INTRODUCTION.
It will, probably, be expected that a new translation of the Furioso should be prefaced by some account of the versions which have preceded it; and I the more readily undertake this little task, as in the execution of it my reasons will be found for the enterprize upon which I have myself adventured.
The first version of Ariosto’s great poem was made by Sir John Harrington, the godson of Queen Elizabeth, who translated it into the same stanza as that of the original. The main defect of this work is its infidelity, and I cannot better illustrate this than by observing, that he has compressed a canto of nearly two hundred stanzas into ninety. A more unpardonable defect is, that he always omits what is best worth preserving; and, as an Italian friend
