association of guild in the Ionic island of Chios "the compositions of each separate Homerid, or the combined efforts of many of them, in conjunction, were the works of Homer" Grote vol 2. p 131-132 [as I take it Grote means that the numerous works, other than the Iliad and the Odyssey, which passed in antiquity as Homer's, were the fruits of these Homeridae - but that the Iliad & Odyssey were genuinely [his] Homer's. Is this the meaning? - WW.] Iliad & Odyssey composed at some period between yr 850 and yr 776 B.C. (viz somewhere bet. yrs 300 and 380 after the Trojan War) remember these pieces were all, or parts for oral delivery, recitation, declamation, &c. by Rhapsodes often, I should think, with musical accompaniments. "The old airs of the Homeric rhapsodists" "The four = stringed lyre, the only accompaniment of Homeric song."There is a hot contest over the point whether Homer's poems were or were not committed to writing, previous to the time of Pisistratus - much has been said on both sides - Prof Felton vol 1. p. 95 - "In all this practice, the art of writing, - long since brought in from Phœnicia, - was doubtless employed in the preparation, teaching, & transmission of these compositions." Wolf argues that the Homeric poems were originally in separate chants or songs. He says : "Homer wrote a sequel of songs & rhapsodies, to be sung by himself for small earnings & good cheer, at festivals, & other days of merriment. The Iliad he made for men, the Odysseus for the other sex. These loose songs were not collected together into the form of an Epic poem until 500 years after." The critic Wm Müller also so decides (Also Lachmann.) They say the songs, parts, were collected, fused, & put together by Pisistratus, latter half of sixth century B. C. Pisistratus seized power in Athens, 560 B. C. & died 527 B. C. "Tyrant of Athens" - eloquent, learned, & generous to the poor contemporary of Solon. Grote decides for the integrity of both Iliad & Odyssey, from the beginning - (& so it seems to me, too)Lipp. Gazeteer - Art. Greece - p. 782 The epoch embracing the years 480 to 336 B.C. is the most illustrious in Grecian annals. During this period all its greatest writers, orators, sculptors, & architects appeared; & it was not only able to repel attacks on its own independence, but to assume the offensive, & enrich its treasury with foreign spoils Birth place of Homer Several are mentioned - the two principal are Smyrna - the seaport - Asia Minor, on the Gulf of Smyrna - (inhabitant "Smyrniot") Scio (shee=o)(or si=o) - an island just off the west Coast of Asia Minor (cont. 500 sq. miles) Beautiful, fertile island Chios (ki=os) inhab. Chee-ot (or Chi=an) Therefore Homer was an Asiatic Greek. Ionia = (Asia) The whole thing commenced in Asia - & so passed over to the Mainland of European Greece.Achilles & Iliad Iliad. - abstract. + First Book - [quarrel of Agamemnon & Achilles] the sorrow & complaint of Chryses, priest of Apollo. - The council agora - quarrel of Agamemnon & Achilles - wrath & withdrawal of the latter - Thetis petitions Jove for redress to her son + Second Book - Jove sends dream to Agamemnon - Thersites - catalogues of ships, forces, &c. + Third Book - Paris proposes single combat, but retires from Menelaus - fight - Paris is saved by Venus. + Fourth Book - Fighting + Fifth " " - Diomedes wounds Venus + Sixth " episodes - + Seventh " Hector and Ajax fight. + Eight " Council of Gods - action of Jove + Ninth " Embassy to Achilles + Tenth " Episode of Diomede & Ulysses + Eleventh " Fighting - Achilels sends Patroclus to tent of Nestor + Twelfth " " Hector victorious + Thirteenth Fighting - in 10th Book of Patroclus slain by Hector. + Fourteenth + Fifteenth & + Sixteenth Fighting - in 16th book Patrocleus slain by Hector + Seventeenth + Eighteenth - Achilles appears, strikes terror to the Troians - Vulcan forges armor for Achilles + Nineteenth - Achilles reconciled to Agamemnon, goes forth to battle - + Twentieth - Grand fighting - the gods join in the battle + Twenty-first - Exploits of Achilles. + Twenty-second Hector slain by Achilles + Twenty-third - Achilles' dream - Funeral rites of Patroclus + Twenty-fourth - Priam's visit to Achilles tent - the poem ends with the truce & funeral obsequies of Hector.Prof. Felton's remarks on Iliad "Ancient & Modern Greece" vol. 1 p. 89. Lect. 6. fanciful portraitures of Homer's travels into Egypt, while a young man - Also of his appearance at festivals as a rhapsode, or chanter, Beginning "Sing, O Goddess, the wrath of Achilles."Homeric Eating- The business of Eating & Drinking goes on as prominently as any thing else in the Iliad & Odyssey. —In the latter, Ulysses