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Latin	Translation
Permeo terras, ubi nuda rupes	Through lands I travel, where the naked cliff-top
Saxeas miscet nebulis ruinas,	Merges in cloud its stark and craggy ruins,
Torva ubi rident steriles coloni	Where the stern landscape ridicules the crofter’s
Rura labores.	Profitless labours.
Pervagor gentes, hominum ferorum	Through tribes I wander where barbarian clansmen
Vita ubi nullo decorata culto,	Live a rude life, unbeautified by culture,
Squallet informis, tigurique fumis	Squalid, distorted, by but-and-ben’s1 thick vapours2
Faeda latest.	Eclipsed and filthy.
Inter erroris salebrosa long,	Through all the joltings of a lengthy journey
Inter ignotae strepitus loquelae,	Through all the babel of an unknown language
Quot modis mecum, quid agat requiro,	In countless ways I ask myself the question:
Thralia dulcet?	“How’s my sweet Thralia?”
Seu viri curas pia nupta multe,	Whether, as good wife, she soothes her husband’s worries,
Seu fovet mater sobolem benigna,	Whether, as mother, gently tends her offspring,
Sive cum libris novitate pascit	Whether, as scholar, feasts her mind on reading
Sedula mentem:	Gaining new knowledge:
Sit memor nostri, fideique merce,	May she remember me! Be her faith rewarded!
Stet fides constans, meritoque blandum	Her faith stand firm; and deservedly enchanting
Thraliae discant resonare nomen	The name of Thralia, learn, Skye, to re-echo
Littora Skiae.	Through all your headlands!3

Thanks to Jonathan B.P.J. Hadfield, whose generous translation from Latin to English helped to bring this information to you. He wrote…

I am not a Thrale, but found your website enthralling. I hope my attempt at verse will please some of your readers. Dr. Johnson argues that the tough, squalid and filthy life that a crofter was compelled to lead precluded all culture. The Sapphic verse is a metre perhaps invented by Sappho, the Greek poetess of Lesbos, which was taken into Latin by Catullus and later, with brilliant success, by Horace. Johnson uses it here and I have attempted to use it here in an English dress.

Footnotes

1. 'But-and-ben' is the traditional crofter’s cottage in the Highlands of Scotland. It translates the Latin 'tugurium' which means cottage. Johnson wanted to make the point that the tough, grimy and squalid crofter’s life stymied all culture.↩︎
2. The 'thick vapours' is the Latin 'fumis', which means 'smokings'. Dr. Johnson is referring to the black soot which is characteristic of the old croft’s walls and general interior. ↩︎
3. This has a meaning similar to ‘As it deserves’.↩︎

Ode to Thrale by Samuel Johnson

On 6 September 1775 Samuel Johnson wrote an Ode to Thrale whilst on a tour of the Scottish Shetlands with the Thrales. The verses are an expression of Johnson’s deep affection for Hester Thrale. He imagines himself wandering through remote and unfamiliar lands, but his thoughts are always with her. He asks himself what she is doing, and he pictures her as a devoted wife to Mr. Thrale, a loving mother, and a diligent learner. He ends the poem by expressing his hope that she will remember him and that her faith in him will remain steadfast.

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