The Lycidas and Epitaphium Damonis of Milton, ed. with notes and intr. by C.S. Jerram

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LYCIDAS

AND

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS

LONDON : PRINTED BY
SPOTTISWOODH AND CO., NEW-STREKT SQUARE
. AND PARLIAMENT STREET

THE

LYCIDAS AND EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS

OF

MILTON

EDITED, WITH NOTES AND INTRODUCTION

(INCLUDING A REPRINT OF THE RARE LATIN VERSION OF

THE LYCIDAS BY WILLIAM HOGG, 1694), BY

C. S. JERRAM, M.A.

TRIN. COLL. OXON

jMfx

cvpiKToy Hfuyai fAty* vinipoxoy tv re yofitdtriy

U T* iLfinrfip€ffin Theocr. A/y/. vii. 17

LONDON
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.

1874

j^// rights reserved

PREFACE.

The two following poems have been selected as the only
specimens of Pastoral Elegy that Milton has given to
the world. Besides the Arcades and the Comus — which
are dramatic^ pastorals — they are his sole contribution
to a class of poetry which was in his age most fashion-
able, and whose influence is apparent in most of his
poems, especially those of earlier date. The origin and
history of the Pastoral, and its place in European litera-
ture, will form the subject of the first part of the follow-
ing Introduction, in which I have endeavoured to give
such preliminary information as may enable the reader

' An attempt was made to dra-
matise the Lycidas in a piece en-
titled Lycidas, A Musical Enter-
tainmenty which appears to have
been performed at the Theatre
Royal, Covent Garden, in 1767.
It consists of Recitatives and Airs,
with a couple of Choruses. For
the Airs the words of the original
are recast in short lines in a lyrical
form ; the following is a specimen,
corresponding to //. 113 foil, of

the Lycidas \,

How well could I have spared for thee
The Swains, who lean and flashy Songs
Grate on their Pipes of wretched Straw !

The sheep look up and are not fed.
But swoln with the rank Mist they draw,

Rot and the foul contaeion spread —
Not so thy Flocks, O Shepherd dear ;
Not so thy Songs, O Muse most rare !

For the credit of the play -going
public of the last century it is to be
hoped that this piece met with all
the success it deserved.

vi PREFACE.

to get some idea of the purpose and character of the
Lycidas and the Epitaphium Damonis before entering
upon a critical examination of them. With the former
of these all Englishmen, who have even a moderate
knowledge of the poetry of their own country, are
probably more or less familiar; the latter is perhaps
known only by name to many a student of Milton,
whose acquaintance with him is confined to the English
poems. All such will unite with me in grateful acknow-
ledgments to Professor Masson for having rescued this
touching elegy from its partial obscurity, by his notice
of it as illustrating one of the most affecting passages in
the early life of our great poet, and by his admirable
translation into English hexameters, which by his kind
permission I have been enabled to insert in this volume.
And here, while I most gladly admit my many obliga-
tions to that eminent biographer of Milton, perhaps it is
only fair to myself to say that the idea of including the
Epitaphmm was conceived by me long before the publi-
cation of his second volume. It was added not only
because of the similarity of its subject and occasion to
those of the Lycidas^ but also from a belief that the
study of Milton's Latin poetry, considered as a more or
less successful imitation of ancient models, would prove
eminently useful to those who are far enough advanced
in scholarship to be able to translate the classical authors
themselves with some degree of ease and fluency. Such
a study, by way of occasional exercise, would be no bad
training for young scholars in our public schools and
elsewhere, if they came to the task furnished with some

PREFACE. vii

previous knowledge of the matter of the poems, such as
the present edition supplies in the case of the Epitaphium
Damonis. Here therefore the notes have been made as
concise as possible ; since I thought it unnecessary to
dwell upon ordinary points of grammar, except where
some unusual or doubtful construction might call for
remark, and since I had explained many of the allusions
in my previous commentary upon the Lycidas, As the
greater number of the references are to Virgil and
Theocritus, whose works every scholar is supposed to
possess, I have not generally cited the passages in
extenso ; but in annotating the Lycidas some discretion
has been exercised in this matter. Quotations from
Latin, Greek, and sometimes from Italian authors, are
mostly given in the original. In a few cases I have
attempted a translation, where the point of the reference
lay in the matter of the extract, and not in the gram-
matical form of expression.

In commenting upon both poems, I have tried to
state clearly and without reserve the conflicting opinions
of former editors upon disputed passages, fairly balancing
the evidence and giving what I considered adequate
reasons for choosing or rejecting any particular inter-
pretation. In one or two instances I have been un-
willingly compelled to leave the question doubtful, and
in one at least (see note on Lycidas, 163) it was felt
necessary to return to an older explanation, in spite of
the fact that all recent editors have adopted the new
one. In every case I have aimed at so much conciseness
as was compatible with a thorough examination of each

viii PREFACE.

point under discussion ; for although I quite agree with
Mr. Keightley* that brevity in a note is a thing most
desirable, I know that it is highly unsatisfactory to the
reader to find a difficulty unexamined or passed over,
and to be put off with the ipse dixit of a commentator,
when he expects, if not a solution of the matter in
dispute, at least an impartial statement of diverse views.
Besides supplying what is barely necessary for under-
standing the author's meaning, I have sought to give
collateral information on points of English grammar and
etymology, illustrated by references and quotations, and
also to exhibit from certain lines in the Lycidas (espe-
cially //. 113 foil.) Milton's relation to the history and
religious opinions of his time. To avoid needlessly
encumbering the notes, the bulk of such information
has been placed in two Appendices at the end of the
poem.

Among the various books consulted, I may mention
the following : —

1. The editions of Milton's poems by Newton, War-
ton, and Todd, chiefly useful for references ; also,
Keightley's edition of 1859, and that by Mr. Browne,
published in the Clarendon Series, 1870. The respective
merits of all these are noticed in the Introduction (pp.

38-9).

2. Dictionaries of all kinds, English and foreign (in-
cluding the latest edition of Johnson by Latham, and
Wedgwood's Dictionary of English Etymology, 1872),

* Preface to lus Editicm of Milton's Poems.

PREFACE. ix

with other works, such as Earle's Philology of the Eng-
lish Tongue, Morris's Outlines of English Accidence,
Marsh's Lectures on the English Language, &c. &c.

3. Masson's Life of Milton (to which I have already
referred), Hallam's History of Literature, Warton's His-
tory of English Poetry, Scott's Critical Essays (1/85),
and several minor works bearing on the subjects under
review.

As regards the text and various readings, I am
greatly indebted to the courtesy of Mr. Aldis Wright,
of Trinity College, Cambridge, who has been good
enough to collate for me the MS. of Lycidas with Todd's
list of readings and with the first printed editions, veri-
fying all, and amending a few which that editor had
incorrectly or insufficiently given.

I have also much pleasure in acknowledging my
obligations to my friend, the Rev. James Moore, M.A.,
Vicar of All Saints, Liverpool, for his careful revision of
the MS. while it was in progress, for his help in arrang-
ing the materials of my Introduction, and for many
valuable suggestions throughout the work.

Once or twice reference has been made to a certain
Epitaph, which (as many readers may remember) was
found by Professor Morley written in MS. at the end of
a copy of the 1645 edition of Milton's poems, preserved
in the King's Library of the British Museum. Not
wishing to commit myself to an opinion either way upon
the authorship of this poem, I have designated it simply
as the Miltonic Epitaph. The whole story of its recovery
and the arguments on Professor Morley's side of the con-

X PREFACE.

troversy are given in his Introduction to Tke King and
the Commons y published in 1869. At present the question
is generally supposed to be settled against the Miltonic
authorship, by the decision of those experts who assert
that the handwriting is not Milton's, nor the signature
J. M. There is at all events no dispute as to the date,
which is 1647, and I have merely cited the poem as the
work of a contemporary writer, and as undoubtedly
* Miltonic* in style and expression.

The Latin paraphrase of the Lycidas^ by W. Hogg,
is inserted at the suggestion of Mr. F. A. Paley of Cam-
bridge, who has recently published a translation of the
same poem. In his preface he alludes to Hogg's version
of 1694, but regrets that he was unable to meet with a
copy of it. There is a copy, possibly unique, of this para-
phrase in the Library of the British Museum, preserved in
a miscellaneous collection of pieces, chiefly of the i8th
century. Most of the poems are in English, but one
of them is a Latin version of the First Book of the
Paradise Lost, by an unknown author, dated 1685.
Hogg's translation is preceded by some Latin Elegiacs,
In Laudem Academice Cantabrigiensis, not worth preserv-
ing, with a dedication to the Earl of Mulgrave. There
is also an English address 'to the Reader,' explaining
the circumstances of King's death, and of the production
of the commemoratory verses (see Introduction^ p. 2).
Part of this address is worth quoting on account of
its quaintness. * Now he [Edward King] was a Person
generally beloved in his Life, which made him so much
lamented at his Death ; which occasioned several Students

PREFACE. xi

to pen lamentations on his Death, ^ among whom was this
Milton and Clieveland. I was desired by others to make
these two Translations, which was the occasion that I
penned them. I was advised to put them in the Press,
and that which encouraged me to adventure to do it was
hopes that ingenious Gentlemen will communicate tokens
of their kindness to me, for at this time my necessity is
very great These Poems will afford a high and innocent
Recreation.* A version of Clieveland's elegy is, as the
Latin title indicates, included in the volume ; but I have
not thought it worth while to reprint this in addition.

