She took the heathen man till that his head fast by his hair;

rolled forth upon the floor. she drew him by his limbs The foul one lay without a towards her disgracefully ;

coffer ; and the mischief-ful

backward his spirit turned odious man

under the abyss, at her pleasure laid;

and there was plunged below, so as the wretch

with sulphur fastened;
she might the easiest well for ever afterwards wounded
command.

by worms.
She with the twisted locks Bound in torments,
struck the hateful enemy,

hard imprisoned,
meditating hate,

in hell he burns.
with the red sword,

After his course
till she had half cut off his neck; he need not hope,
so that he lay in a swoon, with darkness overwhelmed,
drunk and mortally wounded. that he may escape
He was not then dead,

from that mansion of worms; not entirely lifeless;

but there he shall remain
she struck then earnest,

ever and ever,
the woman illustrious in without end, henceforth
strength,

in that cavern-home,
another time

void of the joys of hope. the heathen hound;

Jud.

p.

23.

The poet continues to describe Judith's escape to the town of her countrymen. Her reception is thus mentioned:

There were they blythe, those sitting in the burgh, after they heard

how the Holy One spake
over the high wall.
The army was rejoiced.

CHAP.

IU.

Towards the gates of the fast- in crowds and hosts. ness

They thronged, and ran the people went,

against the illustrious maid, men and women together, from a thousand parts, in numbers and heaps,

old and young

Here repetition of phrase is the substitute for energy of description.

The poet then gives her speech to the people :

Then the discreet one or

should afflict us. dered,

I from him life took away, adorned with gold,

through God's assistance. to her maidens,

Now I to every man with thoughtful mind,

of these citizens that army.leader's

will pray head to uncover,

of these shield-warriors, and it on high,

that ye immediately bloody, to show

haste you to fight. to the citizens

When God, the source of all, Then spake the noble one the honour-fast king, to all the people.

from the East sends “ Here may we manifestly a ray of light, stare on the head

bear forth your banners ; of the man illustrious for vic- with shields for your breasts, tory,

and mail for your hams, of the leader of his people, shining helmets, of the odious heathen com- go among the robbers; mander;

let their leaders fall, of the not living Holofernes, the devoted chiefs, he that of all men to us by the ruddy sword ! most murders has done, they are your enemies, sore sorrows;

destined to death, and more yet

and ye shall have their doom, would have augmented them, victory from your great leader, but that to him God grants the mighty Lord ! not

as he hath signified to you a longer life,

by my hand." that he with injuries

Jud.

p.

24.

The sally which immediately took place, and the consequent battle, are thus described :

BOOK
IX.

Then was the host of the was in all repaid
swift

on the Assyrians;
quickly gathered together, when the Hebrews,
the soldiers to the field; under the banners,
the warriors and the nobles had sallied
illustrious stepped forth.

on their camps. They bore the Tufas,

They then speedily they went to fight

let fy forth straight onwards ;

showers of arrows, men under helms

the serpents of Hilda, from the holy city,

from their horn bows; at the dawn itself.

the spears on the ground They dinned shields;

hard stormed.
men roared loudly.

Loud raged
At this rejoiced the lank the plunderers of battle ;
wolf in the wood,

they sent their darts
and the wan raven,

into the throng of the chiefs. the fowl greedy of slaughter, The angry land-owners both from the west,

acted as men
that the sons of men for them against the odious race.
should have thought to prepare Stern-minded, they advanced
their fill on corpses.

with fierce spirits :
And to them flew in their paths they pressed on unsoftly,
the active devourer, the eagle, with ancient hate,
hoary in his feathers.

against the mead-weary foe. The willowed kite,

With their hands, the chiefs with his horned beak,

tore from their sheaths
sang the song of Hilda. the sheer cross sword,

The noble warriors pro- in its edges tried:
ceeded,

they slew earnestly
they in mail to the battle, the Assyrian combatants.
furnished with shields, Pursuing with hate,
with swelling banners. none they spared
They that awhile, before of the army-folk
the reproach of the foreigners, of the great kingdom
the taunts of the heathen of the living men,
endured.

whom they could overcome. To them what had been hard

Jud.

p

24 at that play of swords,

Cædmon's

As Cædmon's paraphrase is a poetical narration Paraphrase. mixed with many topics of invention and fancy, it

СНАР.