is represented as a great eater - & only ready to do deeds of prowess when he has his belly full The her…Gods, when they…r terrified, show…the [heroes] leading warriors occasionally…run away like cowa… All the…ou very frank… Grecian Executions. Ithica, the Adriatic island and home of the ancient warrior and king, Ulysses, of the days of hero worship, has evidently changed its character, and it has for a long time its name. It is called Theaki now, and is inhabited by a population about one half murderous, and the other half stupid. The two old magistrates on the island dispense justice; the lash for small offenses, and death for deeper crimes. The capital punishment is administered on a novel plan, but unfortunately its novelty is not particularly enjoyable to a Christian, owing to the cruelty that accompanies. The victim is placed in a wooden box, with the lid off, and tied down. The executioner than takes him by the hair, sticks a knife into his throat, as he would into that of a sheep, and turns it until death ensues. Then the lid is nailed on, and the corpus is despatched to be buried. Two Klephts or pirates, who had grown old in plunder and murder, without falling into the clutches of the law, at last, in an unlucky day, were brought to that strait last summer. Their names were Deotrazzi and Maturo, and their final offense had been to plunder and slay a party of Italian savants. They were condemned to death of course, and after several delays driven to the field of death in the midst of several hundred people. Maturo was coffined, bound, and stuck according to the most approved style of the executioner's art, and evidently to his extreme satisfaction. He was about to repeat the process upon Deotrazzi, when a shot was heard, and immediately after nine heavily-armed Greek brigands appeared in sight, and the crowd incontinently fled. The executioner was mortally stabbed with a scimitar, and his prisoner was borne away in triumph.Grecian Executions. Ithica, the Adriatic island and home of the ancient warrior and king, Ulysses, of the days of hero worship, has evidently changed its character, and it has for a long time its name. It is called Theaki now, and is inhabited by a population about one half murderous, and the other half stupid. The two old magistrates on the island dispense justice; the lash for small offenses, and death for deeper crimes. The capital punishment is administered on a novel plan, but unfortunately its novelty is not particularly enjoyable to a Christian, owing to the cruelty that accompanies. The victim is placed in a wooden box, with the lid off, and tied down. The executioner then takes him by the hair, sticks a knife into his throat, as he would into that of a sheep, and turns it until death ensues. Then the lid is nailed on, and the corpus is despatched to be buried. Two Klephts or pirates, who had grown old in plunder and murder, without falling into the clutches of the law, at last, in an unlucky day, were brought to that strait last summer. Their names were Deotrazzi and Maturo, and their final offense had been to plunder and slay a party of Italians savants. They were condemned to death of course, and after several delays driven to the field of death in the midst of several hundred people. Maturo was coffined, bound, and struck according to the most approved style of the executioner's art, and evidently to his extreme satisfaction. He was about to repeat the process upon Deotrazzi, when a shot was heard, and immediately after nine heavily-armed Greek brigands appeared in sight, and the crowd incontinently fled. The executioner was mortally stabbed with a scimitar, and his prisoner was borne away in triumph.it was polled there would be a change Democratic footings. --------------------------- GENERAL JUBAL A. EARLY. Though rather late for a gentleman w[?] was both early and late in the rebellion, General announces, in a letter to the [?] mocracy of Virginia, though the Lyn[?] burg Virginian, that he shall vote for Gr[?] ley, and hopes that all who would save[?] Mother of Presidents from the embraces[?] Radicalism, and from such rule as Sou[?] Carolina has had, will go and do likewi[?] Jubal, the irrepressible Confederate, sa[?] that the Democracy made a mistake at B[?] timore in taking Greely instead of a repr[?] sentative Democrat, yet it is too late now [?] remedy the error, and they can only ma[?] the best of a bad box. He doesn't like that the name of "Conservative" has bee[?] substituted in Virginia for "Democrat.