The English translation of the Epitaphium Damonis^
by Dr. Symmons, is to be found in the Life of Milton
appended to his edition of the Prose Works (1806). It
is a fair specimen of the artificial literary style which
prevailed during the 1 8th centurj'' ; and it may be inter-
esting to some readers to compare it with the version by
Professor Masson, for the sake of contrast and variety.

* The italics are mine.

WooDCOTE House, Windlesham :
May 1874.

CONTENTS.

•o>

PAGB

Preface v

Introduction i

Lycidas 47

Idem Latine redditum a Gulielmo Kogjeo . . . loi

Epitaphium Damonis 109

Translated by Dr. Symmons 126

The Same by Professor Masson . v . . . * 134

INTRODUCTION.

The occasion which led to the production of the Lycidas is
stated in the following heading prefixed to the poem by Milton
himself: * In this monody the Author bewails a learned Friend,
unfortunately drowned in his passage from Chester on the Irish
seas, 1637, and by occasion foretels the ruin of our corrupted
Clergy, then in their height.'

This friend was Edward King, son of Sir John King, who was
Secretary for Ireland under Elizabeth, James I., and Charles I.
He was born at Boyle, Co. Sligo ; admitted as a lesser pen-
sioner of Christ's College, Cambridge, at the age of fourteen,
with his brother Roger aged sixteen, in 1626, Milton's third
year, under the same tutor Chappell {Lye, 36); and made
Fellow by a royal mandate, dated June 10, 1630 — ^an honour
which Milton himself might well have expected. During his
residence at Cambridge he wrote several copies of Greek and
Latin verses {Lye, 10) on special occasions, which are of no
great merit, and was destined for holy orders {Lye, 113 foil.).
It would appear that by his moral worth and gentle bearing he
had won the esteem of all his associates, though nothing is
known of Milton's relations with him during their academic
career, beyond what we gather from the poem before us. On
August 10, 1637, as King was crossing from Chester to Dublin
to visit his friends in Ireland (among whom was Chappell, now
Dean of Cashel and Provost of Trinity College), the ship
struck on a rock off the Welsh coast, and all on board are said
to have perished (Lye, 100). Accounts however vary about
this, for Todd quotes from a preface by W. Hogg (1694),

2 INTRODUCTION.

(whose Latin version of the Lyddas is included in this volume)
a statement that * some escaped in the boat/ and that they
vainly tried to get King into it, so that he and the rest were
drowned, ' except those only who escaped in the boat/ We
do not know whence Hogg got this story: the authorised
preface to the Cambridge verses of 1638 says, * Dum alii vec-
tores vitae mortalis frustra satagerent,' which seems to imply
that they all perished, though ' alii ' (not being celeri) does not
necessarily mean this. The inscription goes on to say that
King was in the act of prayer when the ship went down — a fact
which could not have been known unless some one had sur-
vived to tell the tale. He was then aged twenty-five. Milton
does not mention King's death in either of his letters to
Diodati (Sept. 2 and 23, 1637) ; but later in Michaelmas Term
he joined with other friends of the deceased in writing a series
of memorial verses. He was then at Horton, where he also
wrote the Sonnet to a Nightingale (1633), L Allegro and II Pen-
seroso^ Arcades and Comus (1634). The Lyddas is signed
J. M., Nov. 1637 (but the Cambridge verses appeared early in
the next year), and was republished with his full name and the
title * Poems on Several Occasions' in 1645, when the heading
* In this monody, &c.' was for the first time added. The whole
collection had twenty-three Latin and Greek pieces and thir-
teen English, of which Lyddas came last : the first are entitled
*Edvardo King naufrago ab amicis mcerentibus, amoris et
fjtviifiQ x"P*''>' with the motto Si rede calculum ponas^ ubique nau-
fragium est. Among other names are Henry King, brother
of Edward, and Beaumont of Peterhouse, afterwards better
known. The verses are not worth preserving — a ' poetic
canaille^ as Professor Masson calls them.

The name * Lycidas ' was a common one with the ancient
bucolic poets, but perhaps the Seventh Idyll of Theocritus
was especially in Milton's mind when he adopted it. The mon-
ody is cast in a form commonly known and designated as the
' pastoral ; ' it is not, however, strictly speaking, a pastoral, but
^ poem descriptive of college life under an allegory drawn from

INTRODUCTION. 3

that of shepherds. It is well to make this distinction at the
outset, in order to have some grounds for defending Milton
against the charge of confusion and incongruity which certain
critics (and notably Dr. Johnson, in his Lives of the Poets) have
laid against him. The exact value of such criticism, as applied
to the LycidaSy will be discussed in its proper place ; here it is
enough to say that whatever may be the faults of the poem on
this score (including the crowning one of all — ^the introduction
of the Christian pastor side by side with the ideal shepherd),
confusion of this kind did not begin with Milton, but had been
tiie common practice of his predecessors in a style of composi-
tion which had long been degenerating from its primitive state
of simplicity, and had now become an allowed medium for
expressing opinions upon any sort of subject that might be
present in the poet's mind. A brief review of pastoral poetry
in its various stages from the time of Theocritus will best show
how this change was brought about.

There is no reason for refusing the claims of the Syracusan
bard to the honour of having originated this kind of poetry, if
only we are careful to distinguish the pastpral of real life, such
as the shepherds loved to practise in early times, from the artifi-
cial drafts of professed poets who made rural themes a vehicle .
for their imagination. Among these last we do not know for
certain that Theocritus had any predecessors whose names can
worthily be coupled with his own. Naeke (Opuscula Philo-
logicaj vol. i. p. 162) draws a good distinction between the old
pastoral life and manners, which existed in the first ages of the
world, and the artificial description of them which we call
* pastoral poetry.' He maintains that speculations, such as
those prefixed to the Idylls on the origin of the pastoral,^ really

* The Scholia on Theocritus (ed.
Zi^ler, 1867) say that, after some
civil discord at Syracuse, the citizens
held a festival to Artemis for having
brought about a reconciliation, and
that the rustics presented offerings
and sang praises to the goddess in

their own fashion; hence bucolic
poetry had its beginning. Also that
they afterwards continued the custom
and sang for prizes of loaves and
wallets full of seeds and skins of
wine, with crowns on their heads,
and horns on their foreheads, and

B 2

4 INTRODUCTION.

concern the olden times ; but that the pastoral itself had no
proper existence before Theocritus. He takes no notice of any
tlifference between Theocritus and his successors in their method
of treatment ; and his remarks seem to imply that the Idylls of
Theocritus were no more a picture of facts than Virgil's Ec-
logues or the Italian pastorals. It is indeed very hard to
say how much in Theocritus is literal fact ; but there is the
plainest evidence that his scenes have been drawn from nature
and from the shepherd-Hfe of Sicily, and that they are the
direct and first-hand presentation of actual shepherds singing
of their flocks and of their loves, poetically but not allegori-
cally. At the same time, his Idylls bear the trace of Alexan-
drian refinement, and of having been written, as Naeke says,
' non ad priscorum hominum ingenium sensumque,' &c, but
for those * qui taedio capti aliunde imaginem simplicitatis re-
vocare student* It was only natural that in those early times,
when the conditions of human life were simple and uniform,
and the shepherd's calling was followed by nearly all classes,
the long hours of leisure should have been beguiled by song ;
and, as Lucretius ^. supposes, the whistling of the wind through
the reeds might have suggested the first rude shepherd's pipe.
Various degrees of skill would engender competition, and for
this the rural festivities of Pan or Ceres would afford grand
opportunities of display, which is probably the reason why the
oldest theories on the subject ascribe the origin of pastoral
poetry to such occasions. In course of time the best specimens
would become known beyond the original rustic circle, and so
professional poets began to adopt a similar mode of expression;

crooks in their hands. The above Rhegium to Tyndaris in Sicily,

is stated as ' the true account ' ; whereat the inhabitants sang praises

some, however, maintain that pas- to Artemis in their own rustic style,

toral poetry arose at Sparta during and thus gave rise to a regular

the Persian war, at a similar festival custom.

of Artemis and in a similar way ; * * Et zephyri cava per calamonim

while others place its origin as far sibila primum

back as the time of Orestes, when Agrestes docuere cavas inflare

lie returned from Tauri with the cicutas.' — LucR. 5, 1382 foil.

image of Artemis and crossed from

INTRODUCTION. 5

hence soon arose a distinct school of poetry, in which the poet
and his friends are introduced in the dramatic form of shepherds,
teUing of their flocks and herds, their rustic amours, and the
joys of a country life.*

