most of those which occupy this volume are taken, was made by Vuk, and committed to paper either from early recollections, or from the repetition of Servian minstrels. These, he informs us, and his statement is corroborated by every intelligent traveller, form a very small portion of the treasure of song which exists unrecorded among the peasantry.'-Introduction, pp. xxxv i-xlii.

We are afraid that few of the amatory songs which Mr. Bowring has inserted in this collection, will justify, in the eyes of an English reader, the enthusiastic praise of Göthe. Several of the historical and traditional ballads, however, are remarkable for their incidents and spirit, and we can trace in them much of the manners and ideas of the people to whom they belong. The Gusle, to which they were sung, must remind every classical reader of the Phorminx and Cithara of Homer.

The historical ballads, which are in lines composed of five trochaics, are always sung with the accompaniment of the Gusle. At the end of every verse, the singer drops his voice, and mutters a short cadence. The emphatic passages are chanted in a louder tone. "I cannot describe," says Wessely," the pathos with which these songs are sometimes sung. I have witnessed crowds surrounding a blind old singer, and every cheek was wet with tears—it was not the music, it was the words which affected them." As this simple instrument, the Gusle, is never used but to accompany the poetry of the Servians, and as it is difficult to find a Servian who loes not play upon it, the universality of their popular ballads may be well imagined."-Introduction, pp. xliv-xlv.

It was thus that the elder bards of Greece recited the popular compositions of their day. The musical accompaniment, upon such occasions, is necessarily simple, if not monotonous. Yet its effects are powerful, as they proceed not from a capricious combination of notes, but from those natural and passionate breathings of the soul, which have for their only object to convey, in the most expressive manner, the conceptions of the poet. There is another feature belonging to these ballads, which will strike the classical reader as still more assimilating them to the ancient popular recitations of Greece. The same verse is frequently repeated, and messages conveyed, and the execution of directions described, in nearly the same words in which they were first given. Some critics have pointed out such repetitions as the principal blemishes of the Iliad; but were they not the natural consequence of the mode in which that poem may be said to have been published? In music, the return of the same passage- -a da capo-after some interval, generally relieves and pleases the ear. Might not the same principle have been acted upon, in poetic compositions uniformly recited, or rather chaunted, to the sounds of a stringed instrument? Let this be as it may, we look upon these occasional repetitions in the ballads before us, as an indication of their being considerably older than Mr. Bowring seeems to us to suppose.

Translations of some of the ballads, and nuptial songs, of the

Servians, have already appeared in Germany. The collection from which Mr. Bowring has culled his specimens, was made by a Servian named Stephanovich Karadjich Vuk. His edition of popular Servian Poetry appeared at Leipzig, in 1823-4, in three volumes; and we learn that he is at present engaged in collecting matter for extending their number. We hope that, when published, they will not remain long without a translator in this country-we mean a translator who will not strictly confine himself to the Hamiltonian system of interlinear, or rather equi-linear, version, as Mr. Bowring has done, but will clothe them in language which, without aggravating the defects, or exaggerating the beauties of the original compositions, will in some degree justify, among us, their title to the epithet of "popular."

The first ballad which we shall extract, is entitled 'Ajkuna's Marriage,' and we quote it the more willingly, as it is perhaps one of the best translations which Mr. Bowring has given us. It is, as all his versions of the ballads are, in blank verse, of the measure of the original. The story is of a maid who preferred a poor soldier, with youth and manly grace on his side, to an old gray-headed lover, with thousands in his coffers. It is told with some dramatic power, and the description of the beauty of the lady is remarkably glowing and rich in imagery. The comparison of her virgin bosom to 'two snowy dovelets,' is peculiarly felicitous.

Never, since the world had its beginning,

Never did a lovelier flow'ret blossom
Than the flow'ret we ourselves saw blooming
In the white court of the Bey Liubovich.
High above the level Nevesina*,
Tower'd the fascinating maid Ajkuna;
She, the Bey Liubovich's lovely sister.

She was lovely-nothing e'er was lovelier;
She was tall and slender as the pine tree;
White her cheeks, but tinged with rosy blushes,
As if morning's beam had shone upon them,
Till that beam had reach'd its high meridian;
And her eyes, they were two precious jewels;
And her eyebrows, leeches from the ocean;
And her eyelids, they were wings of swallows;
Silken tufts the maiden's flaxen ringlets;
And her sweet mouth was a sugar casket;
And her teeth were pearls array'd in order;
White her bosom, like two snowy dovelets;
And her voice was like the dovelet's cooing;
And her smiles were like the glowing sunshine;
And the fame, the story of her beauty,

Spread through Bosnia and through Herzgovina.

An extensive plain near the Narenta, in Herzegovina, on which is a village of the same name.'

.

Many a suitor on the maiden waited:
Two were unremitting in their service;
One, the old gray-headed Mustaph Aga-
He of Uraine, from the Novi fortress*,
And the other, Suko of Ubdiniat.

Both together met the self-same evening,
When they came to court the lovely maiden.
Thousand golden coins the old man proffer'd,
And, besides, a golden drinking vessel:
Round the vessel twined a mighty serpent,
From whose forehead shone so bright a diamond,
That at midnight, just as well as noonday,
By its light you might indulge your feastings.
Suko offered but a dozen ducats;

All the youth possessed, except his sabre-
His good sabre, and his steed so trusty.
Suko dwelt upon the country's border,
As the falcon dwells among the breezes.
Then his brother thus address'd Ajkuna :
"Lo! Ajkuna, my beloved sister!

