Potentates 'gainst them shall league
Skill'd in ev'ry dark intrigue.
Odrasis ever safe remains,

While Urda guards the sacred plains:
To investigate their doom,

In vain the sons of Asi come.

III.

Now they turn the intentful mind,
Other oracles to find;

But angry Gods their woes increase,
And bid each lucid vision cease.
Thrainer's words bewilder'd seem,
Like the maniac's mid-day dream:
Dainer's shrines their secrets tell,
Deep involv'd in mystic spell.

IV.

Duergi sons, beneath heavens cope,
Sometimes lift their hands in hope;
Again their fruitless toil bewail;
Down sink their hands-their spirits fail.
Those whom the mountain clifts delight,
Where swift Ginnunger wheels his fligh
All pale behold the heavens above
In direful trepidation move.
Alsuither leaves the track of day,
And spreads thro' ether wild dismay.
V.

Nations feel the earthquake's force:
The sun maintains no equal course:
Storms, wide wasting thro' the air,
Their rage on plains and mountains bear.
Men aghast in vain enquire,

Whence the iterated ire?

Truths oracular subside

In limpid Mimer's angry tide:

When?-or where?-no mortal eye

Can read the coming destiny.

grove;

Heimdaller, eloquent and wise,
Thus began the mysteries:
Of all the sylvan Gods that rove,
The hill, the fountain, and the
Of each belov'd associate here,
Beneath this dark infernal sphere;
Say, can'st thou the hour declare,
When they leave the vital air?
What accidents their life attend?
And what their mortal course shall end?
XII.

Oft the maiden they invoke ;

No word oracular she spoke :
A secret grief her eye reveal'd,
While motionless her lips were seal'd.
The Gods in vain attempt to hide

The big drops down their cheeks that glide:
O'er-moisten'd hands at length display

What streams of anguish urge their

way.

XIII, A,

XIII.

As when from oriental skies,
Where Elivagi streams arise,

The thorny wand, with giant might,
Is brandish'd o'er the realms of night:
(That wand with which the drowsy God.
Subdues the nations to his nod,

When in his shadowy car he rides,
And o'er wild phantom'd dreams presides.)

XIV.

Then mortals sink supine to rest,
By unseen opiate charm oppress'd;
The nerveless arm inactive lies,
And daily vigor nightly dies.
Even wakeful Gods its power feel,
And half subdu'd inconscious reel.
Thus Dainer bids the wand of sleep
Nightly o'er the nations sweep:
The dizzy whirlings of his head
On all things round à torpor spread.

XV.

In sullen, silent, abject mood,

As struck by him Joruna stood:
The Gods in moveless, strange surprise,
In vain expected her replies.

More ardent yet her words they sought;-
Again repulse fresh sorrows brought:
Till vows and tears at last they find
Too weak to move her stedfast mind.

XVI.

Then he who sounds the vocal horn
In Odin's halls, at early morn-
He, the embassy who bore,
Turn'd his steps nor question'd more.
Nala's son with speed he took,
And sad, Joruna's shrines forsook.
The bard celestial staid behind,
In hopes some favoring hour to find.
XVII.

The chiefs of Vidar thro' the skies

Were borne where Vingolf's towers arise:
The winds of Forniot urg'd their flight,

Before the rapid wheels of night.

There the Asi sons they find,

At banquet, in bright halls reclin'd.

XVIII.

The God that holds the scales of right,

And quaffs nectarian bowls each night-
May he, they cried, secure maintain
The sceptre of his guiltless reign;

Long

Long may the Gods his praises tell,
Beneath his auspices, who dwell;
And with immortal Odin share
Pleasures unally'd with care.

XIX.

Baulverker station'd ev'ry guest
That round the immortal banquet press'd.
Fam'd Sæhrimner was the treat -
The food that Gods delight to eat.
In Mimer's bowls Skögula bore
Brisk metheglin brimming o'er.

XX.

The banquet done-the immortals grow
Impatient their success to know:
Gods around Heimdaller press-

Lok, the Goddesses address.

Tell us, they cried, what wond'rous thing
From the prophetic maid you bring,
While shades of night extend their reign
Over the wide etherial plain.

XXI.

Fruitless was our toil, they said;-
Loath to answer was the maid.
The Gods astonish'd, plan again,

How best the answer to obtain.

XXII.

Omi spoke, and still profound
Held the list'ning Gods around:
Let each, he cried, this night revolve,

What seems to him the best resolve;

Night, in sable garb array'd,

Will lend to thought propitious aid:
And what to each shall seem best done,
Let him declare by morrow's sun.

XXIII.

On western hills, and o'er the main,
Where Rhinda's mother holds her reign,
The Wolf, refresh'd with evening dews,
Swift the God of day pursues.

Up the thoughtful heroes rose,
And bade each other soft repose;
While Hrimfaxi swiftly flies,

Where Hropter with his consort lies.
XXIV.

With gems adorn'd, Dellinger's son
Drove down the horses of the sun :
Far off their manes in streaky beam,
Shone o'er the plains of Mannaheim.
Now, thro' the western portals far,
Shot rapid the resplendent car.

XXV. Nymphs

XXV.

Nymphs that mountain summits love,
And they who Thurssian forests rove,
Soft Genii of the deep and air,
And wandering Nani, now repair
To where the Ash extends its shade,
For sleep and cool refreshment made.
XXVI.

The Dynasts wake from soft repose:
The sun in blushing splendor rose.
Night, with all her shadowy train,
Sunk below the western main.
Ulfurna's son, with joy awakes,
And swift his chearful clarion takes;
From dome to dome its call rebounds,

And each celestial rock resounds.'

To these lines we have nothing to object, but their frequent disagreement with the Icelandic text: the translation of a translation, however elegant, is at best but the shadow of a shade, the reflection of moonlight,-the silhouette of a bust, -the echo of a mockbird's song:-but it may glide over objects new and strange, it may glisten with the rainbow hues of fancy, it may wear the contour of beauty, it may warble in melodious cadence.

ART. IV. The Beauties of the late Right Honourable Edmund Burke, selected from the Writings, &c. of that extraordinary Man, alphabetically arranged. Including the following celebrated Political Characters, drawn by himself: Antoinette, late Queen of France, Comte d'Artois, M. Brissot, Richard Burke, Esq, late Earl of Chatham, M. Condorcet, Prince de Conti, Right Hon. Henry Dundas, Hon. C. J. Fox, George III. Lord Grenville, late Mr. Grenville, Warren Hastings, Esq. late Lord Keppel, Sir Hercules Langrishe, Louis XVI. Louis XVIII. Lord North, Right Honourable William Pitt, Marquis of Rockingham, Charles Townsend, Esq. John Wilkes, Esq. &c. &c. to which is prefixed a Sketch of the Life, with some original Anecdotes, of Mr. Burke. Svo. 2 Vols. 10s. Boards. West. 1798.

WE have repeatedly heard objections to the modern inven

tion of garbling the works of eminent authors, under the idea of selecting their "BEAUTIES." It has been alleged, by those who disapprove this method of book-making, that abridgments of this kind are neither well calculated to promote the fame of those writers who are thus mutilated, nor the real improvement of readers;-that such selections commonly furnish only insulated and desultory reading, communicating merely superficial and partial knowlege; and that they sometimes tend to