[?] He proposes to be recognized on[?] as a Democrat, and has no idea th[?] the Baltimore baptism washed out t[?] true designation. And now comes [?] richest point in the Early letter, in the e[?]Homeric Eating- The business of Eating & Drinking goes on as prominently as any thing else in the Iliad & Odyssey. - In the latter, Ulysses is represented as a great eater - & only ready to do deeds of prowess when he has his belly full The heroes, & even the Gods, when they are wounded or terrified, show it plainly - The leading warriors [heroes] occasionally turn & run away like cowards. All these things are shown very franklyOne poet & commentator, (old Greek) Stesichorus, having spoken severely of Helen, is smitten with blindness, [by] [golike godlike] (as a punishment from heaven) - he then recants, in a poem, - affirms that Helen had never been to Troy at all, & that the Trojans had carried thither nothing but her image or eidolon (seems to be thought necessary to redeem the character of Helen, and make the whole adventure founded on an illusion) Others versions followed - some compromised, by admitting that Helen never was in Troy, but insisting on her elopement. It was contended that she remained in Egypt during the war, & that Menelaus, only received her there, after the fall of Troy. This the priests of Egypt told Herodotus & he appears to credit it. The story of the wooden horse is also rejected, as not having any plausible historical basisAegean Sea a great northern inlet of Eastern Medi[t]terranean tch, between Greece & Asia Minor (Troy) thon's Dict p. 679. Asia tending from s along the an sea to small districts ferent cities & rants from B. C. League - twelve rean) (afterward called Achaia) subdued this league or federation it passed under Persian sway. - then the Macedonian - then the Roman Sall MOLTKE AS AN ARCHAEOLOGIST. His Account of Old Troy. 1872 Marshal von Moltke, during his military mission in Turkey, found time to pay a visit to the supposed site of Troy, and he describes this visit in his recently published book: I directed my footsteps (he says) towards a spot to which are attached the oldest of historical souvenirs, but where time has probably blotted out all traces of man's handiwork, towards Ilion. Strange to say, one still has pointed out to one, with great appearances of probability, the theatre of events which were related centuries ago by a blind poet, and which occurred centuries again before his day. Nature has remained the same. Here are the two streams where the women of Troy washed their "shining robes," there the Simois descends from Mount Ida and confounds its turbulent waters with the calm flood of the Scamander. The waves still roar around Cape Sigeum and the Island of Imbros. The white peak Mount Ida, from whence Jupiter contemplated the doings of gods and of men, is visible from every point in the plain, and Poseidon "who made the earth to tremble," could not indeed have found a more splendid seat than "the loftiest point of verdant Samothrace, from the height of which he witnessed the strife and its issue." In The "Iliad" it is necessary to make a distinction between the truth of the events which occurred and that of the poem itself. That all the princes of whom Homer speaks combated beneath the walls of Pergamos may be as doubtful as the genealogy of his demigods; but one thing is certain — Homer made his story fit in with the locality which he must have known most thoroughly. The site of the city is determined by the fact that the Scamander's source was just beneath it, and that the waters of the Simois washed its walls. When it is necessary to fix it more exactly, the opinions of the savants vary considerably; I, who am not an authority in science, was merely guided by military instinct towards the spot which one would choose for the erection of an impregnable fort. If, after leaving the Turkish fortress of Rumkalih, at the southern issue of the Dardanelles, you sail up the Simois for three hours, you will find that the plain leads to a chain of hills at the foot of which is situated the village of Bunarbaschi. It received its present name from the source of the Scamander which here springs from out of the chalkstone. Let us now ascend the slight decline, and we shall reach the spot where most travelers place Troy. Further on — about a thousand yards off — there is a deep gorge, and beyond a still higher plateau about five hundred feet long, which is undoubtedly the position of Pergama. A small mound is held to be the tomb of Hector. tries cannot be passed by one language over to another. The tongues of the past are the voices of gentle shades that are grand or graceful, as the once-living speakers animated them, but have but little closer ties with our Yet Oriental grief makes the picture as true now as then