Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/97

Rh scholars; they are natives of the island who have finished their education at Athens. M. Lælios, the predecessor of the present head master, was educated at a German university, with the sons of Chevalier Bunsen, and exchanged his situation at Mytilene for a better post at Smyrna. The proceedings this morning opened with a long discourse on the merits of ancient literature by the master, well written and clearly delivered. Then were called forth the two senior scholars of the first class, one of whom read a poem of his own composition on Lesbos, in the vile rhyme in which the modern Greeks have shackled and imprisoned their language. There is something to me revolting in Greek rhyme,—not even a Romaic Dante could reconcile me to it.

After the poem, the same boy was ordered to take up a Plato, and construe the beginning of one of the dialogues, first giving an abridged history of the life of Plato, which he did viva voce, very clearly and methodically. He then translated a page into modern Greek. I confess that it gave me a shudder, to hear the mellifluous sentences of the divine philosopher tortured and distended and diluted, so as to suit the modern idiom; but the experiment was interesting as a means of comparing the two languages, and must be very valuable for the boys, because the style of Plato is a perfect model for simplicity, clearness, and strength. Modern Greek is excessively prolix, and its structure clumsy; and thus, in translating from the ancient, much of the condensed energy is necessarily lost.

After the Plato came Homer, preceded in like