BOO K8.

LiETTSOK'S TRANSLATION OF THE N.IBELIINGENLIED.9 THE Nibelungenlied is to the Northern or Teutonic raoe, what the poem of The Cid is to the leininaulae ,peqple,—a great national epic ballad anterior to all modern popular literature, (unless we except the Sagas of the Scandinavians,) and a curious repertory of the manners and ideas of a very remote period. In length and variety The Nibelungenlied is superior to The Cid, and about its equal in an uity. As regards unity and reality, accuracy of dee scription, poetical merit, (so far as a judgment can be farmed from teenelefions,) we apprehend The Cid is entitled to the pre- ference. The writer of that work was more thoroughly acquainted with .his .subject; the adventures of the hero involved real life, while the story of Siegfried and his associates is altogether fabu- lous : in the Spanish poem manners are more distinetLyepainted, and there is more individuality.

Although any comparison between the ep.ic.of the.Greeks and. the epic ballad of modern Europe is out of the question as regards parity of merit, some comparative remarks will assist in zonvey- mg a distineter idea of the characteristics of The Nibelungen- lied, as well as of the ballad generally. The essential difference between the two kinds of composition—that difference which pro- duces all the other differences—is largeness. It has often been observed that Homer possessed all the learning of his time ; there is no doubt that he was as well acquainted with its life and man- ners. All that he knew, too, was original, or at least oral; such of it as he did not acquire by actual observation was drawn from per- sonal communication, ana had all the vivacity which such teach- ing imparts. The accuracy of his descriptions in Greece and Asia Minor shows that he was familiar with those 'countries; if he did not reach Fg..t, he probably met with people who had been there; and he mostnelLe had gazed from the farthest known shore in

the direction of region of wonders—the land of the Cyclops, the island of Calypso, the country where the mouths of hell are situated, and beyond which are the boundaries of the habitable world. The simplicity and half Oriental character of the manners of his age gave him much closer opportunities of studg the character and behaviour of the great by observation, was afterwards obtainable, or is practicable at all in the seclusion and squeamishness of modern life without the advantage of ruition or introduction. Hence Homer's descriptions lave the precision, oere tainty, and spirit of originality ; and his fables are homogeneous.

To this knowledge the ballad-writers have no pretension. Not- withstanding the world from the Elbe to the Indus was open to the knowledge of man, they make the grossest geographical blun- ders—more so, in fart, than Homer did two thousand years before them. In homely wisdom, in natural sentiments, in the description of externals, they are often accurate and lifelike to a high degree. Their representation of manners does not seem to be so reliable. When they are e, • I g those of the people, and of classes a little above the - I e, they are truthfill enough. When they attempt the great, y seem rather to draw upon fancy, more especially in what concerns private feeling or discourse : they represent othm- with the ideas of their own class. Of history they have as little knowledge as of geography: they mix together fact and fable both Classical and Seendinawan, not only without critical skill, which was not to be expected, but without inherent congruity. It may he said that the dark ages were times of ignorance : but Western Miunpe was _open to Agrims and there was a good deal of knew- ledge in the monasteries. 31I;at no poet arose disposed to _acquire merely argues the inferiority and narrowness of mind we speak of,

Connected with this want of largeness is a deficiency in their subject and their art. Whether Homer judiciously or accidentally chose his theme, or whether his own poems might of themselves influence the national fortunes, the siege of Troy was a turninz

point in Grecian history; the tribes assembled before the city an actual existence, the leaders a traditional if not a real being. The war was an alliance, furnishing the moral of an alliance ; and it represented the Greeks in contest with the Asiatics—a contest which continued till almost the close of their independent career. From the time of the " tale of Troy divine " Greece leas Greece. Something of this national ehnrneter forma in The Cid, with his wars against the Moors, and the envy and ingratitude whi el the heroexperiences from his countrymen. But The Nibelungenliedliaoa nothing real in its subject. The learned differ as to whether it isa distortion of traditional history, or a myth originally abort Woden filtrated through numberless minds, so that there is no na- tional distinctness about it; it is the circumstance of language that makes it -German. Want of art is as conspicuous in the ballad as deficiency or largeness in the subject. In The Nil■elungenlied there is a story, but no proper action, and no unity. There may be said to be three

stories at the least. The adventures and marriage of Siegfried; the quarrel of his wife Kriemhild with her sister-in-law Brunhild,

which leads to Siegfried's murder; the final revenge of this mur- der in the deaths of all the parties concerned and their followers. The want of unity in the action, however, might have been readily overlooked-had there been congruity and order. But each of these three stories might have made a separate poem. Themarriage of Brunhild and Gunther is also a story of itself ; and though fried plays in reality the most important part, yet he appears sub- '• The Fall of the Nibebangers, sithernise the Book of Krietnhild : a Translation the Nibelunge Not, or Nibelungenlied. By William Nanson Lettsom. Published

