Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise. I would I had some flowers o' the spring that might Become your time of day ; and yours, and yours, That wear upon your virgin branches yet Your maidenhoods growing. O Proserpina, For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou lett'st fall That come before the swallow dares, and take 153 Milton evidently had this passage in his mind; but perhaps the nearest parallel passage is in Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar, April: "Bring hither the pink and purple columbine, with gilliflowers; Bring coronations, and sops-in-wine [carnations and pinks], Worn of paramours [lovers] : Strow me the ground with daffadowndillies, And cowslips and kingcups and loved lilies [kingcups = crow-toes]: And the chevisaunce [achievement, perhaps here a flower] Shall match with the fair flower-delice" [flower-de-luce; Fr. fleur-de-lis, flower of lily, the white lily?] 151. Laureate, laurelled, 'having the poet's laurel on it.' What is a poetlaureate? Hearse. Coffin? So it seems to be in Milton's Epitaph on the Marchioness of Winchester, 1. 58. Dean Stanley, in his Historical Memorials of Westminster Abbey, says, "The hearse was a platform, decorated with black hangings, and containing an effigy of the deceased. Laudatory verses were attached to it with pins, wax, or paste." (The history of 'hearse' illustrates the curious changes of meaning which words sometimes undergo: Gr. ȧpr, to seize hastily, snatch and carry away; whence äρπaέ, robbing, rapacious; also a grapple, or grappling-iron, used in sea-fights; Lat. hirpex, or irpex, a large rake with iron teeth used for the same purposes as our har Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurled; 155 160 row, erpice being still the Italian for harrow; Low Lat. hercia; Old. Fr. herce, or herche, a triangular framework of iron in the form of a harrow, used for holding candles at funerals and church ceremonies, and placed at the head of graves and cenotaphs. Afterwards the word herce, or hers, came to signify the whole funeral obsequies; also the cenotaph, the grave, the coffin, the dead body; or any framework, platform, or canopy erected beside or over the tomb; lastly, hearse, the carriage in which the coffin is conveyed.) Lycid. "The older poets were fond of shortening classical names thus.” 153. False surmise, the false supposition in which, for the sake of the momentary comfort it affords, we vainly indulge, that thy loved form is here where we can honor it? Frail. This word is used apologetically. Dally, play, trifle. 154. See note line 56. The student will not fail to notice the beauty of this outbreaking of regret that the 'surmise' is but a transient dream. The shores-wash, etc. "This expression, though strange, is not the result of oversight, since Milton deliberately substituted 'shoars' for 'floods' in his MS. The obvious meaning is that the corpse visited different parts of the coast in its wanderings, and was not out at sea all the time. The word shore does, however, literally mean that which divides the water from the land,' and therefore includes the portion sometimes covered by the tide." Jerram. 155. Far away, at a great distance? or to it? 156. Hebrides. Western Islands. These islands, about 200 in number, are on the west coast of Scotland. Why are they 'stormy'? Examine, for the localities in this passage, a good map showing the British islands and the west coast of Europe. 157. Whelming. The first draft has humming,' evidently from Shakes. Pericles, III. i. 64, " And humming water must o'erwhelm thy corpse." 158. Monstrous, abounding in monsters. So Horace, Odes, I. 3. 18, and Virgil, Eneid, VI. 729. Homer's Odyssey, III. 158, has μeyakýteα tóνtov, the deep abounding in sea-monsters. 159. Moist vows. Tearful prayers? protestations of affection ? 160. Bellerus. Milton first wrote the word Corineus, but substituted Bellerus, coining it from Belerium or (as in Ptolemy) Bolerium, Land's End. "It has been supposed that Milton, desiring a legendary namefather for the special bit of Cornwall called Bellerium by the Romans, took the liberty of adding such an imaginary personage to the retinue of the great giant-killing Corineus." Masson. See Milton's History of England for the story of the Where the great vision of the guarded mount Trojan Corineus, Brutus, etc. Fable. The place fabled to have been the haunt of Bellerus. Drayton's Poly-Olbion (1st song) says that Cornwall was named after Corineus to commemorate his victory over Gogmagog, a Cornish giant. See a good map of the west coast of Europe. 161. Vision, the apparition of the Archangel Michael, which is said to have been seen by some hermits centuries ago. A craggy seat, known as 'St. Michael's chair,' on the steep rock called St. Michael's Mount, and about 200 feet high, overhangs the sea in Mount's Bay, near Penzance, and is much visited by tourists. The rock is pyramidal in form, encompassed by the sea at high tide, and surmounted by several old buildings. One of these is a castle, still inhabited at times; and about this castle are traced the remains of a yet more ancient stronghold, once occupied by the Normans. There was a monastery here of Benedictine monks, founded by Edward the Confessor; also a chapel said to have been built in the fifth century. The spot has long been an object of superstitious reverence. "The so-called chair is a fragment of the lantern of the monastery," says R. C. Browne, and he adds that, "to scramble around the pinnacle on which it is placed is a dangerous exploit, and is traditionally rewarded with marital supremacy." Clarendon Press edition. See note in Masson, pp. 460, 461. Guarded mount. How guarded? What of the rhyme here ? 