of grief-stricken Priam sitting sobbing in the midst of weeping sons and daughters, his hoary head yet clotted with the dust he had clutched, when grovelling onMOLTKE AS AN ARCHAEOLOGIST. His Account of Old Troy. 1872. Marshal von Moltke, during his military mission in Turkey, found time to pay a visit to the supposed site of Troy, and he describes this visit in his recently-published book: I directed my footsteps (he says) toward a spot to which are attached the oldest of historical souvenirs, but where time has probably blotted out all traces of man's handiwork, towards Ilion. Strange to say, one still has pointed out to one, with great appearances of probability, the theatre of events which were related centuries ago by a blind poet, and which occurred centuries again before his day. Nature has remained the same. Here are the two streams where the women of Troy washed their "shining robes," there the Simois descends from Mount Ida and confounds its turbulent waters with the calm flood of the Scamander. The waves still roar around Cape Sigeum and the Island of Imbros. The white peak Mount Ida, from whence Jupiter contemplated the doings of gods and of men, is visible from every point in the plain, and Posseidon "who made the earth to tremble," could not indeed have found a more splendid seat than "the loftiest point of verdant Samothrace, from the height of which he witnessed the strife and its issue." In the "Iliad" it is necessary to make a distinction between the truth of the events which occurred and that of the poem itself. That all the princes of whom Homer speaks combated beneath the walls of Pergamos may be as doubtful as the genealogy of his demigods; but one thing is certain— Homer made his story fit in with the locality which he must have known most thoroughly. The site of the city is determined by the fact that the Seamander's source was just beneath it, and that the waters of the Simois washed its walls. When it is necessary to fix it more exactly, the opinions of the savants vary considerably; I, who am not an authority in science, was merely guided by military instinct towards the spot which one would choose for the erection of an impregnable fort. If, after leaving the Turkish fortress of Rumkalih, at the southern issue of the Dardannelles, you sail up the Simois for three hours, you will find that the plain leads to a chain of hills at the foot of which is situated the village of Bunarbaschi. It received its present name from the source of the Seamander which here springs from out of the chalkstone. Let us now ascend the slight decline, and we shall reach the spot where most travelers place Troy. Further on — about a thousand yards off — there is a deep gorge, and beyond a still higher plateau about five hundred feet long, which is undoubtedly the position of Pergama. A small mound is held to be the tomb of Hector. And now, starting for this supposed tomb, take eight hundred steps forward in the same direction towards the mass of stones which is perhaps the fallen tower of the Seæan gate, whence Priam watched the combatants, and whence the son of Andromanche started back in terror before the plumed helment of his sire, you then see before you a piece of ground about five hundred feet each way, and behind you some heights which served for the citadel of Priam, with its six hundred apartments. These heights are bounded on three sides by inaccessible cliffs; the fourth side is practicable, and it is there that must have been situate the Seæan gate — the only one, indeed, that is mentioned as existing. Thence the view embraces the source of the Seamander and the plains where the battles took place, the windings of the Simois, the tombs of Achilles and of Ajax, the position occupied by the fleet near the sandy shore, Mount Ida, and the verdant Samothrace. Nor is this all; along these heights I discovered foundations of walls cutting each other at right angles, and built of stone of various kinds without cement. I will not argue that these are the walls of the houses of Troy, but it is well known that temples have been raised and towns christened in memory of that city. It may be that some such monument has sprung from the ruins of ancient Troy, and that they have furnished the numerous capitals and sculptured columns which cover the whole cemetery of the wretched village of Bunarbaschi. Among the most remarkable objects in this very interesting country are the tombs; that of Achilles is especially easy of recognition by the description given of it in Homer. It was "upon a point of the Hellespont coast, so that it might be seen from afar upon the sea by all men who lived at that epoch