Whether a translation of HOMER may be best executed in blank verse or in rhyme is a question in the decision of which no man can find difficulty who has ever duly considered what translation ought to be or who is in any degree practically acquainted with those very different kinds of versification. I will venture to assert that a just translation of any ancient poet in rhyme is impossible. No human ingenuity can be equal to the task of closing every couplet with sounds homotonous expressing at the same time the full sense and only the full sense of his original. The translator's ingenuity indeed in this case becomes itself a snare and the readier he is at invention and expedient the more likely he is to be betrayed into the widest departures from the guide whom he professes to follow.