4S0 Additional Notes. 



They have, however, been highly commended, particularly 

 by the critics in the author's own country. 



It is the opinion of some good judges that the Lusiad of 

 Mickle is much superior to the Lusiad of Camoens. The 

 translator has certainly, in some respects, improved on the 

 original, and made many additions. 



The Poems of Ossian, a little before the close of the cen- 

 tury, were translated into Italian, by Cesarotti, with great 

 elegance. 



Didactic Poetry. 



Wieland, the celebrated German writer, has written se- 

 veral didactic poems, which have been much commended. 

 His Die Natur, his Anti-Ovid, and his Musarion, are re- 

 presented as possessing peculiar merit. With the.r character, 

 however, I have too little acquaintance to speak particularly. 

 Besides these, the didactic poems of Hagedorn, Gieske, 

 Kastner, Uz and Dusch, also Germans, have been spoken 

 of, by the critics of their own country, with high respect. 



The Grave, a didactic poem, by Blair, is a work of 

 great excellence, and general popularity. 



The following remarks may with propriety be read in con- 

 nection with the character which is given of the Abbe De- 

 lille's Garden. 



" Voltaire, in his discourse pronounced at his reception 

 into the French Academy, gives several reasons why the poets 

 of that country have not succeeded in describing rural scenes 

 and employments. The principal one is, the ideas of mean- 

 ness, poverty, and wretchedness, which the French are 

 accustomed to associate with the profession of husbandry. 

 The same thing is alluded to by the Abbe Delille, in the 

 preliminary discourse prefixed to his translation of the Georgics. 

 ' A translation,' says he, ' of this poem, if it had been under- 

 taken by an author of genius, would have been better calcu- 

 lated than any other work for adding to the riches of our lan- 

 guage. A version of the ALneid itself, however well exe- 

 cuted, would, in this respect, be of less utility; inasmuch 

 as the genius of our tongue accommodates itself more easily 

 to the description of heroic achievements, than to the details 

 of natural phenomena, and of the operations of husbandry. 

 To force it to express these with suitable dignity, would 

 have been a real conquest over that false delicacy which it 