and in the ages yet to come." Between the tomb of Achilles and Cape Rhœtium rises another, which is said to be that of Ajax. This elevated mound has also been opened. Part of it has slipped away, and leaves exposed to view a large square chamber with solid walls, and about ten feet in length. In one corner of this is a vault about four feet high, along which one can creep upon one's hands and feet for about twelve feet. The cement of this masonry work is mixed with a greenish sort of gravel; it is very hard and appears very ancient. But it shows that the vault does not reach back to the time of Homer, for at that period the dead were "laid in the depths of a grave that was afterwards covered over with enormous stones one upon the other." It is very probable that in later days some sovereign may have desired to attach his memory to the imperishable name of Troy, and have had his grave dug in the veritable tumulus of the son of Telamon. But he has had no Homer to confer on him the baptism of immortality; the remembrance of him has passed away, and curiosity has found in this venerable monument nothing save that which vanity had deposited therein.ear. If he is a merchant, he must wait ntil his business is established; if a profes- onal man, until he has a good practice or osition. Every class as a rule marries late, r that which is necessary with the poor has, om its generality, come to be regarded as a stom for all. It is not customary, as in America, for ung gentlemen and ladies to associate much gether, since the expenses of gallantry are ought beyond their means. Young men with young men, and live in clubs or bach- or bands, where each one pays his own ex- enses, and lives as economically as he can. Then they seek female company, which is nly now and then, it is at the public balls in worse connections. This custom has ecome so established that it works the other ay, and no young lady who values her repu- tion will allow herself to be seen alone in mpany with a gentleman before she is en- aged to him, and before the engagement is ly published in the press. The formalities betrothal are celebrated in the presence of er friends. They much wonder at the perty of American young women in Ger- any, who allow themselves to go with any ung gentleman acquaintance whatever, ing one evening with one and the next ening with another. IF THIS Dolly Varden mania is not put a p to, the peace of families will be imperiled d the lunatic asylum be enlarged. Every- ng is Dollay Varden, and Dolly Varden is erything. There are Dolly Varden hats, lly Varden coats, Dolly Varden trousers, lly Varden drawers, Dolly Varden cks, Dolly Varden shoes, Dolly Var- n shirts, Dolly Varden back hair, lly Varden front hair, Dolly Varden ght gowns, Dolly Varden bustles, Dolly rden paniers, Dolly Varden garters, lly Varden hugs, Dolly Varden kisses, lly Varden babies, Dolly Varden cocktails, lly Varden mothers-in-law, Dolly Varden lks, and Dolly Varden Dips in the valse a ex temps. Turn where you will, these two ddening words, "Dolly Varden," meet eye in business, dry goods, cookery, thes, society, "the world, the flesh and"— lly Varden! Already Dolly Varden has ught one man to the silent tomb in Ken- ky; so no more of Dolly Varden. A HUNDRED CENTS will make a dollar, but million dollars will not make good sense. Financial. THE ARLINGTON FIRE INSURANCE COMPANY FOR THE D.C. CAPITAL $200,000. DIRECTORS: James C. Kennedy, Walter S. Cox, Wm. H. Ward, Jesse B. Wilson, Dr. Wm. P. Jonstone, Wm. R. Riley. Chas. Edmondston, Nicholas Acker. Adam Gaddis. JAS. C. KENNEDY, President. WALTER S. COX, V. P. JESSE B. WILSON, Treasurer. S. J. TODD, Secretary. my5-3m Office 1423 G street N. W. S. KNOX MOORE. THOS. S. PARVIN Moore & Parvin, ANKERS AND BROKERS. Buy and Sell at Current Rates. OVERNMENT SECURITIES, GOLD AND SILVER, xecute Orders for Stock and Bonds at New York Stock Board. REAL ESTATE Negotiations conducted in city and country. ONEY LOANED ON GOOD COLLATERAL AND REAL ESTATE SECURITIES. INTEREST PAID ON DEPOSITS. 