the present occasion could obtain a sight of any portion beyond a few extracts.

IN attempting to fill this chasm in British literature, it is vain to speak of the difficulties which presented themselves: these can be best ascertained by such as are the most able to judge of the execution; but if it be well observed by Pope*, that" an indifferent translation may be "of some use, and a good one will be of a great "deal," the translator of Claudian trusts that his efforts will not be without utility, and that his labours may be acceptable.

THOUGH there be reason to suspect that some of the small poems at the end are from another hand, yet it has been thought right to suppress nothing usually placed in editions of this poet. A double asterisk is prefixed to those which our author wrote in Greek.

It would have been easy to load the page with notes; but the fewest possible have been inserted, and these either to assist memory, or for the mere English reader.

THE original text was at first intended to have

* Postscript to the Odyssey, vol. 5. p. 245, edition of 1726, in

12mo.

been given with the translation; but as this would have so considerably increased the size of the work, it has been extended only to the Panegyrick on the fourth consulship of Honorius.

THE

LIFE OF CLAUDIAN.

CLAUDIUS CLAUDIANUS was born at Alexandria, in Egypt, in the beginning of the reign of Valentinian I. about the 365th year of the Christian era. Of his parentage or education, nothing has reached the present times; and though the poet himself distinctly marks in several parts of his works the country which gave him birth, yet various other places have laid claim to the honour. Petrarch and Politianus consider him a Florentine, or at least that his father was such; but Giraldus and the best criticks agree with Suidas and Sidonius Apollinaris in regarding him as an Egyptian. Greek appears to have been the language of his infancy; and from his own account he wrote verses in that tongue before he attempted any thing in Latin.

He came to Rome about six years after the destruction of the temple of Serapis, in the year 395, when Olybrius and Probinus were consuls, on whom he penned a Panegyrick. Perhaps this was his first attempt in the idiom of the Western capital, and he appears to insinuate as much in an epistle to Probinus, one of the consuls, who very probably was his earliest patron. It should seem that he could not be less than thirty years of age when he reached the Italian seat of empire, or at least when he thus commenced his poetick career in Latin.

* In Eutrop. Lib. 1, 15. Epist. ad Hadrianum, 56. Epist. ad Gennadium, 3. Eidyl. iv. Nilus, 10.

Educated in the Greek language, it is the more extraordinary that at such a period of life he should excel in another tongue; he must have spent some time in the acquirements of its elegancies, as he had before done in obtaining those of the language of Athens. A few small poems on sacred subjects, which the criticks, (perhaps mistakingly,) ascribe to the bard, have led many to consider him a Christian. But St. Austin and Paulus Orosius, his contemporaries, say he was a Heathen. Giraldus blames the credulity of Barthius and others in this matter, and attributes these holy verses to Claudius Mamercus, a Christian poet, bishop of Vienne on the Rhone, in Gaul, who flourished at the same time with Sidonius Apollinaris, while Gessner believes them to be the composition of Nonnus.

THE empire at that period lost its prince, who, on his death bed, intrusted the guardianship of his sons to Stilicho. The division of the realm, according to the father's will, placed Arcadius in the EAST, under the care of Rufinus; while Honorius remained with Stilicho in the WEST, where his parent had called him.

To this able general, minister, and friend of the great Theodosius, Claudian attached himself: a person truly worthy of the attention of a rising genius. Not only the emperor had given him the command of his forces, but, as a further reward for his services and virtues, be stowed his favourite niece and adopted daughter, Serena, upon him. Honorius was so fond of this officer, that he made an additional alliance with him, marrying Mary the general's daughter by this prin cess. Perhaps to the character of the protector, we owe the poet's display of talents. For the glory of Stilicho appears to be his constant theme. His satire assails Rufinus and Eutropius, only to give new, lustre to their vanquisher. Serena obtained him the hand of a

rich heiress.

CLAUDIAN was involved in his patron's disgrace, and severely persecuted in his family, person, and fortune, by Adrian, an Egyptian, who was captain of the guards to Honorius, and appears to have suc