But pastoral poetry was not destined to remain long in
this state of uniform simplicity. The real and the dramatic
characters soon became blended into one, and the shepherd
was identified with the poet. Even in Theocritus we see the
beginnings of this very natural confusion, for in the seventh
Idyll the swain Simichidas professes his inferiority to Philetas
and Asclepiades, actual poets of the day and the instmctors of
Theocritus, who, in fact, introduces himself under the name of
Simichidas ; but this Idyll is the only one which contains per-
sonal allusions to the poet, and in which real and imaginary
names are intermingled* Passing on to the 'Ejrira^toc B/aivoc
of Moschus, we find the same phenomenon more apparent ; for
there not only is the deceased bard lamented by name in the
midst of a highly allegorical passage, and the real cause of his
death by poison nakedly stated, but so transparent is the veil of
pastoral allegory which disguises the personality of the poet,
that Bion is represented as piping to his flocks and milking his
goats at the same time that he is compared with Homer, Hesiod,
and Pindar, with his own master Theocritus, and even with
Moschus himself, in language which expressly intimates that
something like a school of bucolic poetry was even thus early
establishing itself in Sicily. Whether such an idea ever had
any recognised existence, or had reached any degree of ma-
turity during the period of 200 years that intervened between
Theocritus and Virgil, is a question we have no means of de-
ciding ; suffice it to say that in the time of the latter poet the
terms * Sicilian ' and * S)a'acusan ' had come to be used as dis-
tinctive literary epithets of pastoral song (Virgil, EcL iv. i ;

* At secura quies et nescia fallere
vita,
Dives opum variarum, at latis
otia fundis ....

Mugitusque bourn mollesque

sub arbore somni
Non absunt.' — Virg. G. ii.

467.

6 INTRODUCTION.

vi. i). This fact of itself shows how conventional the method of
treating the subject had now become, and also prepares us for
what we actually find when we examine the Eclogues of Virgil.
The pastoral, which was at first a true and simple inspiration of
nature, was already passing into an artificial stage in which it
became the mouth-piece of general poetic utterance, and not
seldom a mere toy for tiros in verse, * as young birdes, that be
newly crept out of the nest, by little first prove theyr tender
w)mgs, before they make a greater flyght' * Such a fate indeed
it was only too certain to incur when once it had taken its
regular place in literature and lost its original simplicity. The
poets who adopted the new fashion, though they assumed the
character of shepherds, yet &iled to attain the true pastoral re-
sult, since neither their own inclination nor surrounding influ-
ences favoured a consistent treatment. But in Vir^ first of
all the unreality and confusion of subject-matter and the
general departure from primitive simplici^ begin to be most
conspicuous. His Eclogues are close imitations, often literal
translations, of Theocritus ; and in them we find the Greek
pastoral applied to Roman life, and the scenery of Sicily trans-
ferred to the Mantuan district. Also the persistency with
which shepherds bearing Greek names talk of Rome and the
things of Rome, and adapt not only the pastoral imagery but
even the very circumstances of the Idylls of Theocritus to the
every*(lay occupations of Roman life, seems to prove that
Virgil not merely recognised the Greek pastoral as the source
of his inspiration, but sought to invest Theocritus himself with
a Latin dress. And in numerous passages we cannot help see*
ing that he has allowed his excessive fondness of imitation to
cramp his native originality, and to close his eyes to tlie open
face of nature. At Rome Greek literature was a beau ideal of
excellence, and Greek models were accepted as supreme ; so
that an aptness for applying the matter no less than the metre

* Spenser, Episth to Gabridl in his IntroductioQ to ViigiPs Bt^
Harvey (quoted also by Conington colics).

INTRODUCTION. 7

of Greek poetry to Roman uses did not in those days appear
to derogate in the least from the character of originality.
NevCTtheless Virgil, though he lived and breathed so fully in the
atmosphere of Greece, and reproduced with such exactness the
tastes and impressions he had there imbibed, copied as one
who brought with him native insight and vision, and had the
power of impressing his own stamp upon much that he had
gathered from others. The confusion of the pastoral may be
considered as fully developed in the Eclogues, though often-
times so perfect is the poet's art, and so exquisite his grace,
that we may be led to forget or even to reconcile ourselves to
what he has done in this direction. Henceforth pastoral poetry
is no more than a particular mode of poetical expression, and
has nothing in common with Theocritus beyond its outside
form.i It seems strange indeed that a people like the Romans,
claiming descent from a pastoral ancestry and nursed by a
regular recurrence of festivals *in pastoral recollections, should
afterwards have been almost wholly indifferent to the cultivation
of this class of poetry ; yet the later Roman bucolic poets,
such as Calpumius and Nemesianus, occupy but a low place
among the post- Augustan authors, and need only be mentioned
as specimens to show how little regard was paid to the Pastoral
for some time after the days of Virgil. Their poetry, which
invests poHtical subjects with a pastoral dress, is miserably un-
real, and, though obviously Virgilian in its style and aim, is
wholly destitute of the master's power and elegance. It may
be interesting to notice here in passing an eclogue {Conflictus
Verts et Hiemis, sive Cuculus) by the Venerable Bede, which
was one of the few and scattered pastoral reminiscences during
the long and dreary period which intervened between the old
and the new epochs of literature.

From what has been said it appears that there may be two
kinds of pastoral — one real and the other allegorical : the first

* For a fuller and nearly exhaust* critus, see Conington's Introduction
ive criticism of Virgil's Eclogues^ in to the Bucolics^ in vol. i. of his
their relation to the Idvlh of Theo- edition of Virgil.

8 INTRODUCTION.

gives an actual representation of rural life in any country what-
ever, siich as we partially find in the Idylls of Theocritus,
while among our own poets perhaps Ben Jonson, in his Sad
Shepherd, has approached most nearly to this primitive type.
The second class is represented by Spenser and his con-
temporaries, its object being to disentangle the poet from all
local and surrounding associations, and to place him in such a
state of ideal freedom as shall afford full scope for his imagina-
tion. For this the fiction of some Arcadia, a kind of visionary
land, was most suitable, where the poet, in shepherd guise,
could adapt to his purpose as much of pastoral life as he saw
fit. And although Spenser, in the opening lines of the Faery
Queen, gives notice of changing his * oaten reeds for trumpets
stem,* and for ' knights and ladies gentle deeds,' much of the
pastoral nevertheless shows itself even here. Whatever the theme
might be, it was thrown by the poetical fashion of the time
into an imaginary world, and an ideal scene was fitted to it.'

The earliest modem pastorals are Portuguese, in or even
before the fourteenth century. They mainly deal with the
passion of love in its relation to the ideal felicity of shepherd
life. Spain followed in the same course; but the adoption of
the fashion by the Italians, whose language was more widely
known, started an epoch of great popularity for this kind of
composition in Europe. Sannazaro wrote his Arcadia in 1502,
and the Piscatory Eclogues,^ which are in Latin and very
Virgilian, appeared about 1520. Soon afterwards began the
regular pastoral drama, of which // Sagrifizio of Beccari, in
1554, was the first specimen. This, as Hallam thinks, may
have been suggested by the * Sicilian Gossips ' (AdoniazuscR) of
Theocritus, where there is the germ of a dramatic action in the
dialogue. George de Montemayor, v/ho, by his Diana, made

• See Masson, Life of Milton, zaro tried to vary them by depicting

vol. i. p. 412. the sea and fishermen ; but the sea

2 On these Eclogues Dr. Johnson having less variety than the land,

{Rambler, 1750) observes that, as and being less known to the gene-

the range of pastoral is narrow and rality of men, is therefore less fit

its images few and general, Sanna- for pastoral.

INTRODUCTION. 9

this kind of poetry fashionable in Spain, followed Sannazaro,
but improved upon him by giving more variety, more passion,
more reasoning, and a more connected story. Then followed
Lope de Vega with his Arcadia^ about the end of the sixteenth
century. Towards 1580 came Tasso's Aminta^ and in 1585
Guarini*s Pastor Fidoy containing musical choruses, ' the pro-
totypes of the Italian Opera which added recitatives to the
choruses.'

In 1690 the Society of Arcadians was founded at Florence
by Crescentini. They assumed all the accessories of Greek
pastoral, and took as their device the pipe of seven reeds
bound with laurel ; and their president was designated * custode
generale.'* Their influence was great in purifying the national
taste ; and though the poetry rather lacked power of feeling, its
natural imagery and pastoral character have invested it with a
charm and beauty which to the imaginative reader is quite
irresistible. From Italy the fashion passed to England about
the sixteenth century, when travel led the way to knowledge,
and translations began to be made. Though the influence of
Italian poetry upon English literature goes back at least to
Chaucer, who translated many lines from the Italian, and pro-
bably borrowed his Palamon and Arcite and his Troiltis from
the Theseida and Filostrato of Boccaccio respectively, yet it was
not till much later that Italian poets and romances were popu-
larly known in avowed translations. Ascham, in his Schokmaster
(1589), complains of them as * carrying the will to vanitie and
marring good manners.' Boccace's novels were translated by
W. Paynter in 1566, and Burton, in his Aftatomy of Melancholy ^
mentions the reading aloud of them as a winter evening's
diversion. A translation of Ariosto's Orlando Furioso by
Harvington appeared in 1596, and one of Tasso's Gerusalemme
Liberata^ probably by Carew, in 1593.

