THE BATTLE OF THE LAKE REGILLUS.

Tax following poem is supposed to have | Porsena nothing seems to be borrowed from ceen produced ninety years after the lay of foreign sources. The villany of Sextus, the Horatius. Some persons mentioned in the lay suicide of his victim, the revolution, the death of Horatius make their appearance again, and of the sons of Brutus, the defence of the bridge, some appellations and epithets used in the lay Mucius burning his hand,* Cloelia swimming of Horatius have been purposely repeated; for, through Tiber, seem to be all strictly Roman. in an age of ballad-poetry, it scarcely ever But when we have done with the Tuscan war, fails to happen, that certain phrases come to and enter upon the war with the Latines, we be appropriated to certain men and things, are again struck by the Greek air of the story. and are regularly applied to those men and The Battle of the Lake Regillus is in all rethings by every minstrel. Thus we find both spects a Homeric battle, except that the com in the Homeric poems and in Hesiod, in 'Hex-batants ride astride on their horses, instead of κληείη, περικλύτες ̓Αμφιγυήεις, διάκτορος Αργειφόντης, ἱπτάπυλος Θήβη, Ἑλένης ἕνεκ' ηϋκόμοιο. Thus, too, in our own national songs, Douglas is almost always the doughty Douglas: England is merry England: all the gold is red; and all the ladies are gay.

driving chariots. The mass of fighting men is hardly mentioned. The leaders single each other out, and engage hand to hand. The great object of the warriors on both sides is, as in the Iliad, to obtain possession of the spoils and bodies of the siain; and several circumstances are related which forcibly remind us of the great slaughter round the corpses of Sarpedon and Patroclus.

Τρωσὶν μὲν προμάχιζεν Αλέξανδρος θεοειδής,

......

The principal distinction between the lay of Horatius and the lay of the Lake Regillus is, that the former is meant to be purely Roman, while the latter, though national in its general But there is one circumstance which de spirit, has a slight tincture of Greek learning serves especial notice. Both the war of Troy and of Greek superstition. The story of the and the war of Regillus were caused by the Tarquins, as it has come down to us, appears licentious passions of young princes, who were to have been compiled from the works of seve-therefore peculiarly bound not to be sparing of ral popular poets; and one, at least, of those their own persons in the day of battle. Now poets appears to have visited the Greek colo- the conduct of Sextus at Regillus, as described nies in Italy, if not Greece itself, and to have by Livy, so exactly resembles that of Paris, as had some acquaintance with the works of Ho-described at the beginning of the third book of mer and Herodotus. Many of the most strik- the Iliad, that it is difficult to believe the reing adventures of the house of Tarquin, till semblance accidental. Paris appears before Lucretia makes her appearance, have a Greek the Trojan ranks, defying the bravest Greek to character. The Tarquins themselves are re-encounter him: presented as Corinthian nobles of the great house of the Bacchiadæ, driven from their country by the tyranny of that Cypselus, the tale of whose strange escape Herodotus has related with incomparable simplicity and liveliness.* Livy and Dionysius tell us that, when Tarquin the Proud was asked what was the best mode of governing a conquered city, he replied only by beating down with his staff all the tallest poppies in his garden. This is exactly what Herodotus, in the passage to which reference has already been made, relates of the counsel given to Periander, the son of CypseJus. The stratagem by which the town of Gabii is brought under the power of the Tarquins is, again, obviously copied from Herodotus. The embassy of the young Tarquins to the oracle at Delphi is just such a story as would be told by a poet whose head was full of the Greek mythology; and the ambiguous answer returned by Apollo is in the exact style of the prophecies which, according to He

rodotus, lured Croesus to destruction. Then the character of the narrative changes. From the first mention of Lucretia to the retreat of

*Herodotus, v. 92. Livy, i. 34. Dionysius, iii. 46.
+ Livy, i. 54. Dionysius, iv. 56.
Her lotus, iii. 154. Livy, i. 53

• Αργείων προκαλίζετο πάντας αρίστους, ἀντίβιον μαχέσασθαι ἐν αἰνῇ δηϊοτῆτι. Livy introduces Sextus in a similar manne.: "Ferocem juvenem Tarquinium, ostentantem se in primâ exsulum acie." Menelaus rushes to meet Paris. A Roman noble, eager for vengeance, spurs his horse towards Sextus. Both the guilty princes are instantly terror. stricken:

Τὸν δ' ὡς οὖν ἐνόησεν ̓Αλέξανδρος θεοειδής,
ἐν προμάχοισι φανέντα, κατεπλήγη φίλον ήτορ,
ἂψ δ' ἑτάρων εἰς ἔθνος ἐχάζετο κῆρ ἀλεείνων.

Tarquinius," says Livy, "retro in agmen suorum infenso cessit hosti." If this be a fortuitous coincidence, it is one of the most ex. traordinary in literature.

In the following poem, therefore, images and incidents have been borrowed, not merely without scruple, but on principle, from the in comparable battle-pieces of Homer.

M. de Pouilly attempted, a hundred and twenty years ago, to prove that the story of Mucius was of Greek origin; but he was signally confuted by the Abbe Sallier. See the Mémoires de l'Académie des Inerrin tions, vi. 27, 66.