ifficult. In the first place, the translator has to deal with
a language remarkable for its unity and fluency, qualities which,
according to Curtius (_History of Greece_, i. 18), are the result of the
"delicately conceived law, according to which all Greek words must end
in vowels, or such consonants as give rise to no harshness when
followed by others, viz. _n_, _r_, and _s_." Then, again, the translator
must struggle with the difficulties arising from the fact that the
Greeks regarded condensation in speech as a fine art. Demetrius, or
whoever was the author of _De Elocutione_, said: "The first grace of
style is that which results from compression." The use of an inflected
language of course enabled the Greeks to carry this art to a far higher
degree of perfection than can be attained by any modern Europeans. Jebb,
for instance, takes twelve words--"Well hath he spoken for one who
giveth heed not to fall"--to express a sentiment which Sophocles
(_OEd. Tyr._ 616) is able to compress into four--[Greek: kalos elexen
eulaboumeno pesein]. Moreover, albeit under the stress of metrical and
linguistic necessity the translator must generally indulge in
paraphrase, let him beware lest in doing so he sacrifices that quality
in which the Greeks excelled, to wit, simplicity. Nietzsche said, with
great truth, "Die Griechen sind, wie das Genie, einfach; deshalb sind
sie die unsterblichen Lehrer." Further, the translator has at times so
to manipulate his material as to incorporate into his verse epithets and
figures of speech of surpassing grace and expressiveness, which do not
readily admit of transfiguration into any modern language; such, for
instance, as the "much-wooed white-armed Maiden Muse" ([Greek:
polymneste leukolene parthene Mousa]) of Empedocles; the "long countless
Time" ([Greek: makros kanarithmetos Chronos]), or "babbling Echo"
([Greek: athyrostomos Acho]) of Sophocles; the "son, the subject of many
prayers" ([Greek: polyeuchetos uios]) and countless other expressions of
the Homeric Hymns; the "blooming Love with his pinions of gold" ([Greek:
ho d' amphithales Eros chrysopteros henias]) of Aristophanes; "the
eagle, messenger of wide-ruling Zeus, the lord of Thunder" ([Greek:
aietos, euryanaktos angelos Zenos erispharagou]) of Bacchylides; or
mighty Pindar's "snowy Etna nursing the whole year's length her frozen
snow" ([Greek: niphoess' Aitna panetes chionos oxeias tithena]).

In no branch of Greek literature are these