05 FIFTEENTH STREET, polite the United States Treasury, late Banking Office of Webber & Co. ap14-tf HE FREEDMAN'S SAVINGS AND TRUST COMPANY. A NATIONAL SAVINGS BANK, States GovernmentHOMERIC TRANSLATIONS. -- A CLEVER writer in Blackwood, lately discussing the French language confirms us in a long-formed opinion that there is hardly any such thing as a translation possible. There may be imitation, up to plagiarism, if you please, but no real translation. Coleridge's "Wallenstein" is an improvement, Urquhart's "Rabelais" a transference that is as perfect a translation as it is, because Urquhart was a rakish scapegrace who reveled in the wondrous dirty chronicle of Gargantua and Pantagruel. But we know of no other equal achievement in modern languages; and, when we turn to the dead languages, the difficulties are multifold greater. The great gulf of twenty to thirty centuries cannot be passed by one language over to another. The tongues of the past are the voices of gentle shades that are grand or graceful, as the once-living speakers animated them, but have but little closer ties with our present modes than the common nature that disembodied souls have with ours yet in the grosser caskets of mortal flesh. In fact, a the triple bar is raised between the present and the long-buried past. Usually, there is no estimate made for the subtle changes Christniaty has produced upon language by introducing a different class of ideas. And, as it clothes them with living, current words, there results a different grade of meanings attached to corresponding words that often originally expressed the commonest neds and thoughts of all men. And, lastly, we do not give force enough to the necessary alterations in the same or similar classes of words due to the expanding forces of an ever-changing civilization. We can roughly estimate this in the history of our own mother-tongue. The changes from the past of Chaucer (or, to go farther back, even in Piers Plowman) to our present are greater in the meanings of the commonest words than in the amount of obsolete words. In fact, Homer's sentence is quite as near the structure of a modern Greek sentences as the verses of Piers PLowman are to the verses of any living English poet, only, perhaps, the Homeric is the better grammar, as Tennyson's is better than the Malvern Folk satirists' grammar. With all the various domination that Athens submitted to--Roman, debased Byzantine, Venetian, or Turkish --the Roman is nearer the vocabulary of Pericles than our English is to that of Chaucer. Yet Christianity has so modified even the modes of thought common to all men that Homer is more of a classic to the Athenians of to-day than Chaucer is to us. In fact, we may say that, even to the later classic authors, this became a palpable fact. To Socrates, Homer presented a series of theologic ideas that were different from the accepted ones among thinking men of his day. There are really but few ranges of thought that remain unaffected, and these are comparatively narrow. Imagery that depends upon true wit, and the descriptions of Nature or of the passions, remain as true to human perceptions now as then. The deeper underlying traits of character that make the whole world kin remains for us, too. But all subordinate modes and passions are modified, even as the aspects and bounds of Nature have changed. Homer would now hardly recognize the scenes of his epic. Ida yet rears her snow-crowned head, the sea heaves by, Xan-thus and Scamander still flow into the deep; but soil has accumulated over the smoking ruins of Troy, the wasting wave has changed the shape of the shore, and men of other than heroic mould now tread the ground on which Achilles and Hector fought. No one now thinks of pouring out a libation to Zeus. But holy hymns, and prayers, and litanies, he could never comprehend, fill the Christian fanes--not so far away. But still assemblies are moved as of old, like waving fields of wheat swept over by the wind. Still the speaker's words may fall as persuasively, like flakes of driven snow, upon the throngs that listen. Yet Oriental grief makes the picture as true now as then of grief-stricken Priam sitting sobbing in the midst of weeping sons and daughters, his hoary head yet clotted with the dust he had clutched, when groveling on the earth, in the first paroxysms of sorrow for his slain, his stalwart Hector. But other ranges of thought, as vast and more essential, cannot be reproduced. The the whole machinery of gods and goddesses is really unproduceable. It is not alone or even largely that these deities are absurd, or that the incidents connecting them with human needs are inadequate or loosely jointed, they belong to a wholly distinct series of beliefs that we cannot now parallel. A single instance of misconception in two leading translators will show how easily the whole mythology of the Homeric age may be transmuted by Christian theology. Both Lord Derby and Mr. Bryant translates "Makapes" of the gods by "blessed." It really means happy--in the infinite distance, too, of immortal happiness. Tennyson has strike the right chord of mythic faith in the "Lotos-eaters," which makes the blunder in both the translators less excusable. It was no irreverence to Homer to make his heroes as brave as and insultingly daring toward