GRANTA. A MEDLEY.
59
10.
Who sacrifices hours of rest,
To scan precisely metres Attic;
Or agitates his anxious breast,[1]
In solving problems mathematic:
11.
Who reads false quantities in Seale,[2]
Or puzzles o'er the deep triangle;
Depriv'd of many a wholesome meal;[3]
In barbarous Latin[4] doom'd to wrangle:
12.
Renouncing every pleasing page,
From authors of historic use;
Preferring to the letter'd sage,
The square of the hypothenuse.[5]
- ↑ And agitates.—[4to]
- ↑ Seale's publication on Greek Metres displays considerable talent and ingenuity, but, as might be expected in so difficult a work, is not remarkable for accuracy. [An Analysis of the Greek Metres; for the use of students at the University of Cambridge. By John Barlow Seale (1764), 8vo. A fifth edition was issued in 1807.]
- ↑ And robs himself of many a meal.—[4to]
- ↑ The Latin of the schools is of the canine species, and not very intelligible.
- ↑ The discovery of Pythagoras, that the square of the hypothenuse is equal to the squares of the other two sides of a right-angled triangle.