NOTES TO THE POEMS
satirical weapon in the mock-heroic " Rape of the
Lock" (1712) and "The Dunciad" (17128). His
"Essay on Criticism" (1711) and "Essay on Man"
(1734) are clever re-statements of other men's ideas.
Pope completed verse translations of Homer's " Iliad "
(1720) and "Odyssey" (1726), which made his
fortune. His poetry has a matchless glitter and, after
Shakespeare, his poetic aphorisms are probably more
often quoted than those of any other English poet.
P. 160, 1. 15. Pallas : the Greek goddess of wisdom.
Mars : the Roman god of war.
Latona : daughter of the Titan Coeus and Phoebe,
and mother of Apollo.
Hermes : Mercury, the herald and messenger of the
gods.
1. 16. Olympus : a mountain in Greece, supposed to be
the home of the gods.
1. 18. Neptune: the god of the sea.
P. 161, 1. i. Maeander ; a river in Asia Minor.
P. 162, 1. 5. Othello: the Shakespearean protagonist whose
jealousy of Desdemona, his wife, was aggravated by
seeing her handkerchief in the possession of another.
1.13. The Muse : the goddess of poetry.
1. 16. Proculus : a Roman senator, to whom Romulus,
after his death, is said to have appeared, and whom
he informed that the Roman people were thereafter
to honour him as a god.
Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog.
P. 163, 1. 5. Islington : now a district of London ; for-
merly a village outside the city.
1. 18. Pique : ill-feeling, quarrel.
Fred.
P. 164,1. 5. Fred: Frederick, Prince of Wales, son of
George II.
1. 13. The whole generation : the Hanoverians.
The Colubriad.
William Cowper (1731-1800), the son of a clergyman of
Great Berkhampstead, was educated at Westminster
School, and articled to the law. His serious, melan-
choly temper which turned at times into madness,
appears in " The Castaway " and " On the Receipt
of my Mother's Picture." Occasionally he turned
for relief to lighter humorous themes, as in "John
Gilpin." His quiet years of retirement are mirrored
2IQ