[II, 3, and III, 2, of _The Progress of Poesy_ are quoted without
comment.]
The second 'Ode is founded on a tradition current in Wales, that Edward
the first, when he compleated the conquest of that country, ordered all
the Bards that fell into his hands to be put to death.' The Author seems
to have taken the hint of this subject from the fifteenth Ode of the
first book of Horace. Our Poet introduces the only surviving Bard of
that country in concert with the spirits of his murdered brethren, as
prophetically denouncing woes upon the Conqueror and his posterity. The
circumstances of grief and horror in which the Bard is represented,
those of terror in the preparation of the votive web, and the mystic
obscurity with which the prophecies are delivered, will give as much
pleasure to those who relish this species of composition, as anything
that has hitherto appeared in our language, the Odes of Dryden himself
not excepted.
[I, 2, I, 3, part of II, 1, and the conclusion of _The Bard_ are
quoted]--_The Monthly Review_.
[Footnote F: The best Odes of Pindar are said to be those which have
been destroyed by time; and even they were seldom recited among the
Greeks, without the adventitious ornaments of music and dancing.
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