Page:The spirit of the Hebrew poetry 1861.djvu/116

 Roadstead, Estuary, Watershed (American) Lock, Canal, Drain, Bight.

There is yet another ground of comparison on which an estimate may be formed of the relative copiousness of languages. It is that which is afforded by collating a translation with the original—in this manner—to take as an instance the class of words already referred to. The Hebrew Lexicon, as we have said, gives us as many as fifty words or phrases which are representative of natural objects of this one class; and each of these terms has—if we may take the testimony of lexicographers—a well-defined meaninor of its own. We have then to inquire by how many words are these fifty represented in the Authorized English version. We find in this version twenty-five words answering for the fifty of the Hebrew—apparently because the English language, at the date of this version, did not furnish a better choice. In very many places the same English word does duty for five, six, or seven Hebrew words—each of which has a noticeable significance of its own, and might fairly claim to be represented in a translation. As for instance the three words River, Brook, Spring, are employed as a sufficient rendering of eight or ten Hebrew words, each of which conveyed its proper sense to the Hebrew ear, and might not well have given place to a more generic, or less distinctive term.

A collation of the Greek of the Septuagint—say, in any one of the descriptive Psalms—will give a