162. Namancos. In Mercator's Atlas of 1623 and 1636, Namancos is set down as a town in the province of Galicia, near Cape Finisterre and a little to the east, and Bayona is a city on the west coast of that province, some distance to the south. Masson characterizes as nonsensical the notion once entertained that by Bayona Milton meant Bayonne in southwestern France, and by Namancos the ancient Numantia. He shows that there was an old traditionary belief that Cape Finisterre and its vicinity could be seen from Cornwall, and vice versa. Hold, stronghold, fastness; as repeatedly in Shakespeare; e. g. in Cymbeline, III. vi. 18, ""T is some savage hold.” 163. Angel. The critics generally, Warton, Masson, R. C. Browne, Stevens, Morris, and the rest, make this an apostrophe to the 'great vision,' the Archangel Michael; "Look no longer seaward to Namancos and Bayona's hold: . . . . look homeward to your own coast now, and view with pity the shipwrecked Lycidas." But Jerram, on the contrary, argues that St. Michael's apparition is merely introduced parenthetically, as part of a local description, and never directly addressed. It is, according to him, the spirit of Lycidas, now an angel, that is invoked. Ruth (Old Eng. hreowan; Ger. reuen, to sorrow), sorrow, pity. 164. Dolphins. This fish, remarkable for its swiftness and its beautiful brilliant colors, has been a favorite with poets ever since it saved the life of Weep no more, woful shepherds, weep no more; 165 For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead, Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor. So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed; And yet anon repairs his drooping head, the sweet singer Arion. When the rude sailors coveted his treasures and threw him overboard on his way from Sicily to Corinth, the song-loving dolphins assembled around the vessel, and one of them 'him bore Through the Ægean seas from pirates' view.' Spenser, Faerie Queene, IV. xi. 23. Somewhat similar is the story of Palemon and the dolphin in Pausanias; and of the boy and dolphin in Gellius quoted from Apion. Pliny describes the dolphin as an animal 'most friendly to man.' Liddell and Scott in their Greek Lexicon describe the dolphin (Gr. deλpis) as 'a small species of whale, which played or tumbled before storms as if to warn seamen, and so was counted the friend of men'; hence the story of Arion. The 'curving back,' as Ovid calls it (Fasti, II. line 113), is supposed by the sailors to have suggested the idea of carrying burdens. See Shakes. Midsummer Night's Dream, II. i. 150, and elsewhere. See Class. Dict. 165. Weep no more. This transition is somewhat like that near the close of Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar for November, but it is by no means an imitation. The Clarendon Press edition says approvingly, "Keightley thus accentuates, as also the 'Weep nó more, woful shepherds, weep no more,' 'Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more' of Shakespeare, and supports his view by quoting from classic and from English, German, and Italian writers, instances of repeated phrase with varied accent"! Mr. Keightley has put himself to needless trouble. As if it were necessary to accent every second syllable! Have crítics no ears! 166. Sorrow, the object of your sorrow. 167. Watery floor. So Dante, Purgatorio, Canto II. 1. 15, 'sovra 'l suol marino,' upon the ocean floor. 168. Day-star, the sun, called the 'diurnal star' in Par. Lost, X. 1069. So Pindar in his first Olympian Ode has, "Seek no bright star during the day, in the desert air, more genial than the sun." Shakespeare calls the moon 'the watery star.' Winter's Tale, I. ii. 1. Jerram thinks the evening star is referred to. See his note. Dwell a moment on the exquisite beauty of the simile and the music of these lines. 169. Repairs (Lat. re-parāre, to prepare again; Fr. réparer), refreshes, restores to a good state. In Lydgate's Troy we find, "Long ere Titan [í. e. the sun] gan make his repaire." Horace, Odes, IV. vii. 13, has "damna And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore 170 Flames in the forehead of the morning sky: So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high, Through the dear might of him that walked the waves; With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves, 175 tamen reparant cœlestia lunæ," the swift moons repair their wanings in the skies. Drooping. Why drooping? 170. Tricks (Welsh treciaw, to furnish; or, better, from Dutch trek, a draught; pull; deceit; feature; whence, perhaps, though Wedgwood doubts it, comes Fr. tricher, to cheat; Ital. treccare), dresses, sets off. In Il Penseroso, lines 123, 124, we have, 'Not tricked and frounced as she was wont = blazoned." Span "Tricked," says Dyce, "is properly an heraldic term gled (Gaelic spang, a shining metal plate). Milton often uses this word; but, like tinsel, it has lost somewhat of dignity.' See Trench (Study of Words, and English Past and Present). Ore. In Shakespeare (as in Hamlet, IV. i. 24, 25, ‘like some ore among a mineral of metals base') we have 'ore' meaning gold, or golden splendor. 'Ore' would seem to be more appropriate to the sun than to a star. 171. Forehead. In the Puritan Sylvester's translation of the Divine Weeks and Works of the Protestant Du Bartas, a favorite book of Milton's, we find the line, 'Oft seen in forehead of the frowning skies.' 173. That walked the waves. Matt. xiv. 25, 26; Mark vi. 48, 49. The student will not fail to observe the beautiful appropriateness of this allusion to Christ's power over the waters. = 174. Other groves and streams than those which he used to frequent on earth. Along beside, 'without the usual idea of motion.' Jerram. 175. Nectar, the drink of the gods. "It was also used by way of ablution to preserve immortality." Laves. So the aged Nereus' reared the lank head' of the drowned Sabrina, "And gave her to his daughters to imbathe In nectared lavers." Comus, 836, 837. Oozy (A.-S. wos, juice; wosig, juicy; Provincial Eng. ouse, the liquor in a tanner's vat). 176. Unexpressive, inexpressible, ineffably sweet. So Shakespeare has 'the fair, the chaste, and unexpressive she.' As You Like It, III. ii. 10. So |