Williams and Norgate.

ordinate throughout. The Nibelungenlied is rather a succession of ballads relating to Siegfried, brought together to make a long poem, than an extensive work, necessarily commensurate with its extent of subject. This fact gives some colour to the theory of Lachman, that The Nibelungenlied is a number of originallymde- pendent ballads strung together. Stripped of the subordinate and accessory circumstances by which the theme is not unskilfully expanded and varied, the story may thus be told. Siegfried, the son of the King of " Nether- land," is a hero of mighty prowess, who has vanquished all oppo- nents natural and supernatural. He is possessed of a magic cloak, obtained from a conquered dwarf, which renders him invisible; and having bathed himself in the blood of a slain dragon, he be- comes invulnerable, except on a part between the shoulders where a linden leaf fell,—a somewhat awkward imitation of the story of Achilles, by whatever roundabout way it may have reached the North. Gunther, the King of Burgundy, has a sister, as renowned for beauty and virtue as Siegfried for deeds of arms. A report of her beauty has reached Siegfried; he pays a visit to the court of her brother Gunther, and obtains Kriemhild on condition of assisting Gunther in his design upon Brunhild. This princess makes it a oondition with all suitors, that they should engage her in certain feats of arms ; if vanquished, they die—if victorious, she yields : which is very possibly another classical derivation. By dint of Siegfried's strength and magic cloak, Gunther appears vic- torious, while his friend has done the work. The difficulty, however, is not yet over. Brunhild will not yield herself to the nuptial embrace, unless she is subdued by her husband ; and poor Gunther, entering into the unequal contest, is bound hand and foot, and passes his wedding-night suspended from the wall. The magic cloak and its owner are again brought into requisition : Siegfried, after a severe struggle in the dark, compels Brunhild to own herself defeated ; Gunther, who has had some difficulty in dodging himself clear of harm, profits by the prowess of his friend ; and with the double marriages, and the fetes thereupon, the action properly, ends. Such termination, however, would have left false- hood and deception triumphant,—about which the old bard might not have cared much ; and it would not have pointed the moral of women's curiosity, tongues, and quarrels,—on which he had clearer ideas.

Siegfried, at the court of Brunhild, had passed for the vassal and " man " of Gunther ; and how Gunther could marry his sister to a vassal, exceedingly puzzled his wife. This problem occupied her for'ten years, (the interval between the first and second stories); and in order to solve it, she resolved to get Siegfried and Kriem- hildio leave their own realm and visit Burgundy. A quarrel takes place between the ladies; which grows to hard words on a dispute about precedence at the cathedral-door. Brunhild reproaches her sister with being the wife of a vassal; Kriemhild retorts with an allusion to the struggle in the bedchamber, which Siegfried had told her in confidence, and, adding some injurious terms of her own, produces a ring Siegfried had drawn of Brunhild's finger. Wrath and confusion ensue : the upshot is that Gunther, beset by his wife and her party among the courtiers, consents to Siegfried's as- sassination : the hero is treacherously slain with his own spear, in the spot where alone he was vulnerable; and the first division of the poem ends with his burial, the departure of his friends, and the grief of Kriemhild. The action of the second part is the pun- ishment of this m s er, by the massacre not only of the murder- ers but of all the diens, who are treacherously inveigled into Hungary, whose Kriemhild has married. The narrative is long, and coMplicated by secondary matters; and, whatever may be thought of Lachmann's theory, alluded to above, this second division of The Nibelungenlied seems evidently by another author, of a later age, with a worse taste.

