210 



obliterate the name "Lauderdale" from a fiy leaf of one of the volumes; 

 and the writer further states that he compared the translations with 

 the corresponding JEneids of Lauderdale's Virgil, published in 1709, 

 and expresses an opinion that these manuscripts are the originals from 

 which that publication, pro tanto, originated. In this criticism I agree 

 with Mr. Lentaigne ; but I disagree with that gentleman in his adop- 

 tion of an early charge of plagiarism from these manuscripts made 

 against Dryden, and consider that Dryden' s statement, introduced in the 

 preface to the first edition of his incomparable work, published in 1697, 

 namely, "that he was permitted by Lord Lauderdale to make use of 

 his Lordship's translation, and that he consulted it as often as he 

 doubted of Virgil's sense, ,, may be received as unquestionable truth; 

 indeed, the style of these contemporaneous authors is so different, that 

 neither could with any chance of success adopt the metrical translation 

 of the other as his own. Lauderdale is a close translator, and in that 

 all his merit lies ; Dryden is emphatically a poet — graceful, smooth, and 

 aspiring — qualities rarely present in the composition contained in the 

 manuscript volumes now presented to the Academy. These volumes are 

 fragments of an entire work, compiled on the Continent of Europe, and 

 the circumstance is quite appropriate to the history of Richard Earl of 

 Lauderdale, who was a Jacobite, accompanied King James in his expatri- 

 ation, was at his court at St. Ger mains in the year 1692, and died at 

 Paris in 1695. There can be no reasonable doubt that the manuscript 

 volumes are a portion of his Lordship's work, or that that work was 

 completed before Dryden's more classical production was even thought 

 of. 



Mr. P. "W. Joyce read a paper " On the Changes and Corruptions in 

 Irish Topographical Names." 



Mr. *W. Gr. Brooke, by permission of the Academy, read the follow- 

 ing paper : — 



Notes on" an Old Irish Canoe found in Lough Owel, Co. Westmeath. 



In the close of last year an old Irish Boat was safely lodged within the 

 walls of this house. Beyond question the most fitting depository for 

 the largest and noblest of these relics of bygone years ever found in 

 this country is the Royal Irish Academy. Actuated by this view, Mr. 

 Charles Levinge, of Mullingar, the fortunate finder of the Boat, 

 presented it to this institution, and it now lies in the rooms be- 

 neath us. It is this old Boat which I desire this evening to introduce 

 to your notice, and briefly to describe. My claim to stand here rests, 

 I regret to say, not on my privilege as an Academician, but merely on 

 the fact that, having visited this Boat shortly after it had been raised 

 from its watery bed, I assisted Mr. L. in having it safely transported to 

 Dublin, and brought it under the notice of Sir William Wilde, one to 

 whose valuable labours, and helpful and ready sympathy on the sub- 

 ject of Antiquities, we are all deeply indebted. 