his deities. Man was a human conception superhumanly elevated; Jupiter was a passionate, uproarious cloud-compeller; Juno a very human, white-armed, deep-bosomed deity, with womanish hatred and female spites. And Homer reverently believed, worshipped, and sung, accordingly. He was at least honestly true to his ideas about his gods, and, subjectively speaking, what Christian can do more? For all that, Juno, Jupiter, Mars and the rest of "all that ilk," are wholly incongruous to our modes of belief. The absurdity can only be softened by substituting the older and unfamiliar names. It is unfortunate that we enter the Pantheon of heathen myths by the later Latin gate, as we only know at first the Greek deities their bastard Roman names. We should be rid of much of the grating ludicrous if we only restored Ares, Here, Aphrodite, and Zeus, to their rightful titles. Rough Poseidon, striding down the crages of Idea, with but four paces, would not create the smile that he does when we suppose him to be the tamer Virgilian Neptune. Yet the incongruities must reappear. We cannot as easily bestride the thirty centuries that part us from Homer as Poseidon charged down to his sea-deep palaces. Note that we speak only of the translation. When we turn to the right old Maeonides himself, all doubt is vanished. We forget the great flood of time. From Ida's peak 294 GOBELIN TAPESTRY we see the windy plains of Troy, the barren heaving sea, the distant, craggy Isle of Tenedos, the sandy beach, lined with the black-beaked galleys; then appear the tents, then the great wall. We see, too, the lofty towers of sacred Ilion. The armored chiefs moving amid the serried spears, the clash of the hand-to-hand duels, all come back to us. We charge with Hector against the wall, or pray with Ajax reeling in the heady fight for one single gleam of light. The heathen aroma comes back just as the smell of geologic ages of salt-ooze came over us when we stood at the bottom of a deep marl-pit; and all translations read, as looked and smelt a lump of the same marl in our impromptu laboratory — earthy and modern. There is yet another source of difficulty, at least for Homer. Other poets make no such imperious demands upon the translator in the matter of metre. They may be treated familiarly. Anacreon could be translated admirably into Doric Scotch; or Theocritus be put into Tennyson's admirable pastoral blank verse. But Homer cannot be so unceremoniously treated. In Blackwood, years ago, there appeared, from time to time, capital translations of bits done in the original versification; and we believe that the whole "Iliad" has recently been so translated. The English hexameter was Pope's wand for conjuring up the dead past; but it failed, or rather Pope failed to conjure aright with it, and often put in his own mirror, which distorted the shapes of the dead. Dr. Maginn has tried passages in the ballad measure and in octosyllabic verse with wonderful closeness. Lord Derby and Mr. Bryant have tried the Miltonian blank verse, and, to our mind, notwithstanding many laudations, with indifferent success. They amplify too much, and often misconceive the coloring of the scenes Homer draws. But a more poetico-critical (pardon the word) analysis of the "Iliad" than has yet been made by any translator, except perhaps Dr. Maginn, would solve a part of the difficulty, and make a poem of sixteen (and odd) thousand lines much more pleasant to modern readers. If the narrative and recitative parts, the legendary episodes, the battle-scenes, the council conferences, were distinguished, and each rendered into some appropriate English verse, it would remove much of the trouble, and relieve the monotony of so long a poem. True, English anapests, the Spenserian stanza, or any short ballad-measure, could never represent the grand rhythm of the Homeric verse. But neither does blank verse, nor the transferred hexameter, nor the English imitation. But each in turn would better represent portions of the themes that are brought into and vary the great motive of the poem — Achilles's wrath. Each class of verse would suit and reproduce the subject best fitted for it, whether stately speech, the hurry and clang of the battle, or the quarrels in the agora, or the councils in the tents; or tell the tale interwoven with loftier themes, or recount the grief of the Trojan wives, mothers, and daughters. The poem would bear a composite look, but, if it represented Homer better — if it gave, through the prism of the English of to-day, the true color to the scenes of swaying, swelling, ebbing hopes, fears, passions, and griefs, that Homer has painted, it would be a truer translation