III.

has also as great a claim to be considered as a narrative poem, as Milton's Paradise Lost has to be deemed an epic poem. It was published by Junius as the work of the ancient Cædmon, who has been already mentioned. It treats on the first part of the subjects which Bede mentions to have been the topics of the elder Cædmon; but it is presumed by Hickes not to be so ancient as the poet mentioned by Bede. I confess that I am not satisfied that Hickes is right in referring it to any other author than the person to whom Junius ascribes it.

It begins with the fall of angels, and the creation of the world. It proceeds to the history of Adam and Eve; of Cain, and the deluge; of Abraham and of Moses. The actions of Nabu. chodonosor and Daniel are subjoined. In its first topic, “the fall of the angels,” it

, exhibits much of a Miltonic spirit; and if it were clear that our illustrious bard had been familiar with Saxon, we should be induced to think that he owed something to the paraphrase of Cædmon. No one at least can read Cædmon without feeling the idea intruding upon his mind.

As the subject is curious, I shall make no apology for very copious extracts from Cædmon, translated as literally as possible: -

To us it is much right Almighty Lord!

On the that we the Ruler of the fir. There was not to him ever be- Fall of mament,

Angels.

ginning the Glory-King of Hosts, nor origin made; with words should praise, nor now end cometh. with minds should love. Eternal Lord ! He is in power abundant, But he will be always powerHigh Head of all creatures. ful

3

BOOK
IX.

over heaven's stools,

The glory-fast thegns
in high majesty,

praised the King :
truth-fast and very strenuous, they said willingly praise
Ruler of the bosoms of the sky! to their Life-Lord ;

Then were they set they obeyed their Sovereign ; wide and ample,

With virtues, they were
thro' God's
power,

very happy;
for the children of glory, sins they knew not ;
for the guardians of spirits. nor to frame crimes:
They had joy and splendour, but they in peace lived
and their beginning origin, with their Eternal Elder.
the hosts of angels;

Otherwise they began not
bright bliss was their great to rear in the sky,
fruit.

except right and truth.

3 I use the term in the original, because such expressions as have any allusion to ancient manners should always be preserved. Since I published my idea that Milton may have taken some of his conceptions of his Satan from Cædmon, Mr. Todd has favoured me with a copy of the following letter from Bishop Nicholson to Humphrey Wanley on the same subject. It is dated 20th August, 1706.

“ I have long wished for an accurate translation of Cædmon, and Mr. Dean (Hickes) only is able, glad I am to hear that he is willing, to undertake that part. Honest Mr. Junius told me there were three or four words in that

poem which he did not understand. This perhaps hindered him from attempting a complete translation; though, I believe, most of it is rendered piece-meal in the quotations he has made thence in his Saxon dictionary.

“I hope your translator will oblige us with the reasons of his opinion, if he still continues in it, that a good part of Milton's Paradise was borrowed from Cædmon's. I can hardly think these two poets under the direction of the same spirit: and I never could find, I think his introduction to our English history rather evinces the contrary, that Oliver's secretary was so great a master of the Saxon language, as to be able to make Cædmon's paraphrase his own.”

I do not know who Wanley's translator was, nor his reasons for thinking that Milton had consulted Cædmon. I have myself no other than the apparent similarity of some of the thoughts on a peculiar and uncommon subject, in which casual resemblances are less likely to occur than on more usual topics. Milton could not be wholly unacquainted with Junius; and if he conversed with him, Junius was very likely to have made Cædmon the topic of his discourse, and may have read enough of it in English to Milton to have fastened upon his ima. gination without his being a Saxon scholar.