The first English pastorals were Barkley's Eclogues (15 14),
chiefly moral and satirical, with little rural scenery. They were

* From Hallam*s History of European Literature^ vol. ii.

10

INTRODUCTION.

modelled on Petrarch's XII. Eclogues (1350), which were the
first modem Latin bucolics, and on Mantuan (1402). And
these modern Latin pastorals became so much admired that a
collection of thirty-eight of them was printed at Basel in 1546.
Mantuan was read and taught as a classic : see Shaksp., Lovis
Labour Losty iv. 2, where Holofemes quotes a line of his and
says, * Old Mantuan ! old Mantuan ! who understandeth thee
not loves thee not/ In 1563 came Googe's Eglogs} Epitaphs^
and Sonnets^ and this abundance of pastorals is probably trace-
able to the fascination of the Italian poets. Spenser's Eclogue
December . is a literal rendering from the French of Clement
Marot. (Warton's Hist of English Poetry^ and Critique on the
Faery Queefi.)

In the Elizabethan age pastoral poetry was a popular
delight. Bishop Hall, Prologue to Satires ^ i597> exclaims —

Would ye but breathe within a wax-bound quill,
Pan's sevenfold pipe, some plaintive pastoral ;

and in his first satire he complains that he cannot

Under everie bank and everie tree
Speak rimes unto mine oaten minstrelsie.

In his History of English Poetry Warton remarks : * This fami-
liarity with the pagan story was owing to the numerous English
versions of them. Translations occupied every pen, and
acquired a general notoriety. Learned allusions were no
longer obscure ^ to common readers ; but their extravagances

' Petrarch introduced the form
^glogue for Eclogue^ imagining the
word to be derived from aT| (olyiJs),
* a goat,' and to mean * the con-
versation of goatherds.* But, as
Dr. Johnson observes in his Life of
A. Philips^ it could only mean 'the
talk of goats. "^ Such a compound,
however, could not even exist, as it
would be cuyo-Xcryfo, if anything.
Eclog(z\ (^K-Aoyot) of course mean
simply Selected Pieces, a name

afterwards given to the poems which
Virgil himself called by the de-
scriptive name Bucolka.

* The chief translations of the
classics after 1550 are Virgil's
Mneid, by Phaier(iS58) ; by Stani-
hurst (1583) ; the Culex^ by Spenser
(1 591); Ovid's Metamorphoses^ by
Golding (1565) ; Epistles, by Tur-
berville (1567) ; Tristia, by Church-
yard (1580); Horace's ^/j/Atj and
Satires, by Drant (1567) ; Homer,

INTRODUCTION. ii

were imitated, and not their natural beauties.' Again : * When
the queen paraded through a country town, almost every
pageant was a pantheon. When she paid a visit at the house
of any of her nobility, on entering the hall she was saluted by
the Penates, and conducted to her privy chamber by Mercury.
. . . At dinner select transformations of Ovid's Meta-
morphoses were exhibited in confectionery. . . . When
she condescended to walk in the garden, the lake was covered
with Tritons and Nereids ; the pages of the family were con-
verted into wood n)aiiphs, who peeped from every bower, and
the footmen gambolled over the lawns in the figure of satyrs.*
. . . When her majesty hunted in the park, she was
met by Diana, who, pronouncing our royal prude to be the
brightest paragon of unspotted chastity, invited her to groves
firee from the intrusions of Actaeon. ... In one of the
fulsome interludes at court, the singing boys of her chapel pre-
sented the story of the three rival goddesses on Mount Ida, to
which her majesty was ingeniously added as a fourth ; and
Paris was arraigned in form for adjudging the golden apple to
Venus, which was due to the queen alone.' (Warton's Hist, of
Eng, Poetry^ ed. 1824, vol. iv. p. 323.)

Besides the classics and the Italian tales, Gothic romance
still held its ground. * Giants, dragons, and enchanted castles,
borrowed from the magic storehouse of Boiardo, Ariosto, and
Tasso, began to be employed by the epic muse. The Gothic
and pagan fictions were blended and incorporated' (ib,) \ and
we find in Sidney's Arcadia an application of the Italian pas-
toral to feudal manners, and so fashionable did pastoral
writings soon become that the language of courtiers with all its
false and tawdry finery was put into the mouths of simple
shepherds. Spenser, whose ShepheanTs Calaidar (1579) is the
masterpiece of all pastorals in that age, brought his treatment
nearer to the truth of nature ; yet the Doric rusticity of the dia-

by Chapman (1604-14). Queen * See account of the pageant at

Elizabeth herself translated Seneca's Kenilworth in Scott's novel of that
Hercules yEtaus, name.

1 2 INTRODUCTION.

logue is somewhat repulsive to modem ears ; and this, which
was native to Theocritus, is borrowed, not always ^ correctly, by
his English imitator.

In 1590 appeared Sidne/s Arcadia^ one of the most beau-
tiful efforts of English fancy in that age — not exactly a pastoral,
since it has far less to do with shepherds than with courtiers
and knights, though the idea might have been suggested by the
popularity of the Diana of Montemayor, to which allusion has
been already made. In the preface of his edition of the Ar-
cadia (1867) Mr. Friswell says : ' The scene is laid in a fabulous
and semi-pagan Greece, where young people wander in woods,
kill lions and bears, fall in love, believe in Christianity and
heathen gods, wear armour like the Tudor knights, and fight
with Helots and Lacedaemonians, in a most confusing way.'
It would now, perhaps, be thought very tedious, but it is less
pedantic than most books of that time, and its popularity was
great in the days of Shakspere and for years afterwards
(Hallam, vol. ii. p. 216). Early in the seventeenth century
appeared the Faithful Shepherdess of Fletcher (the forerunner
of Comus)^ Browne's Britannia's Pastorals (16 13), also well
known to Milton, and the Sad Shepherd of Jonson.

Touching the influence of Spenser on succeeding poetry,
Professor Masson (vol. i. p. 410 folL) remarks that about 1630
there was ' a distinct Spenserian School,' partly of professed and
partly of unconscious disciples. As the poetry of Spenser is
* as nearly poetry in its essence as any that ever was,' a resem-
blance to him was thought a warrant of poetic quality. This
is seen in Chapman, Jonson, Drayton, and others, Shakspere
being an exception, sui generis^ and of no school. But there
were also those who purposely studied Spenser, made him their
avowed model, and cultivated his forms of poetry — the pastoral
and the descriptive allegory ; and among these W. Browne
and Giles and Phineas Fletcher stand most prominent.

• For the mistakes which Spenser by Skeat on the two concluding
has made as to the meaning of some eclogues of the ShcphearcPs Calendar,
of the old words he uses, see notes

INTRODUCTION.

13

Browne's Brit, Pastorals (1613-1616) are cast very closely
in pastoral form, and are a story of shepherds amid scenes of
Elnglish country life, full of luxuriant natural descriptions, with
only an occasional flight to higher subjects. Spenser is acknow-
ledged several times by name, but traces of other poets
(especially of Du Bartas ') may be discerned. The Shep-
, herd^s Pipe^ of seven eclogues (16 14), is a simpler poem, and
one of equal skill. Of Giles Fletcher there only remains
Chris fs Victory over Death (16 10), which is very Spenserian.
Phineas Fletcher's two great poems are the Piscatory Eclogues^
where fishermen take the place of shepherds, and the Purple
Island, a poem describing the anatomy of the human body
under an image indicated by that name. Both were published
at Cambridge soon after 1632.

The old criticisms on what the pastoral ought to be may be
divided into two classes, each of which failed, though in a dif-
ferent way, of hitting the mark. Those who insisted upon a
' golden age,* simple manners, mean sentiments, and the like,
confused the pastoral of real life, which had long ceased to
exist (if it ever did exist after Theocritus), with the changed
artificial growth which had sprung out of it. Those on the
other hand who avoided this particular mistake, but forbade
all allusions to politics or religion as foreign to the nature of the
pastoral, forgot that all pastoral poets after Virgil's time had
admitted such allusions, and by so doing had, as it were, legal-
ised them ; and these same critics fell into the totally distinct
error of allowing too wide a definition of this sort of poetry, as
if any rural poem whatever were ipso facto a pastoral. Having
briefly drawn this distinction, let us now examine by way of

* Sylvester translated the Divine
Weeks and Works of Du Bartas in
1605, which was very popular till
1650, but afterwards ceased to be
read. When Milton was a boy,
everybody was reading it. The first
part of the poem is called *The
First Week,' or * Birth of the
World,' and it is divided into seven

days or cantos. The Second Week
contains the Bible history as far as
the Kings and Chronicles, also
divided into days, each correspond-
ing to an epoch and headed with a
name (Adam, Noah, &c.). Four
days are complete ; the rest are un-
finished.

