Теперь морщины по лицу И снѣгъ житейскихъ вьюгъ Въ твоихъ кудряхъ; но— Богъ храни Тебя, сердечный друг! Джонъ Андерсонъ, сердечный друг! И сколько мы счастливыхъ дней Пойдёмъ - и вмѣстѣ подъ горой FRENCH. IN coming to the French versions, we find a different mode of translation. Most of those I have already noticed are cast, or are attempted to be cast, in the metre which Burns adopted, and a departure from it, as will be seen in the French and Italian translations, shows how much the beauty of the original is lost by the want of the original mould. Nor is this to be wondered at, for Burns himself shows how much the music to which he generally wrote his songs moulded the words and versification. "Until I am complete master," he says, "of a tune in my own singing (such as it is), I can never compose for it"; and this sentiment was evidently in Carlyle's mind when, writing of Mr. Heintze's translation, he said, "Perhaps the one counsel I would venture to give Herr Heintze were this, in all cases to learn the tune first." Naturally, more than this is wanted—the appreciation of the force of the words, the spirit of the piece; but the "not having learned the tune" is painfully apparent in the French and Italian versions. There are several translations and imitations of Burns in French-"Morceaux Choisis de Robert Burns, traduction par MM. J. Aytoun et J. B. Mesnard, edition Ferra du Paris, 1826"; another by Léon de Wailly, published in two editions simultaneously in 1843 by A. Delahuys (Paris) and Charpentier (Paris); and a prose version by Richard de la Madelaine, printed by Cagniard at Rouen, in 1874M. Léon Valadi has published a few translations and imitations, some, such as "John Anderson," being not without merit; and Leconte de Lisle's imitations are well known. They are all more imitations than translations. I give as an example the Rigs o' Barley. ANNIE. LECONTE De Lisle. La lune n'était pas ternie, Le cœur de ma chère maîtresse Que sa chevelure était fine! Notre ivresse était infinie, Et nul de nous n'avait parlé, Dans les sillons d'orge et de blé This piece is perhaps nearer to the original than any of this writer's other efforts. They lack the suppleness and precision of Burns; the freshness and charm of life which are so characteristic of Burns's songs seem to have escaped M. Leconte de Lisle, and their absence is not compensated for by the beautiful literary mosaics of coloured adjectives with which his pieces are adorned. In addition to these, M. Louis Demonceaux published at Paris, in 1865, Poésies imitées de Robert Burns, but as they neither are, nor pretend to be, translations, I do not further notice them. Another work appeared in 1893 from the pen of the well-known Professor Auguste Angellier of Lille, on the life and works of Robert Burns,1 but it would be almost a slander to call this splendid masterpiece of literary workmanship merely a translation. Of the above translations the best-as it is the most complete-is that of de Wailly. It is now over half a century since this work appeared, and it would therefore be out of place at this time of day to criticise it too closely. Indeed, M. de Wailly disarms criticism by the frank remark with which he closes his most interesting preface:-2 "Le malheur est que ces poésies sont de nature à perdre beaucoup dans une traduction. D'une part, elles offrent peu d'intérêt dramatique, et, de l'autre, les grâces naïves du patois écossais n'ont pas d'équivalent dans notre langue. On peut dire d'elles ce que Burns dit des plaisirs : 666 'Mais les plaisirs sont des pavots qu'on cueille : Vous saisissez la fleur, elle s'effeuille.' "Mécontent de la prose, j'ai voulu essayer des vers, et en voici quelques-uns que je soumets au lecteur. Mais, vers ou prose, 1 Robert Burns, sa Vie et ses Euvres, par Auguste Angellier, Paris: Hachette, 1893. 2 tomes. 2 See de Wailly, p. xxxiii. s'il n'est point satisfait, je l'engage, sans la moindre hypocrisie, à ne point s'en prendre au poète, mais à l'insuffisance du traducteur ou de la traduction."1 Il était une fois trois rois A l'Orient, puissants tous trois : Qu'ils feraient mourir Jean Grain-d'Orge. Dans un sillon bien labouré, Tout vivant, ils l'ont enterré ; Qu'ils avaient tué Jean Grain-d'Orge. Mais le printemps revient joyeux, "The misfortune is that these poems are of a kind that lose much in a translation; on the one hand they offer little dramatic interest, and on the other the naïve graces of the Scottish tongue have not their equivalent in our language. One may say of them what Burns said of pleasure "But pleasures are like poppies spread; You seize the flow'r, its bloom is shed.' "Dissatisfied with prose, I wished to try verse, and here are some specimens which I submit to the reader. But, verse or prose, if he is not satisfied, I beg of him, without the least hypocrisy, on no account to ascribe it to the poet, but to the insufficiency of the translator or the translation." |