Page:Tex; a chapter in the life of Alexander Teixeira de Mattos (IA texchapterinlife00mcke).pdf/17

 Alexander Teixeira de Mattos

I

"A great translator," one friend wrote of Teixeira, "is far more rare than a great author."

Judged by the quality and volume of his work, by the range of foreign languages from which he translated and by the perfection of the English in which he rendered them, Teixeira was incontestably the greatest translator of his time. Throughout Great Britain and the United States his name has long been held in honour by all who have watched, cheering, as the literature of France and Belgium, of Germany and the Netherlands, of Denmark and Norway strode along the broad viaduct which his labours had, in great part, established.

Of the man, apart from his name, little has been made public. His love of laughing at himself might prompt him to say: "When