Mr. Djris on tlie Poetry of tlie Cliinese. 4-2 1 



and by treating these in such a manner as shall interest the greatest number 

 of tasteful and cultivated readers. To weary the attention with a mere 

 list of barbariphonous and uncouth names, to produce some bald and 

 miserably verbal translation, to present the mere caput mortuum of some- 

 thing that in its original shape possessed spirit and beauty, is in fact 

 scaring away attention from a new subject, which, with a little discre- 

 tron, might be rendered sufficiently attractive even to general readers. 

 With such considerations in view, we might look to the successful ex- 

 ploring of the Chinese mine, and to the extraction of the ore of genius 

 and sense from the mass of baser matter in which it happened to be im- 

 bedded. 



Whenever a work of taste meets with universal approval in its own 

 country, we may be assured that its success is in great measure owing to 

 the merits of its style and language ; and therefore it seems singularly 

 injudicious to tiiink of transferring the spirit and effect of such a Chinese 

 composition into bad English, which it must inevitably become, by a servile 

 adherence to the letter of the original. Between the greater number of 

 European languages there is a certain connection, which allows literalness 

 of rendering to be carried to a great extent — but a verbal translation from 

 the one concerning which we now treat, must of necessity degenerate into 

 a horrible jargon, which few persons will undergo the disgust of perusing. 

 These observations do not apply in the same manner to works of scientific 

 or doctrinal detail, as to those of mere taste, whose end and aim is to convey 

 j)leasure, as well as instruction, — though perhaps chiefly the first. A 

 certain distinction, too, must be made between prose and poetry : the 

 former doubtless both requires and admits of a closer rendering — with 

 regaid to the latter, we may adopt the happy illustration used on a similar 

 occasion, " Celui qui pretendrait juger de quelque poeme que ce fut dans 

 une traduction litterale, pourrait aussi raisonnablement esperer de trouver, 

 sur ie revers d'une tapisserie, les figures qu'elle represente dans toute leur 

 delicatesse et toute leur splendeur." Verse, then, must be the shape into 

 which Chinese, as well as all other poetrj', ought to be converted, in order 

 to do it mere justice ; though in the present treatise, where so many dit- 

 ferent pieces are introduced for such different purposes, it has been thought 

 expedient to adopt by turns a prose translation, a faithful metrical version, 

 or an avowed paraphrase, as might best suit the subject; and the occasion. 

 More has been deferred iierein, than suited the writer's own judgment and 



Vol. II. 3 1 