14 INTRODUCTION.

illustration a few of the opinions of successive critics, remarking
upon them as we proceed In the Preface to John Fletcher's
Faithful Shepherdess we read : ' A pastoral is a representative
of shepherds and shepherdesses with their actions and passions,
which must be such as may agree with their natures ; at least,
not exceeding former pictures and vulgar traditions. They are
not to be adorned with any art but such as nature is said to
bestow, such as singing and poetry, or such as experience may
teach them, as the virtues of herbs, &c'

Again, Drayton, in his Preface to the Pastorals^ observes :

* The subject of pastoral, as the language of it, ought to be poor,
silly, and of the coarsest woof in appearance, yet the highest and
noblest matters of the world may be shadowed forth in thenu
The chief law of pastoral is decorum^ and that not to be ex-
ceeded without leave, or, at least, fair warning.' Pope, in the
Introduction to his Pastorals (1704), gives a rhumk of the
opinions of preceding critics, the chief of which are that

* Pastoral is an image of the golden age,' so that ideal and not
actual shepherds have to be described. The principal points
to be observed are * simplicity, brevity, and delicacy.' * The
fable simple, the manners not too polite nor too rustic, the
thoughts plain — the expression humble, yet as pure as the
language will afford, neat but not florid, easy yet lively.' The
joyous side of shepherd life and not the miseries should be
shown. The Eclogues should be various, each having its own
particular beauties. In the Guardian (17 13) pastoral poetry
is spoken of as describing a state of early innocence and joy,

* where plenty begot pleasure, and pleasure begot singing, and
singing begot poetry, and poetry begot pleasure again.' Sim-
plicity must be pourtrayed, but troubles should be concealed,
except such small annoyances as merely set off the general
happiness of the state. The shepherds need not, however, be

* dull and stupid ;' they may have *good sense and even wit,
provided it be not too gallant and refined ;' but they must not
'make deep reflections,' which are to be left to the reader.
The reasons why we are pleased with pastoral are threefold —

INTRODUCTION. 15

* love of ease/ * approbation of innocence and simplicity,' and

* love of the country ;' and all these are natural to man. Theo-
critus is the great master of pastoral ; Virgil sacrifices simplicity
to nobleness and sublimity, and some of his Eclogues are not
properly pastorals at all. The Italians are * fond of surprising
conceits and far-fetched imaginations,' as is shown in Tasso's
Aminta and Guarini's Pastor Fido, ' The French are so far from
thinking abstrusely that they often seem not to think at all ; ' * they
fall into the manner of their country, which is gallantry,' and the
dresses and manners of their shepherds are like those of a court
and ball-room. The English have too servilely copied the Greek
and Roman pastorals ; Spenser and A. Philips have succeeded
best, since they have *not only copied but improved the
beauties of the ancients.' The manner of the ancients should
be followed, but deviations as to climate, customs, and the soil
and its products, are to be recommended. The theology of
the Pagan pastoral may be retained, where 'universally known;
and all else should be made up of our own rustical superstition
of fairies, goblins, &c. — since no man can be delighted with the
imitation of what he is ignorant of.' On April 27, 17 13
(Guardian^ No. 40), appeared a mock comparison of Philips's
with Pope's Pastorals^ really written by Pope himself, in which
he gave the palm of superiority to his own poems under pre-
tence of preferring those of his rival. The whole production is
ironical, and it ends by asserting of Pope's Pastorals that * they
are by no means pastorals, but something better.' Here we
must not omit to notice Gay's burlesque pastorals, entitled the
Shepherds Week^ both because many of his remarks, though
ironically uttered, really bear on the matter before us, and
because there has been from time to time so much ludicrous
misconception as to their object and character. We make the
foUomng extracts from the Proeme to the Shepherds Week^
which appeared in 17 14: 'Great marvel hath it been that in
this our island of Britain no poet hath hit on the right simple
eclogue after the true ancient guise of Theocritus before this
mine attempt . . . My love to my country much pricketh me

i6

INTRODUCTION.

forward to describe aright the manners of our own honest
ploughmen ; albeit not ignorant am I what a rout and rabble-
ment of critical gallimawfry hath been made by certain young
men concerning I wist not what Golden Age and other out-
rageous conceits to which they would confine pastoral. This
idle trumpery unto that ancient Doric shepherd Theocritus
was never known. It is therefore my purpose to set forth
before thee a picture of thy own country. . . . Thou wilt not
find my shepherdesses idly piping on oaten reeds, but milking
the kine, tying up the sheaves, &c. Spenser I must acknow-
ledge a bard of sweetest memorial ; yet hadi his shepherd's
boy at times raised his rustic reed to rhymes more rumbling
than rural. Diverse grave points hath he also handled of
churchly matter, to great clerks only appertaining. His names
[are] indeed right simple and meet for the country (Lobbin,
Cuddy, &c.), some of which I have made bold to borrow. . . .
The language of my shepherds is such as is neither spoken by
the country maiden nor the courtly dame, having too much of
the country to be fit for the court, too much of the court to be
fit fo" the country. . . . But here again much comfort ariseth
in me from the hopes that some lover of simpUcity shall arise
who shall render these mine eclogues into such more modem
dialect as shall be then understood.' ^

In the pieces which follow. Gay's object was to ridicule pas-
toral itself by presenting a homely and often coarse picture of
rustic life as a set-off against the * golden age ' view we have
mentioned ; and in doing so he claims simply to be going back
to Theocritus, the fountain-head of all bucolic poetry, who
was himself faithful to nature. Nor can it be denied that Gay

' Dr. Johnson {Life of Gay) says
that Pope ' is supposed to have
incited Gay to write the Shepherd* s
Week, to show that, if it be neces-
sary to copy nature with minute-
ness, rural life must be exhibited
such as grcssnessand ignorance have
made it. The Pastorals are intro-
duced by a i"roeme, written in imi-

tation of obsolete language. But
the effect of reality and truth be-
came conspicuous, even when the
intention was to show them grovel-
ling and degraded. These Pastorals
became popular, and were read with
delight by those who had no interest
in the rivalry of the poets, nor
knowledge of the critical dispute'

introduction: 17

does in this respect present us vnih a superficial copy of his
alleged model in almost everything but the ridiculous names
(Blowselinda, Bowsybaeus, &c.)he gives to some of his charac-
ters, which are not at all after the style of those adopted by
Theocritus, How then is it that Gay's pastorals are on the
whole an evident burlesque, while those of Theocritus are as
evidently real ? It cannot be merely a question of coarseness
as contrasted with refinement, for there are indecencies in some
of the Idylls to which no parallel can be found in the SA^-
herd's Week, As a poet of course Theocritus has the ad-
vantage ; but this does not make all the difference between
them. The solution seems to be in some way as fol-
lows. Both poets described actual facts of rural life and in
homely language ; but the kind of rural life Theocritus had to
describe was very different firom that which came under the
notice of Gay. * Thou wilt not find my shepherdesses idly
piping on oaten reeds, but milking the kine, tying sheaves,' &c.
Just so ; but the shepherds of Theocritus did pipe as well as
milk and bind sheaves ; and if they had not piped, or if no
shepherds had ever done so, the production which we call
Pastoral Poetry would never have existed. This does not con-
sist merely in a description of rustic manners.* To us it is
purely artificial, and has been so in all countries ever since Virgil's
time ; but to Theocritus and his contemporaries it was a reality
— ^a substantially correct reproduction of the doings, feelings,
occupations, and utterances of the Sicilian shepherds — and
afterwards but too often an ungainly mimicry of what once had

* From not observing this fact, From Truth and Nature shall we
Crabbe made the genuine mistake widely stray

embodied in the following lines from Where Virgil, not where Fancy,
his poem The Village (1783) : — leads the way?

•On Mincio's banks in Csesar's Yes, thus the Muses sing of happy

bounteous reign, ^ swams.

