Mushajjar, the Arabic Tree-alphabet,--and had theories
and opinions as to its origin; but he did not, I know, connect them in any
way, however remote, with Catullus. I therefore venture to think you will
quite agree with me, that they have no business here, but should appear in
connection with my future work, "Labours and Wisdom of Sir Richard Burton."

All these three and a half years, I have hesitated what to do, but after
seeing other men's translations, his _incomplete_ work is, in my humble
estimation, too good to be consigned to oblivion, so that I will no longer
defer to send you a type-written copy, and to ask you to bring it through
the press, supplying the Latin text, and adding thereto your own prose,
which we never saw.

Yours truly,

ISABEL BURTON.

_July 11th, 1894._

* * * * *

FOREWORD

A scholar lively, remembered to me, that _Catullus_ translated word for
word, is an anachronism, and that a literal English rendering in the
nineteenth century could be true to the poet's letter, but false to his
spirit. I was compelled to admit that something of this is true; but it is
not the whole truth. "Consulting modern taste" means really a mere
imitation, a re-cast of the ancient past in modern material. It is
presenting the toga'd citizen, rough, haughty, and careless of any
approbation not his own, in the costume of to-day,--boiled shirt,
dove-tailed coat, black-cloth clothes, white pocket-handkerchief, and
diamond ring. Moreover, of these transmogrifications we have already enough
and to spare. But we have not, as far as I know, any version of Catullus
which can transport the English reader from the teachings of our century to
that preceding the Christian Era. As discovery is mostly my mania, I have
hit upon a bastard-urging to indulge it, by a presenting to the public of
certain classics in the nude Roman poetry, like the Arab, and of the same
date....

RICHARD F. BURTON.

_Trieste, 1890._

[The Foreword just given is an unfinished pencilling on the margin of
Sir Richard's Latin text of Catullus. I reproduce below, a portion of
his Foreword to a previous translation from the Latin on which we
collaborated and which was issued in the summer of 1890.--L. C. S.]

A 'cute French publisher lately remarked to me that, as a rule, versions in
verse are as enjoyable to the writer as they are unenjoyed by the reader,
who vehemently doubts their truth and tr