I have been many months indebted to you for a very obliging letter. I
delayed to answer it, in expectation of seeing your curious Specimens of
the Ancient British Poetry, advertised, from the press before this time.
Permit me to enquire, what forwardness that intended publication (which
you gave me hopes in your last of seeing speedily printed) is in? From
the translations, you have already favoured me with a sight of, I
conceive a very favourable idea of the merits of your ancient bards, and
should be sorry to have their precious relics swallowed up and lost, in
the gulph of time; a danger which they will incur, if you, that are so
well acquainted with their beauties, and so capable of making them
understood by others, neglect this opportunity of preserving them. I can
readily conceive that many of their most beautiful peculiarities cannot
possibly be translated into another language, but even through the medium
of a prose translation one can discern a rich vein of poetry, and even
classical correctness, infinitely superior to any other compositions of
that age, that we are acquainted with. Certain I am, that our own
nation, at that time, produced nothing that wears the most distant
resemblance to their merit.
I have lately been collecting specimens of English poetry, through every
age, from the time of the Saxons, down to that of Elizabeth, and am
ashamed to show you what wretched stuff our rhimers produced at the same
time that your bards were celebrating the praise of Llewelyn with a
spirit scarce inferior to Pindar. Inclosed I send you a specimen of an
Elegy on the death of Edward I.--that cruel Edward, who made such havoc
among the Cambrian poets. I know not whether you will be able to
decipher these foul scrawls or distinguish them from the marginal
explications, with which I have accompanied them. But you will see
enough to be convinced of the infinite superiority of your own bards; nor
do I know, that any of the nations of the continent (unless perchance
Italy, which now about began to be honoured by Dante) were able at that
time to write better than the English. The French, I am well assured,
were not. One thing is observable in the Elegy on Edward the First,
which is, that the poet, in order to do the more honour to his hero, puts
his eulogium in the mouth of the Pope, with the same kind of fiction as a
modern bard would have raised up Britannia or the genius of Europe,
sounding forth his praises. Considering the destruction which our
merciless monarch made among the last sons of ancient genius, it may be
looked upon as a just judgment upon him, that he had no better than these
miserable rhimes to disgrace his memory.
With regard to your Specimens, should they not yet be put to the press, I
should take it for a great favour if you would indulge me with a sight of
them in MS., or at least the Dissertation to be prefixed to them; an
indulgence that would not be abused, and which, under whatever
restrictions you please, would oblige, dear Sir,
Your very affectionate and faithful servant,
THOMAS PERCY.
_Eastern_ _Maudit_, _Dec._ 31, 1763.
* * * * *
The same to the same.