As there is a want of largeness in the Nibelungenlied as re, the essential substance of the work if compared with the higher kind of poetry, so there is a deficiency of force in the execution. With the exception of Hagan, the murderer of Siegfried, the 13er- sons want strength of character—the reader is told of qualities they do not exhibit; though in the first part their consistency is generally maintained. In what may be called the common feehngs of nature there is much of truth, but we suspect the poet has some- what failed in his delineations of ideas as they are modified by rank : the higher manners are rather fanciful than real. Of the style of a translated work it is difficult to speak, when the language of the original has become so obsolete that a modernization is necessary for native readers. Judging from Mr. Lettsom's poem, the German balladists did not, (any more than the English_,) perceive the true poetical power of the language. The metre, like that of all our ballads, wants variety: and this is much more felt in so long a work as The Nibelungenlied, where the constant recurrence of the same pauses not only produces mono- tony but a sing-song unpleasing to the ear, and unsuitable to a work of such national pretensions as the one before us. The geography of the old writer, as we have intimated, is not very profound. It is by no means clear who are the Nibelunpers, that give the name tq his work.. At one time they appear to

Northern people, whom Siegfried has conquered ; at another, they seem to be his followers from Netherland; while in the second part they figure as the Burgundians. This last change, however, is intelligible enough if that division is the work of a second au- thor ; for although well informed about the geography of Switzer- land, Austria, and Hungary, he might easily err as to a region of uncertain seat. The author of the first part has so little idea of lo- calities, or care for probabilities, that, though Siegfried's exploits have been performed in widespread regions, he represents neither his name nor his person as known to Gunther or his people, though the Burgundian chief holds his court no further from "Nether- land" than Worms. On the arrival of Siegfried and his followers, the monarch has to send for Hagan of Trony to tell him who they are.

"Much wonder'd then the Monarch, whence came the gallant band, That with so fair equipment bad reached Burgundian land, And with so massy bucklers : that none could tidings bring Of those heroic strangers, but little pleas'd the King.

"To Gunther then made answer the knight of Metz, Ortwine, A warrior bold and mighty, and of the loftiest line- ' Since none of us can tell you who these same knights may be, Send for my uncle Hagan ; let him the strangers see.

" 'He knows the proud and puissant of every foreign land ; So we, what now we guess not, from him shall understand.'

Him and his warlike vassals the impatient King bade call, And soon redoubted Hagan strode tow'ring through the hall.

" What would the King with Hagan ?' the warrior made demand. 'Here in my house are wand'rers from some far-distant land, Unknown to all around me : observe the strangers well, And if thou e'er bast seen them, the truth, good Hagan, tell.'

" Thai will I straight,' said Hagan : to a window then he went, And his eyes attentive on the strangers bent. Well pleas'd him their fair vesture, and well their armour sheen, Yet sure the like he never in Burgundy had seen.

" Whenever come these champions whom chance to Rhineland brings, Kings might they be,' said Hagan, ' or messengers of kings. How highly bred their chargers how gorgeous their army !

Wherever lies their country, high-mettled lords are they. "And thereto added Hagan, 'This too I'll vouch for yet ;

Albeit on noble Siegfried I never eyes have set, Still to aver I'll venture, that (let ivhate'er befall) 'Tis he that's stalking yonder, so stately and so tall.

"'He brings some new adventure to our Burgundian land; The valiant Nibelungers he slew by strength of hand, Nibelung and Shilbung, the princes stern in fight, And since has many a wonder achieved with all-surpassing might."

The best adventure and the fullest of character in the whole poem is probably that where Gunther goes a wooing to Brunhild. There is a touch of sly humour in the old writer's description of the curiosity of the ladies, and of the feelings with which the lover and his two Burgundian knights regard the preparations for the trial of strength.

"Then bade the Queen her maidens from the windows go ; Them it ill befitted to stand a sight and show For the rude eyes of strangers : they bow'd to her behest ; But what next did the ladies, we since have heard confest.

" They robed them in their richest to meet the strangers' gaze : Such, ever since were women, were ever women's ways. Through every chink and loophole was levell'd many an eye At the unweeting champions, through love to peep and pry.

"There were but four together who came into the land : The far-renown'd Siegfried led a horse in hand. This Brunhild at a window mark'd with heedful eye : As lord of such a liegeman was Gunther valued high.

"Then humbly by the bridle he held the monarch's steed, Huge of limb and puissant and of the purest breed, Till in the royal saddle King Gunther proudly sat : So served him noble Siegfried, which he too soon forgot. "Then his own the warrior led from ship to shore ; He of a truth such service had seldom done before, As to stand at the stirrup, when another mounted steed. Of all, close at the windows, the women took good heed."

Our extracts must stop here, though more would be necessary to possess the reader with a full idea of this remarkable poem. The deficiency, however, can be readily supplied by Mr. Lettsom's volume ; which is to be regarded as an addition to English letters, and an addition all the more useful as the language of the original, long obsolete, is not to be acquired merely for the sake of reading The Nibelungenlied.