AN ACCOUNT OF THE LIFE OF HOMEL

So little is known of this truly great man, that alı our most anxious inquiries concerning him, have been but meagerly rewarded. The vague conjectures of his numerous biographers, serve only to thicken the haze that has settled over his long-since faded pathway.

So many fabulous accounts have been given of this prince of poets, by his early biographers, that some rather too skeptical, now deny even his existence. His wonderful poems, however, (the Iliad and Odyssey,) stand as monuments of his true greatness. They are voices from the grave of the past, floating on the tide of time, breathing in poetic numbers the fire of youth and the frenzy of love. The most reliable sources of information concerning Homer are, per haps-Bibliotheca Græca, by Fabricus, Wood's Essay on the Genius and Writings of Homer, Cumberland's Observer, Lempriere's Classical Dictionary, Herodotus, Plutarch, and the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Various opinions have been entertained respecting the period in which he flourished, the place of his birth, and even his true name. These have been subjects of heated controversies among the learned of

all ages.

In the most important events of his life's history the most of his biographers agree; namely, that he became blind early in life, after which he completed the Iliad and composed the Odyssey; was a wandering minstrel; that the age in which he lived was unworthy of so great a genius; and that he lived and died in the most abject poverty. It is not the design of the present writers to hazard any conjectures of their own respecting the age in which he lived, or which of the seven illustrious cities-Smyrna, Colophon, Chios, Salamis, Rhodes, Argos, or Athenea, had the honor of giving birth to so great a prodigy; nor will we here offer any comments upon his merits. Some suppose Homer to have flourished three hundred and forty years after the siege of Troy; but according to Herodotus about one hundred and sixty-eight years, and six hundred and twenty-two years before the expedition of Xerxes.

The place of his nativity is not certainly known. But the most prevalent opinion among historians is, that he was born at Smyrna, nine hundred years before the Christian era. His mother's name was Crytheis, an orphan left to the care of one Cleonies, her father's friend, by whom she was seduced. This coming to the knowledge of her guardian, he was anxious to conceal it, and accordingly sent her to Smyrna. Crytheis being near her time, went one day to a festival which the inhabitants were celebrating on the banks of the river Melis, where she was delivered of the immortal Homer, whom she named

Melesigenes. Crytheis was afterwards married to Phemius, a teacher of music and literature in Smyrna, who likewise adopted her son, and soon found in him marks of extraordinary genius. After the death of Phemius, Homer was left to the management of his father's school; but he was soon after induced to embark on a voyage with a person named Mentes. Having then commenced writing his Iliad, he was anxious to visit the places he should have occasion to mention; and he accordingly traveled through all Greece, Asia Minor, and many other places. From Egypt he brought the names of all their gods, the chief ceremonies of their religion, and a more improved knowledge of the arts.

He next sailed to Africa and Spain, and on his return touched at Ithaca, where he was detained for some time with a disease of the eye, which ended ultimately in total blindness. Here he was hospitably entertained by a friend of Mentes, named Mentor, a man of wealth, from whom he learned many things relating to Ulysses, which he afterward made use of in composing his Odyssey.

Mentes, on his return to Ithaca, took Homer with him to Colophon; from thence he returned to Smyrna. Being now reduced to the most extreme want, and still cherishing the fond hope that something might yet be done to restore his sight, our poet reinoved to Cuma. Here he was received with great joy, and his poems highly applauded. But when he proposed to immortalize their city by writing a poem in its

praise, on condition that he should be supported by the public treasury by an annual income, he was told there would be no end of maintaining the Homeroi, or blind men. From this he received the name Homer. Finding his generous offer so ill deserved by the citizens of Cuma, he left that city, uttering this imprecation: "May no poets ever be born in Cuma to celebrate it by their poems." He afterward wandered for several years from place to place, as a minstrel, and finally settled at Chios, where he established a school of poetry, and composed his Odyssey. From this he realized a small profit, married, and had two daughters, one of whom died young; the other became the wife of a very dear friend at Bolyssus. Having now determined to visit Athens, he embarked in a vessel for that city, but was driven on the Island of Samos, where he spent the winter singing at the houses of the great, for a bare subsistence. On the ɔpening of spring he again set sail for Athens; but, landing by the way at Ios, he fell sick, died, and was buried on the sea shore.

"Narrow is thy dwelling now,
Dark the place of thine abode
Deep is the sleep of the dead,

Low their pillow of rest.

When shall it be morn in the grave?

To bid the slumberer awake."

Ossian.

According to some Grecian traditions, both the Iliad and Odyssey were written by Homer after his blindness. Longinus, an eminent Greek critic and

philosopher, compares the former to the mid-day, and the latter to the setting sun; and observes, "that though the Iliad claims an uncontested superiority over the Odyssey; yet, in the latter, the same force, the same sublimity and elegance prevail, though divested of their most powerful fire; and that it still preserves its original splendor and majesty, though deprived of its meridian heat."

These two celebrated poems are so frequently met with in this land of books, and so universally admired, that whatever we might here offer in praise of their author's wonderful inventive powers, the purity of his style and his godlike conceptions, would seem superfluous. He has been very justly called the father of Epic Poetry. So charmed was Alexander the Great with his compositions, that he commonly placed them, together with his sword, under his pillow. The Iliad he carefully deposited in one of the most valuable caskets of Darius, in order, said he to his courtiers, "that the most perfect production of the human mind, may be enclosed in the richest casket in the world." It is related of Alcibiades, that he once gave a rhetorician a sound box on the ear, for not having the writings of Homer in his school. The Battle of the Frogs and Mice, and several epigrams, have been ascribed to him; but the most probable opinion is, that there are none of his writings now extant, except the Iliad and Odyssey.

By many of the ancients, Homer was worshiped as a Divinity, and sacrifices were offered to him.