Laudator Temporis Acti

Walter Savage Landor (1775-1864), Poemata et Inscriptiones (London: Edward Moxon, 1847), pp. 193-194, no. XXXIX = "Ad Jamesum," lines 18-26 (on p. 193):

Te nec vetustas arbores securibus
Ferire turpis ardor impulit lucri,
Ut triobolarium istum .. at aufer in crucem.        20
Ulmos amatas video quarum murmure
Obrepsit olim dulcis ignavo sopor,
Video revulsa brachia, nudum verticem:
Nec novit aut curavit iste furcifer
Sub iisdem ut olim jacuit (heu flendum diu        25
Utcunque vinctum palmâ) Abercrombî caput.

"Jamesus" was one of Landor's Rugby School masters, Dr. James (d. 1804). A slightly different version of these lines occurs in a letter (postmarked November 1805) from Landor to Walter Birch. For the text of the letter see A. LaVonne Ruoff, ed., "Landor's Letters to the Reverend Walter Birch," and Edwin Burton Levine, tr., "Landor's Latin Poetry," Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 51 (1969) 200-261 (at 212-217; the lines, differently numbered, are on p. 213, reproduced here with the editor's notes):

Te nec vetustas arbores securibus
Ferire turpis ardor impulit lucri,
Ut triobolarium istum¹—at aufer in crucem—
Ulmos amatas video, quarum murmure        20
Obrepsit olim dulcis ignavo quies;
Video revulsa brachia, nudum verticem!
Nec novit aut curavit iste furcifer
Sub iisdem ut olim jacuit, heu flendum diu
Palmâque vinciendum! Abercrombis caput.²        25

¹ Mr. N. C. Kittermaster, Librarian of Rugby School, suggests that the trees to which Landor alludes may have been cut down to make room for four new classrooms for the School House. Neither he nor I can identify the "good-for-nothing" who cut them down.

² Sir Ralph Abercrombie or Abercromby (1738-1801) entered Rugby in 1748 (Rugby School Register, i. 56). He was noted for his heroism and for his work in restoring discipline and integrity in the British army. Commander of the force sent to drive the French out of Egypt, he died from a wound received in the Battle of Alexandria.

These lines are translated (op. cit., p. 214) as follows:

Not you the ugly greed for gain did drive.
To strike the ancient trees with axe,
Like that good-for-nothing—but may the devil take him!
I see the elms I loved, at whose murmur
Sweet sleep once overcame the idler;
I see the branches torn away, the treetop stripped!
That hangdog neither knew nor cared,
When long ago he lay beneath them, for Abercrombie's head,
Long, alas! to be mourned and wreathed with the palm.

Hat tip: Eric Thomson.

Labels: arboricide