If Tityrus found the golden age Because the Muses never knew their

again,

pains

Must sleepy bards the flattering ' By such examples taught I paint

dreams prolong, ^"® ^^^

Mechanic echoes of the Mantuan As Truth will paint it, and as bards

spng?

will not/

i8

INTRODUCTION.

life and reality. The shepherd's pipe, which was at first real,
became afterwards a sham ; and the poetry met with much the
same fate. Owing to the nature of its climate and its manners,
England is not a country in which shepherds could practise
piping and singing like the Dorian swains ; and perhaps neither
the genius nor the language of the English race would ever have
fostered an3rthing like the true ancient pastoral amongst us.^

Of those critics, who fell into the error of identifying the
pastoral with rural poetry in general. Dr. Johnson may be
fairly taken as the representative. In the Rambler he remarks,
* The true definition of a pastoral is a poem in which any action
or passion is represented by its effects upon a country life, and
has nothing peculiar but its confinement to rural imagery, with-
out which it ceases to be pastoral.' Hence he thinks those
writers are wrong who insist upon a golden age, meanness of
sentiment and language, and confinement to persons of low
rank.^ Still the interest should be centred in rural life, and
therefore should not contain allusions to the Church or State,
or * lamentations on the death of some illustrious person, whom
when once the poet has called a shepherd he has no longer
any labour upon his hands, but can make the lilies wither and
the sheep hang their heads, without any art or learning, genius
or study.' On the misconception involved in refusing to admit
political allusions into the pastoral we have already remarked
(p- 13) \ t^at there is the essence of truth in the last quoted
sentence (minus the sarcasm) every reader will allow. We will
•close this part of our subject by citing a still more sarcastic

> * In England every poet who
has tried to play on the Doric pipe
has sounded a false note. There is
nothing in our damp island atmo-
sphere, or in our own character, to
fevour that easy, contented, grass-
hopper life which still marks the
peoples of the South.' — Quarterly
Review^ July 1873.

* He instances * the Dorick * of
Spenser's ^/ft^>ft^«nf J Calendar^ *a

mangled dialect which no human
being could ever have spoken,' and
quotes the opening of the 9th
Eclogue, —

* Diggon Davie I I bidde her god

daye;
Or Diggon her is, or I missaye, ' &c.

— which Pope affected to admire in
his ironical essay in the Guardian^
No. 40.

INTRODUCTION. 19

utterance of the same critic, in his life of A. Philips (1781),
which nevertheless gives us a perfectly true account of the
reasons why the writing of pastorals became so fashionable.
*At the revival of learning in Italy, it was soon discovered
that a dialogue of imaginary swains might be composed with
little difficulty; because the conversation of shepherds excludes
profound or refined sentiment, and for images and descriptions
satyrs, fauns, &c., were always within call ; and woods, rivers,
&c, supplied variety of matter, which having a natural power to
soothe the mind did not quickly cloy it' Add to this the well-
known charms of the country and its associations, and the
relief which these afford from the turmoils of life, to the
imagination at least, if not always in reality, and we shall cease
to wonder at the vitality of a species of composition which
held its ground for so many centuries, though it has now,
perhaps for ever, passed away.

Hence it will appear that even if Lyddas were a formally
cast Pastoral, ample license by precedents would be allowed
for the method in which Milton has treated his subject. We
are now in a position to consider a few of the criticisms which
have been passed upon the poem itself. That of Dr. Johnson
in his Lives of the Poets is the best known and the most
unfavourable of all. In his Life of Milton he writes : — * The
diction is harsh, the rhymes uncertain, and the numbers un-

pleasing not the effusion of real passion,

which runs not after remote allusions and obscure opinions.

Where there is leisure for fiction there is little

grief. No nature, for there is no truth; no

art, for there is nothing new. Its form is pastoral, easy, vulgar,

and therefore disgusting. When Cowley tells

Hervey that they studied together, it is easy to suppose how
much he must miss the companion of his labours; but what
image of tenderness can be excited by these lines : " We drove

afield, &c."? Though the representation

may be allegorical, the true meaning is so uncertain and
remote that it is never sought, because it cannot be known

c 2

20 INTRODUCTION.

when it is found Among the flocks, &c., appear the heathen
deities, Jove, &c. He who thus grieves will excite no sym-
pathy ; he who thus praises will confer no honour/ Again —
'With these trifling fictions are mingled the most awful and

sacred truths The shepherd is now a feeder of

sheep, and afterwards a superintendent of a Christian flock —
an approach to impiety of which, however, I believe the writer

not to have been conscious No man could

have fancied that he read Lycidas with pleasure had he not
known the author.' It should in the first place be understood
that in Milton'^ day English poetry had not 6een brought
under the kind of criticism to which it has since been sub-
jected, and that therefore we must view the Lycidas in relation
to its age. But whatever incongruities a harsh and prosaic
test may elicit, other critics even of Dr. Johnson's own time
have held very different opinions respecting the melody, ten-
derness, and grandeur of this charming poem.* Thyer (1785)
observes that * what gives the greatest grace to the whole poem
is the natural and agreeable wildness and irregularity which
runs through it, than which nothing could be better suited to
express the affection which Milton had for his fiiend. Grief
is eloquent, but not formal.' Hurd, though he sees ' no extra-
ordinary wildness and irregularity in the conduct of this little
poem,' remarks, ' There is a very original air in it, owing not
to disorder in the plan, but to the variety of the metre. Milton's
ear was a good second to his imagination.' On Johnson's com-
parison of Lycidas with Cowle/s Elegy ^ Scott (Critical Essays y
1785) says, * Cowley speaks of Hervey in propria persona i
Milton is pro tern, a rustic poet* Hence the images of the one
are drawn from the study, those of the other from the field.
* Whatever pathos there is in either results from the recollection
of friendship terminated by death.' The comparison of Milton
with Cowley is about as unfortunate as any that could have

* See collection of criticisms in touching the alleged insincerity of
the editions of Warton and Todd. Milton's sorrow is given further on
The answer of Professor Masson (p. 30).

INTRODUCTION, 21

been made, either as regards true feeling or true poetry. The
reader may judge for himself by contrasting the following
extract from the elegy on the Death of Hervey with any corre-
sponding passage in Lycidas he may choose to select :—

Ye fields of Cambridge, our dear Cambridge, say,
Have ye not seen us walking every day f
Was there a tree about, which did not know

The love betwixt us two ?
Henceforth, ye gentle trees, for ever fade,

Or your sad branches thicker join,

And into darksome shades combine.
Dark as the grave wherein my friend is laid.

Or again —

Wondrous young man, why wert thou made so good
To be snatched hence, ere better understood? &c. &c.

But enough of this. We know that Dr. Johnson had no
genuine appreciation of poetry ; yet his shrewd intelligence
and the soundness of his judgment on most literary points
might have enabled him to write a fairer critique of Milton's
early poems, had not the marked opposition of his religious and
political principles to those of our author prejudiced his mind
against the man, and thus prevented his forming an impartial
estimate of the/t?^, even where the conflict of their respective
opinions was not concerned. Hallam notes it as remarkable
that Johnson had before 'selected Viigil's loth Eclogue for
peculiar praise, which belongs to the same-class of allegory and
requires the same sacrifice of reasoning.' As to the second
objection, it may be urged that though Milton has brought
together in the same poem heathen and Christian images, he
has not grouped them confusedly together, nor united them in
action, but dealt with them in proper succession. The passage
which treats of the corruption of the clergy in Lycidas is as
completely isolated as that about the Syrian shepherdess in the
Epitaph on the Marchioness of Winchester, So in the Nativity
Hymn the epithet * Great Pan ' is applied to the new-bom child,

32 INTRODUCTION.

just as our Lord is spoken of as * Pan/ in Spenser*s 5th and
7 th eclogues — the sense in which the early Church loved to
express such words as those of St. John x. li, when on the
walls of the catacombs the first Christians pictiu-ed the Good
Shepherd. The mingling of sacred and profane allusions
appears in a more glaring form in such passages as Spenser,
F, Q. I. X. 53, where Mount Sinai and the Mount of Olives
are placed with Mount Parnassus ; or in Surrey's Translation
of iEneid IV., where we have ' holy water stocks ' in Dido's
temple, and * mm * commonly used of a pagan priestess (cf.
Drayton, Eel. 5, * Diana's nuns ') ; and Shakspere's Midsummer
Nighfs Dream, i. i, where ' nun ' and ' cloister* are mentioned
along with Diana, Venus, &c. ' Church ' is used of heathen
temples (cf. Acts xix. 37), e.g. 'Church of Jove' in Marlowe's
Lucan, and 'Church of Pallas* in Chaucer, who also calls
Amphiaraus, priest of Apollo, a * bishop.' It is therefore unfair
to say that Milton is alone and conspicuous in these irregulari-
ties. The early Italian poetry also affords frequent instances
of the intrusion of strictures on the clergy; the introduction
of St Peter in company with Triton and Neptune reminds us
of Dante's making Cato Uticensis porter of Purgatory, and the
excuse which has been offered for the one poet may fairly
enough be urged for the other — ' Per veritk h un gran capriccio,
ma in ci6 segue suo stile.' ^

The Lycidas may therefore be described as an allegoric
pastoral representing College life and friendship, and is cast
mainly in the form of Greek and Latin pastorals, though the
scenery is transferred to the British isles. Nowhere is the
student brought in as such ; nor is the pastoral disguise ever
dropped, except in the digression upon Fame and in the isolated
passage about the clergy where another kind of shepherd ap-
pears upon the scene. Virgil's loth Eclogue is in most points
similar, even including those* few lines (44-49) ^^ which he
describes Gallus as an actual soldier of the camp in Italy,

* See Neve*s Cursory Remarks on some English Poets (1789).