When my mother bore thee, she betrothed thee-
She betrothed thee to another lover.

Many a lover, maiden! now would woo thee;
But the best of all those wooing lovers

Are those twain to-day that seek thy presence.
One the venerable Mustaph Aga;

He that comes from Uraine out of Novi.
Countless are the old Mustapha's treasures:
He will clothe thee all in silk and satin,
Will with honey and with sugar feed thee.
Suko of Ubdinia is the other:

But this Suko nothing more possesses
Than his trusty steed and his good sabre.
Now, then, choose, Ajkuna; choose, my sister;
Say to which of these I shall betrothe thee."

Thus his sister answer gave her brother:
"Thine shall be the choice, my brother! only;
Him alone I'll wed whom thou wilt give me;
But I'd rather choose a youthful lover,
Howsoever small that youth's possessions,
Than be wedded to old age, though wealthy.
Wealth-it is not gold-it is not silver;
Wealth-is to possess what most we cherish.
Little did he listen to his sister,

For he gave the maid to Mustaph Aga;
To that old white-bearded man he gave her.
He with speed to his own court departed.
Brought the bridal guests, to lead the maiden

To his dwelling; and among them Suko
Lifted o'er the rest the bridal banner;
And they hasten'd to the maiden's dwelling.
At the dwelling of the lovely maiden,
Three white days the bridal crowd had linger'd,
When the fourth day dawn'd, at early morning,
Forth they led the maiden from her dwelling;
And ere yet far off they had proceeded,
Ere they reach'd the flat and open country,
Turn'd the lovely maiden to the leader,
And into his ear these words she whisper'd :
"Tell me now, my golden ring, my brother!*
Who is chosen for the maiden's bridegroom?"
Softly did the marriage-leader answer:
"Sweetest sister! fairest maid, Ajkuna!
Look to right, and look to left, about thee;
Dost thou see that old man in the distance,
Who like an effendi sits so proudly
In the farthest palanquin of scarlet,
Whose white beard o'ercovers all his bosom?
Lo! it is the aged Mustaph Aga;

He it is who's chosen for thy bridegroom."

And the maiden look'd around the circle,
And within her sad heart sighing deeply,
Once again she ask'd the marriage-leader:
"Who is he upon that white horse seated,
He who bears so high aloft the banner,
On whose chin that sable beard is growing?"
And the leader answers thus the maiden:
"He's the hero Suko of Ubdinia;

He who for thee with thy brother struggled,-
Struggled well indeed, but could not win thee."
When the lovely maiden heard the leader,
On the black, black earth, anon she fainted:
All to raise her, hastening, gather round her,
And the last of all came Mustaph Aga;
None could lift her from the ground, till Suko
Sticks into the earth his waving banner,
Stretches out his right hand to the maiden.
See her, see her! from the ground upspringing,
Swift she vaults upon his steed behind him;
Rapidly he guides the courser onwards,
Swift they speed across the open desert,
Swift as ever star across the heavens.

'When the old man saw it, Mustaph Aga,

Loud he screamed with voice of troubled anger:

Brother-in-law. The Servians have a number of words to express the shades of relationship. Brat is brother; Sever, the husband's brother; Shura, the wife's brother; Snaa, the brother's wife; Pobratim, the adopted friend."

"Look to this, ye bidden to the wedding:
He, the robber! bears away my maiden:
See her, see her borne away for ever."
But one answer met the old man's wailings:
"Let the hawk bear off the quail in safety,-
Bear in safety-she was born to wed him;
Thou, retire thee to thy own white dwelling!

Blossoms not for thee so fair a maiden !'-pp. 27-34.

To this ballad we shall add Hassan Aga's wife's lament,' although Vuk has omitted it in his later editions, as he had not heard it himself in the Servian language. Göthe first translated it from a French version, which he found in the Travels of the Abbé Fortis, and in the Morlachian Notices of the Countess Rosenberg. It had the effect of directing the attention of the Germans to Servian literature. It is a very simple and pathetic tale.

'What's so white upon yon verdant forest?

Is it snow, or is it swans assembled?
Were it snow, it surely had been melted;
Were it swans, long since they had departed.
Lo! it is not swans, it is not snow there;
'Tis the tent of Aga, Hassan Aga;
He is lying there severely wounded,
And his mother seeks him, and his sister;
But for very shame his wife is absent.

When the misery of his wounds was soften'd,
Hassan thus his faithful wife commanded:
"In my house thou shalt abide no longer-
Thou shalt dwell no more among my kindred."
When his wife had heard this gloomy language,

Stiff she stood, and full of bitter sorrow.

When the horses, stamping, shook the portal,

Fled the faithful wife of Hassan Aga

Fain would throw her from the castle window.
Anxious two beloved daughters follow'd,
Crying after her in tearful anguish-

"These are not our father Hassan's coursers;
"Tis our uncle Pintorovich coming."

'Then approached the wife of Hassan Aga-
Threw her arms, in misery, round her brother-
"See the sorrow, brother, of thy sister :
He would tear me from my helpless children."

'He was silent-but from out his pocket,
Safely wrapp'd in silk of deepest scarlet,
Letters of divorce he drew, and bid her
Seek again her mother's ancient dwelling-
Free to win and free to wed another.