GREEK AND LATIN CLASS-130010.—The Theban Trilogy of Sophocles. By the
Rev. W. Linwood, M.A. (Longmans.)—Tbe title-page adds, " with copious explanatory notes, for the use of elementary students," and this description of the editor's purpose will sufficiently express the character of his work. The notes are copious to the fullest degree that the moat exacting or helpless of students could require, and the Choral Odes are translated. The interpretation of so excellent a scholar as Mr. Linwood is commonly right, and always defensible. Hence the aid supplied to the student is both in quality and quantity most consider- able. Whether it is too liberally given is another question. The ten- dency of the day seems to be towards such liberality ; teachers welcome, and if need be, supply the assistance which a former generation would have branded as illicit. Mr. Linwood's treatment of the text seems to be in the main judicious. He does not slavishly follow Dindorf, who has exercised lordship over Oxford scholar- ship for the last thirty years and more.—The Heauton Timorumenos of Terence, with Introduction and Notes, by E. S. Shuckbargh, M.A. (Macmillan), is another edition which the student ought to be glad to got hold of. Excellent notes and a faithful and spirited translation give all the help which he can need. There is also a brief, but satisfactory introduction treating of the Roman drama, and a translation of Sue- tonius's "Life of Terence." The Heauton Timorumenos is not one of the best of Terence's plays. Probably it was his earliest, or anyhow, very early, as Mr. Shuckburgh acutely infers from the title, "Manton Timorumenos P. Terenti," the position of the author's name indicat- ing that he was unknown. Had he been famous, it would have been "P. Terouti Heauton Timorumenos." Nor is the plot particularly edifying. But any student who may have occasion to read it will do so under favourable auspices, if he employs this edition.— Mr. F. A. Paley continues his useful school editions of the best plays of the Greek tragedians, with the Seven against Thebes of Aschylus (Heighten, Bell, and Co.) The " Seven " occupies a middle position, as far as difficulty is concerned, between the " Prometheus " and the "Persians " on the one hand, and the " Trilogy" on the other, the corrupt and difficult " Suppliants " being left out of the question. Mr. Paley is not too prodigal of his aid, but he is not, on the whole, we think, too chary. His notes, we need baldly say, are always sound ; sometimes, perhaps, considering that he writes for " young students," dwelling too much on readings. It is best, we think, in editions having the purpose of this present one to take the text which seems most probable, and to dispense with explanations and defence.—Mr. A. Sidgwick sends out an excellent edition of Homer's Iliad, Books I., II. (Riving- tons.) Mr. Sidgwick has some excellent remarks on the epic forms and syntax, which ho has systematised in that lucid and careful way which constitutes so groat an excellence in his work as an editor. We have often doubted tho wisdom of plunging boys into Homer, and perplexing them with the varieties of epic language, before they have well learnt that of the Attic writers; but they will, anyhow, have an excellent guide in Mr. Sidgwick.—From the sante editor we have Ovid, Festi VL, edited for the Syndicate of the University Press (Cambridge University Press). This is one of the alternative books for the Cambridge local examinations. The selection is not a very happy one. There is more than one passage not fit for boys to read, and though Mr. Sidgwiek has done something to expurgate, he has left too much. His notes, as usual, leave nothing to bo desired. Hero and there we may differ from him, but he evidently knows what is wanted. We must differ from Mr. Sidgwick when he annotates, on line 71 (rent quo mei juris malim tenuisse precaudo), "mei juris tenuisse, lit., . to koop it as part of my right,' i.e., keep it in my power.'" Surely it is simpler to connect rem and mei juris together, and to translate, " I should prefer to koop by prayer [rather than by any other means] a thing that is of my right," i.e., " that undoubtedly belongs to mo."—The Fourth Book of the Odes of Horace, with a Vocabulary, by John T. White, D.D. (Longman.)— To have to notice at once four Greek grammars proves that science and German have not yet pushed out Greek.—An Elementary Greek Grammar, by J. Hamblin Smith (Rivingtons), is likely to be a useful book. The accidence is copious and complete, though it might bo said that what the author describes as "the chief device of his book," " to place before the student in a simple form the principles upon which the inflexions of Attic Greek are formed," has hardly been carried out. He does not gift, so much principles as rules. The rules doubt] es are exhaustive, and we may mention, as a very use- ful feature, the numerous and copious vocabularies. There is a short "Catechism of Syntax," which might have been advan- tageously extended over the space occupied by a chapter, which is not sufficiently complete to bo of much use, on "The Dialect of Homer." —An Elemental y Greek Grammar, by the Rev. G. J. Davie (Bentley), has been found useful by its author, and may doubtless be found so by others. For ourselves, we do not see much in the tables of inflexions on which the writer lays much stress. When a boy has declined and conjugated many words for himself, he may bogin to make them for himself—A First Greek Grammar, by W. Gunnion Rutherford (Macmillan), has the look of a clear and well-arranged book. We wish that the writers of new manuals on old subjects would state the points of difference which may be supposed to be weir raison d'etre.—We have also to notice A Grammar and Analytical Vocabulary of the Words in the Greek Testament, in Two Parts—Part L Grammar—by the Rev. C. II. Waller (Sampson Low and Co.); A First Greek Reader, by W. G. Rushbrooko (Clarendon Press); and A Complete Latin Course, by J. Wright, M.A. (Macmillan), "comprising Rules, with Examples, Exercises, both Latin and English, in each Rule, with Vocabularies." Mr. Wright's, we observe, are rational methods of grammatical explana- tion.—We have also two books on Latin composition ; A First Latin Writer, with Accidence, Syntax Rules, and Vocabularies, by George L. Bennet, M.A. (Rivingtons); and Exercises on the Elementary Principles of Latin Prose Composition, by J. Hamblin Smith, M.A. (Rivingtons.) Mr. Bennet's book commits, wo think, the mistake of including too much. It would take, wo should say, seven years in a moderately favourable case, less perhaps in an exceptionally good ono, for a boy to get from what he is set to learn on Mr. Bennet's filet page to what be is expected to do on the last. Now, who can expect a book to last seven years? Grammars ought to be kept to themselves, we think, and exercises to themselves. Apart from this, the book is likely to be useful. Mr. Hamblin Smith's book is more homo- geneous, though it is a long way from "I was falling," p. 1, to the anecdotes which occur on p. 147, and a book that survives the journey will bo more than ordinarily fortunate. This volume contains some very well selected examination papers, which teachers will find useful, and some tables of differences between English and Latin, illustrated by short sentences, which may very advantageously be rendered into Latin by the scholar, and then committed to memory. —Also An Introduction to the Latin Language, comprising a Grammar, Exercises, s-c., by Maurice C. Hime, M.A. (Sullivan Brothers, Dublin); Easy Latin Stories for Beginners, with Vocabulary and Notes, by George L. Bennet, M.A. (Rivingtons).
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