than any that has yet been given to the Christian English-speaking peoples. We look upon all that we have yet seen as being, except in detached portions, so far failures. --------- GOBELIN TAPESTRY. ----- AMONG the fearful depredations committed by the Communists during the past year in Paris, the destruction by fire of the beautiful collection of tapestries, preserved through three centuries, was among those most to be regretted. These exquisite tapestries are like fine copies of the original work of a great master, and to the medium by whom they are transmitted to us all honor is due. The process is far from being wholly mechanical, for only by patient toil, and with artistic appreciation and love of the work, can the delicate beauty of Raphael's creations, or the sublime coloring of Titian, be transferred to canvas, with only the aid of a fleecy wool or silk. In the prosperous days of Napoleon, many workmen or artists were employed in the manufacturer of Gobelin tapestry in Paris, but, since a large part of the building has been burned to ashes, only a few workmen remain, and these are engaged in filling orders given previous to the war with Prussia. In a long and narrow room some six or seven hand-looms are arranged, not unlike those used in our country by farmers' wives and daughters, but larger, of course, and rather more delicately constructed. The heavy roller is at the bottom of the loom, and the threads which form the warp of the canvas pass over the roller horizontally, and are confined in the frame above. These threads are very coarse and heavy, and from this fact, together with the fineness and extreme delicacy of the worsted used for the filling, one would suppose there could be no durability to the fabric. It is, however, intended rather for ornament than for use, and partly by the heavy cord the beautiful effect on the fabric is obtained. On the white surface formed by these horizontal threads, the outline of the figure, or group of figures, is dotted in ink, and these dots appear on both the front and back of the warp, or what is properly the right and wrong side of the picture. On the wrong side sits the artist on a low bench, near which stands a long, trough-like receptacle, containing thousands of tiny spools, long and narrow in shape, like needles. On these spools are wound the varied colors and shades in wool, to be used in the picture. This worsted is very fine and but slightly twisted; a delicate, plastic thread, selected by an artist's eye, and guided by a cunning hand, not rapidly, like the swiftly-flying needle, darting in and out of this great white warp, does the lovely picture glow with life, but slowly, stitch by stitch, and by a process like that with which a lady makes the pretty linen edge called tatting. The spool of worsted in the hand of the tapissier is like the little ivory shuttle bearing the[*Ægean Sea a great northern inlet of Eastern Meditterranean stretching between Greece & Asia Minor (Troy)*] Ionia see Author's Dict p. 679. A district of Asia Minor, extending from river Hermus along the shore of Ægean sea to Miletus - small districts around the different cities & towns - settled by emigrants from Attica 1050 B. C. - (Iona) - Ionian League - twelve cities (or thirteen) - old Ionia (afterward called Achaia) [*Persia adjoins east*] - Crœsus (Lydia) finally subdued this league or federation -then it passed under Persian sway. - the[m]n the Macedonian - Then the Roman Sylla the tyrant devastated it - [*not only was Homer Ionian*] - then again Saracens but Parrhasius the painterDistance of Troy from Greece from the nearest part of the Grecian Mainland [of the Grecian] about 170 miles - from Athens about 200 miles (Syria is not to be called in Asia Minor)Odyssey criticism & resumé see Author's Class. Dict p. 914 see N. A. Review for (I think) April 1871 for a fine criticism on Homer1872 WHITMAN STUDIES HOMER; two notebooks. A.MS. with portrait laid in. (27 and 4p. 21½ x 14 cm.) Two handbound notebooks, titled "Homeros: Iliad, Odyssee." Notes and references to different editions of Homer's Works. Passages of Grote's History of Greece quoted by Walt Whitman, as well as important events and dates, contents of various chapters, names and geographical information pertaining to Ionia, the Aegean Sea, Syria, etc., etc. Newspaper clippings pertaining to Homer tipped in. The first notebook tied together by Walt Whitman with string. A clipping of a reproduction of a marble bust of Homer, pasted onto cardboard, laid in. Both notebooks are significant in showing Walt Whitman's intensive way of studying. In upper right corner of first page: "Horace Traubel's property." (42)