INTRODUCTION. 23

There is really the same confusion in LycidaSy though its cir-
cumstances are not quite so incongruous. Lycidas, as a shep-
herd, had no more to do with a shipwreck than Callus, as a
shepherd, with the army; but in the former instance the
pastoral fiction passes more easily into the actual circumstances
of King's death than in the case of Callus. The allegory
proper extends only to King's life and to Milton's connection
with him, while the catastrophe is given as it actually occurred.
So in Virgil Lycoris is not represented as an actual shepherdess,
but is supposed to have literally gone away to the Alps with a
rival. What gives Milton more license in his treatment is the
iasX that Lycidas is not an avowed pastoral, forming one of a
series of the same kind ; whereas Virgil's loth Eclogue does
occur in such a connection and cannot well be separated from
the rest Virgil was ostensibly engaged in pastoral compositions
and introduced the story of Callus among them ; Milton how-
ever not being previously thus occupied, but starting with a
desire to celebrate his lost friend's memory, availed himself of a
form of poetry which was at the time most in vogue. The
opening lines ^ show that Milton had not meant to write verse
again until he had attained the full maturity of that poetic power
which he had long felt within him ; yet the tribute due to his
deceased friend overcame this resolution, and thus the expres-
sion of his grief is the pervading thought of the whole. It may
even be that the fact of King's having been intended for holy
orders was the starting point whence sprang those well-known
lines on the English clergy which eventually became the most
significant part of the poem, and the heading added in 1645
is an express intimation that Milton intended to give special
prominence to lines which were originally suggested by his im-
mediate subject, and in fact only came in by way of digression.
There are two such digressions in Lycidas (see notes on //.
85 and 132) — one on Fame, the other on the corruptions of
the clergy. Touching the first, the consideration of a hfe

> See note on * Once more,' /. i.

24

INTRODUCTION.

of youthful promise, so suddenly cut short, leads to the reflec-
tion that after all there may be no use in human laboiu: and
striving after fame ; but he turns from all this to the lofty truth,
that the power of faultless discernment and the final meed
of fame are in the hands of an all-wise and supreme Judge.
Here Milton has lighted upon a grand fact of humanity which
cannot be better expressed than in the words of a recent
writer in the Contemporary Review (April 1872): — 'The
desire for fame is thp craving to be judged fairly ... an
universal instinct of mankind. Man has a right to a just
judgment, which is to be welcomed as a privilege. . • ,
Real reputation is the reflection of the glory of God upon
the lives of men ; but when men feel they are not appreciated,
they make their appeal to another life, and claim to stand
before the eternal judgment-seat'

The second digression is probably his first definite expression
of feeling on Church matters, not as yet decidedly anti-episco-
palian. He simply laments the state of things existing ; but it
was not till 1641 that he directly ascribed it to the influence of
prelacy (Reason of Church Government), The papists ceased
to be troublesome after the death of Mary of Scotland (1587),
and the defeat of the Spanish Armada (1588); but now the
ultra-Protestant party ^ began to desire an advanced reformation,
having already (1563) attacked the vestments and ceremonies
of the Reformed Church. Episcopacy was struck at on the
ground of not being expressly ordered in Scripture, while
government by elders was held to be divinely appointed.^ In
1593 an Act was passed against Romanists and Puritans equally,
for non-acceptance of the Liturgy was made equivalent to

* Walton [Life of Hooker) notices
three parties then in England : * the
active Romanists, the restless Non-
conformists, and the passive, peace-
able Protestants.* The first lost
power after the death of Mary ; and
the second he charges with * an innate
restless pride and malice — opposition

to the government and especially to
the bishops.'

* On this point see remarks of
Mr. M. Arnold, in the Cornhill
Magazine for Feb. 1870, on the
difference between the Puritan theory
and that of the Established Churches
upon Church Government.

INTRODUCTION. 25

disloyalty. This identification by statute soon led to some
disaffection, though in Elizabeth's reign the political side of
Puritanism did not strongly appear, as all parties felt that their
strength was bound up with the safety of her person and her
throne.^ But the character of James I. secured no such
esteem; and the Puritans began to assume a more decide4
antagonism, both political and religious. The Hampton Court
Conference (1604) was on the whole unfavourable to their
party ; the doctrine of the di\dne right of kings was gratifying
to James, and the two maxims — Le roy ^avisera^ and No bishop^
no king— went together. The Millenary Petition was rejected|
and the 141 Canons* enforced conformity with great rigour.
The 'King's Letters* of 1623, for restraining extravagant
preaching on both sides, fell perhaps more heavily on the Puri*
tans, with whom a lengthy exposition of doctrine was a sine
qua non, than on the Prelatists who made this a matter of less
vital importance, and who were, moreover, content that cate^
chising on the Sunday afternoons should take the place of
sermons (see note on /. 125). Charles I. (1625) united the
pretensions of absolute monarchy with those of a powerful
hierarchy, and thus Crown and Church were opposed to
People and Puritans. Church and State questions were more
closely related than ever ; and the influence, first of Bucking*-
ham, and then of Strafford and Laud, tended to the same
result. The Star Chamber and High Commission Courts went
hand in haiid ; and the resistance of Hampden to an unjust
impost was almost coincident with the outcry against the new
Liturgy in Scotland. On March 10, 1629, Charles dissolved the
parliament, and seemed intent on ruling without one. Now
the struggle began in earnest. For some time there had been
* an anti-Calvinistic spirit in the English Church, which was
now spreading among the yoimger clergy * (see Masson's Life of

* See Macaulay, Hist, of England, nods, Episcopacy, Established Order
vol, I. ch. i. ' of Services, and condemn all im-

* The Canons assert Royal Su- pugners of Church order and disci-
premacy, Authority pf Church Sy- pline as hereby established.

26 INTRODUCTION.

Milton^ i. p. 309, and also the account of the consecration of
St. Katharine Cree Church in Fuller). Laud was Bishop of
London, and virtually Primate ; the death of Buckingham had
given him paramount influence with the king, and the patron-
age of Church benefices was largely in his hands. He was a
man of small intellect, but of great tenacity of purpose ; and
'his nature if not great was very tight' (Masson, L p. 361),
All his views centred in divine right of bishops and uniformity
in the Church ; and he was of opinion that * unity cannot
long continue in the Church when uniformity is shut out at
the church-door ' (Laud's Diary). In 1633 the period of
* Thorough ' began ; Wentworth ruled despotically in Ireland,
Laud was made Primate, great strictness of Church discipline
was enforced, and Prynne was imprisoned for his HistriomaS'
fix. In 1637 Prynne, Burton, and Bastwick were pilloried,
the question of ship-money was decided against Hampden
(June 12), a placard designating Laud * the arch- wolf of Can-
terbury ' was posted at Cheapside,^ and Williams, Bishop of
Lincoln, a friend of the Puritans, was imprisoned (July 11) for
alleged libel. On July 23 a tumult arose in Edinburgh about
the New Liturgy, and issued in the signing of the Solemn League
und Covenant (Feb. 28 or March i, 1638), which lasted for
many weeks. Then the Scotch bishops were deposed, and the
Covenanters prepared for war.

As to Milton's own religious sentiments, we know that from
his father he inherited strict Puritan principles, yet accompanied
with refined aesthetic tastes. His early surroundings were
Puritan, and Richard Stock, ' a zealous Puritan,' was pastor of
the parish in which he lived. The time of his birth (1608) was
that in which the Puritan party was gaining strength, though
still in the minority. His early training was under his father
(cf. Epist ad Fatrbm), who doubtless exercised much influence
upon his opinions. Next he was under the care of Young, a
Piiritan minister (Ep, Fam, i. El. 4), and afterwards at St

' See beginning of Appendix II.

INTRODUCTION.

27

Paul's School, under the two Gills {Ep, Fam, 2, 3, 5). His
reading was very wide, including, besides the classics, French,
Italian, Hebrew, and the mass of English literature then exist-
ing.^ His early versions of Psalms cxiv. and cxxxvi. show
extensive reading. In February 1625 he entered Cambridge,
where there was a strong Puritan element, Dr. Preston of
Emanuel being the leader. Christ's College was less impreg-
nated with these principles, and Chappell himself was in Laud's
interest, who afterwards made him Bishop of Cork. The Latin
elegies on Bishops Andrewes and Felton (1626) show that
Milton was not then an anti-Prelatist, and the Ode in Quintum
Novembris of the same year is laudatory of the * pious James/
In 1627 his Elegy to Young, who had fled to Hamburg probably
because of his non-conformity, expresses affection for him and
S3nnpathy with his doctrines. In July 1628 he writes to
A. Gill, deploring the ignorance of the clergy \ and in the same
year he wrote the Academic Prolusion on * the compatibility of
sportive exercise with the study of philosophy' (Masson, i. p. 250
foil.), which contains specimens of outrageous license and
even of coarse obscenity, for which, however, he apologises on
the ground of long-standing custom. He there designates the
students generally as * calf-heads,' *rams,' * Irish birds,' &c. &c.,
and by other titles quite unmentionable ; all which shows that
he could at times throw off his habitual seriousness. The
general idea we gather of Milton's University life is that he
was serious and earnest, reading with unusual vigour, but, being
thrown among companions for the most part uncongenial, he
had little affection for the place.* In the ApoL Smect (1642)

* The chief authors Milton pro-
bably read are — Chaucer (ending
1400), Lydgate, Ascham, Skelton,
Surrey, Wyatt, &c. ( 1 400- 1 5 80) ;
and the Elizabethans (15S0-1625)
Sidney, Hooker, Raleigh, Bacon,
Spenser, Sackville, Daniel, Dray-
ton, Chapman, Sylvester's Du
BartaSj Donne, Davies, the two
Fletchers, Wither, Carew, Browne,

Greene, Marlowe, Shakspere, Hey-
wood, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and
Fletcher, Massinger and Ford.

