[ xvii ]
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 that affected them.'" (Introduction, p. xliv.)
With regard to his predecessors Bowring remarks: "The translations which have appeared in Germany under the name of Talvj, are the work of an amiable woman (Theresa von Jacob) who, having passed the earlier part of her life in Russia, and possessing a mind cultivated by literature and captivated by the natural beauties of Servian poetry, has most successfully devoted herself to their diffusion. Professor Eugenius Wessely, of Vinkovcze in Slavonia, has also published a small volume of Translations from the Nuptial Songs of the Servians[1]. The renderings have the merit of perfect fidelity, and his introduction contains many interesting illustrations of Servian manners.... To fidelity at least, this volume may lay an honest claim. I have endeavoured to avail myself of all the authors who have written on the subject, particularly of the valuable criticisms of Dr Kopitar in the Vienna Jahrbuch der Literatur, of the works of Goethe, Grimm and Vater. The notes attached to Talvj's translation I have employed without any special reference to them."
On comparing the Servian Popular Poetry with her own Volkslieder der Serben, Talvj came to the conclusion that Bowring was indebted to her for more than the notes, and the lady cherished a certain resentment against the author for concealing, as she thought, the extent of his indebtedness. He had a certain fluent and agreeable knack, which, although it urged him sometimes to the verge of the namby-pamby, is employed, upon the whole, effectively enough. It would be unjust as well as ungenerous to decry the work of Bowring, but it is the date of his book and the complete absence of rival translations which give
- ↑ E. Eugen Wesely was a gymnasium professor at Vinkovce. His book containing metrical translations of fifty wedding-songs from Vuk's collection was published at Pest in 1826. Cf. Grimm, Kl. Schr. iv. p. 421.
