ii s. i. FEB. 5, i9io.] NOTES AND QUERIES.
119
dents and characters see ' Notes on * ' Tom
Brown's Schooldays,"- * by Lieut. -Col. Syd-
ney Selfe, published by Lawrence of Rugby,
1909, from which I have taken these
particulars.
A. T. M.
"SUCKET " (10 S. xii. 443). I had already
conjectured in my ' Folk-Etymology,' 1882,
pp. 378, 653, what PROF. SKEAT has now
fairly shown, that this word was derived
from " sugar ?J (Scot, sticker). It seems to
have got mixed up with It. zuccata, a slice of
pumpkin (ibid.). A. SMYTHE PALMER.
NOTES ON BOOKS. &c.
The Iliad of Homer. Vol. I. Books I.-XII. Translated by E. H. Blakeney. (Bell & Sons.)
THIS is one of the new series of " Bohn's Libraries," which had not the happiest of traditions for classical scholars. Now, however, all is changed, and the present translator gives xis a version of considerable literary merit, using the English of the Authorized Version and Elizabethan writers generally. The result is a rendering usually of considerable dignity, though, perhaps, un- necessarily archaic. Mr. Andrew I^ang is the pioneer in this style, of course, and Mr. Blakeney's version approximates to his, though he has, we gather from the prefatory matter, worked inde- pendently, consulting occasionally the renderings of the Rev. \V. C v . Green and Lord Derby.
Mr. Blakeney is something of a poet himself, and provides a neat sonnet by way of intro- duction, besides well-considered references to the literature of the subject. These as aids to further study, we regard as of genuine importance. There are also numerous notes, as to textual matters and literary parallels in English, which need no apology. The whole volume is, indeed, admirably calculated to give those who have no Greek a view of Homer's supremacy in the world of letters.
The words " acre perennius " are quoted in the Introduction. This is natural enough, but we think it would have been better to use English instead. Horace's phrase will be Greek to many a general reader nowadays. The English lan- guage is capable of expressing all that need be said on an occasion like this, and we feel that if the classics are to be revived, those who are charged with the business should carefully reflect on the limitations of the readers to whom they appeal, both in using Latin phrases, and in searching for English which is natural as well as literary. A classical scholar might say " devising English " : that would be a Homeric turn of language, but one which we should regard nowadays as un- natural.
The whole subject is full of difficulties, and Mr. Blakeney has mastered them so well that we look forward with pleasure to his second volume. His rendering is clearly a labour of love. We end with a mere query whether a tendency to blank verse in several passages is desirable.
ANOTHER excellent addition to the same series
is The Plays of sEschylus, translated from a revised
text by Walter Head lam and C. E. S. Headlam.
Readers 'are fortunate nowadays to secure in a
popular series the work of one of the most dis-
tinguished of younger Greek scholars, who died,
alas ! before the fruits of much of his work could
come to maturity. Walter Headlam's versions
of five of the plays have been already published,
and here his brother, also an excellent scholar,
finishes off the work by adding ' The Persians '
and ' The Seven against Thebes.'
" The object of these prose translations," says the Prefatory Note, "is to enable those who know some Greek to read the Greek of JEschylus correctly," and the expert will find much to interest him in the notes added as to text, mean- ing, and parallels. The late Dr. Headlam had a range of erudition which always made his work remarkable. The last twenty years, as he notes, have done much for the text and interpretation of ^Eschylus, of which the present volume supplies an excellent summary.
The general reader should not, however, be warned off the book by the fact that it contains much only for the advanced scholar. The versions here printed are much better reading for the average man than the literal doggerel which used to be placed before him. He will get some idea of the style of ^Eschylus the grandest style in literature. We give a passage from the ' Agamemnon ' in which one of the Elders speaks of the fire-signals from Troy :
" We shall soon know about these beaconings of light-bearing torches and these passings-on of fire, whether they be true, or whether this light came only with a dream-like joy to cheat our sense : I see a Herald yonder coming from the shore beneath the shade of olive-branches : and by Mire's consorting sister, thirsty Dust, I am assured of this, he shall not make you sign with- out a voice or by kindling flame of mountain timber with mere smoke, but with express words shall make either joy more plain, or else but with the alternative I have no patience now ; may fair result appear to cap fair witness visible ! "
A small matter, but one of considerable practical importance, is that the numbers of the Greek lines in tens are marked at the side of the English text.
Kelly's Handbook to the Titled, Landed, and Official Classes (Kelly's Directories) is a compact and useful guide with a wide range of information. The publishers, in accordance with their excel- lent practice, submit the proof of every entry to the person to whom it has reference, and we regret to see that their care in this respect meets in many cases with no return of details. There is a good deal of varied merit and interest in the landed classes, which have pedigrees as good as those of the peers, and are, we imagine, a far more operative class.
To The Fortnightly Review Mr. J. L. Garvin contributes his usual vigorous summary of ' Imperial and Foreign Affairs : the Elections and their Meaning.' Another political article is ' The Labour Party and the Future : an Address to W T orkmen,' by Mr. Maurice Hewlett, who has already appeared as a political letter-writer in The Daily Chronicle. He says that working-men by a general strike could always prevent war