' See 1st Elegy (to Diodati) :
* Quam male Phoebicolis convenit
ille locus ; ' also in his letter to GiU
(1624) he writes: *Atque ego pro-
fecto cum nullos fere studiarum con-
sortes hie reperianiy Londinum recta
respicerem, nisi per justitium hoc

i88 INTRODUCTION.

he says of the University — * In the time of her better health
and mine own younger judgment I never greatly admired (her),
so now much less.'

In 1629 he took his B.A., and subscribed the Articles (a
ceremony which he repeated in 1632 on taking his M.A.) ; and
in the same year he wrote his 6th Elegy to Diodati, in praise of
wine and mirth, though he says that the higher poesy demands
pure life and spare living. The Nativity Ode contains a
decided opinion in favour of Church music, and this is ex-
pressed again in the ode At a Solemn Musick and towards the
end of the Fenseroso j but in the later treatise on Christian
Doctrine^ bk. ^ii. c. 4, he inveighs against all external worship,
quoting Amos vi. 5, 'Woe to them,., that chaunt to the sound
of the viol,' &c.

In a letter to a friend, December 163 1, inclosing the 7th
sonnet, he declares his unwillingness to take holy orders, chiefly
on the ground of unfitness ; but in the Reason of Church
Government (1641) he stated his objections more clearly thus—
f I thought it better to prefer a blameless silence before the
sacred office of speaking, bought and begun with servitude and
forswearing.' L Allegro and // Fefiseroso, written in or near
1632, are both far from Puritanical — the one being a joyous
outburst of mirth and fancy, free from the least sensuous taint,
and the other expressing the melancholy of a studious mood
without sourness or austerity. The Masques of Arcades and
Comus (1634) represent a kind of amusement which he after-
wards, in his Free Commonwealth^ disapproved because of its
licentiousness. But Comus is itself a protest against this very
thing, and thereby, instead of inveighing at the immorality of
the stage after the usual Puritanical manner, he showed practi*
cally how to turn such things to good account.

By birth and education then Milton was in every respect ^
Puritan, notwithstanding his classical learning and his genuine

sestivum (the Long Vacation) in tarem, et quasi claustris musaninL
otium alte literarium recedere cogi- delitescere,' (See note on /. 34.)

INTRODUCTION, 29

love for the beautiful. He was a man of few convictions, but
these were strong and lasting, the uppermost feeling of his
mind being that a ceaseless and determined struggle must be
maintained against the evil that is in the world. In both his
prose and his poetry /ilferfy stands forth as the ideal ; and this
yearning after freedom fostered in him a resolute dislike of that
religious and civil formality, which had displaced the healthy
and genial life of the preceding Elizabethan times. Moreover
the impulse of an indwelling poetic life, and an exalted idea of
human duties and responsibilities, * as ever underneath the great
Taskmaster's eye,' would often bear him beyond the narrow range
of party conflict. His mission was to be a poet first, and a
statesman or theologian afterwards. He had also a power of
foresight and of self-discipline, which imparted a kind of set
purpose to all his works, and caused an absence of those
* strains of unpremeditated art,' which he was himself foremost
to appreciate in Shakspere.* All along he seems to have con-
sciously nursed his inborn powers, unwilling before the full
growth of his genius to begin the lofty poetic task of which he
felt himself capable, ' though of highest hope and hardest
attempting.'

It may be that the self-consciousness of the student ever
accompanying the poet in Milton has produced an artificial
semblance in some of his poetry which may reasonably lead to
the question — * How far is Lycidas an expression of genuine
sorrow ? '

In reply to Dr. Johnson's coarse criticism, that it is * not the
effusion of real passion, which runs not after remote allusions
and obscure opinions,' that ' where there is leisure for fiction
there is little grief,' that * there is no nature, for there is no
truth,' and that * no image of tenderness can be excited by the
lines "we drove afield,'" &c. — the opinions of some other
critics have already been quoted,* to which may be added

' V Allegro J 133 — Warble his native wood-notes

*And sweetest Shakspere, Fancy's wild.'

child, ' See p. 20.

30 INTRODUCTION.

Hallam's remark {Hist of Eng, Lit vol. iii. p. 46), that * it has
been said fairly that Lycidas is a good test of real feeling in
poetry.' But no better or more comprehensive answer could
be given than the following, which we take the liberty of
quoting from Masson*s Life of Milton^ vol. ii. p. 84 : It is * a
finer monument to the memory of King — to let the fact of his
death originate a whole mood of the poet's mind — than if he
had merely registered the fact in a lyric of direct regret So
poets honour the dead : they let his image intertwine itself with
all else that arises in their minds \ and out of the best choosing
still the best, they lay that on the tomb, saying, " This belongs
to you'^ * * Yet Dr. Johnson, notwithstanding his prejudice,
forgot certain facts which he might with a little ingenuity have
pressed into his service. First, we know nothing whatever of
Milton's relations with Edward King, except what we gather
from this poem. There is no mention of any kind of associa-
tion between them during their college career. Secondly, we
do know that King gained the fellowship over Milton's head ;
and thirdly, Milton does not notice King's death to Diodati,
though writing only a month afterwards. As to the disappoint-
ment about the fellowship, we have no right to suppose that it
led to any coldness between the two fiiends, and it would not
have been like Milton to allow this. The first and third points
are purely negative, so that after all we must look to the
Lycidas to speak for itself. The mere form of the poem can
prove nothing against the genuineness of Milton's regret, for
grief, like all deep feeling, will reflect the tendency or mental
habit of the patient. Thus Cicero philosophised grief when
his daughter died; and Marmontel, the dramatist, wrote the
play of Penelope on the death of his child ; to which we may
add the example of our own poet laureate in his exquisite In

" Of the Lycidas it may be truly are shed with artistic precision and

said (to use the language of one of griefs meted out in strict accordance

our public journals), that it is not to with the canons of the schools.* —

be classed among * the coldly- correct Daily Telegraphy on death of Charles

Jeremiads, in which at the grave of Dickens, June 20, 1870.
acadeinical renown rhetorical tears

INTRODUCTION. 31

Memoriam, It was, therefore, only natural that Milton should
give vent to his grief in verse, and in that kind of verse which
was then most usual on such occasions. But we must be care*
fill lest the pathos and intrinsic beauty of much of the poem
should lead us into an exaggerated idea of the extent of his
sorrow. We may safely conclude with Professor Masson that
King was really a friend, but not the friend of his youth. For
both the evidence of Milton's correspondence with Diodati,
and the intense and passionate grief of some portions of the
JSpitaphium Datnonis^ prove that he and not King was deepest
in his affections. Yet the elegy in which he laments the loss
of Diodati is a pastoral, cast in a form more artificial than even
the Lyddasy and written not in English but in l^tin. We will
now proceed to give some account of this other poem.

The subject of it, Charles Diodati (see the Argument), was
bom in 1608, and was therefore about the same age as Milton.
His father, Theodore Diodati, was an Italian by descent, but
married an English lady of good fortune, and was appointed
physician to Prince Henry and the Princess Elizabeth, afterwards
Queen of Bohemia : his uncle, Giovanni Diodati, was the author
of the Italian translation of the Bible, known by his name. He
formed a close intimacy with Milton at St PauFs School, which
he left in 162 1 for Trinity College, Oxford, where Alexander
Gill, son of the head-master of St. Paul's, had also been
educated. The friendship between the two young men con-
tinued throughout their university career, though they could
only meet in London during the vacations, and correspond by
letters at other times. Two of Diodati's epistles are extant,
"written in Greek, probably in 1625 and 1626, and bearing the
headings QtoaloroQ MiXro/vi ivt^lvtaQai and \aipkiv respect-
ively. The first name is, of course, a literal rendering of the
Italian Dia-ddiiy * God-given' (see note on Epit, Dam, 210).
To this letter Milton appears to have replied in the elegiac
poem which stands first in the collection entitled Elegiarum
Liber y the third line of which shows that his friend was then
residing in Cheshire, somewhere on the banks of the Dee^

32 INTRODUCTION.

From the heading prefixed to the 6th elegy of the same series
we learn that Diodati had on Dec. 15, 1629, sent Milton a
copy of verses, describing the Christmas festivities he was then
enjoying, and pleading these by way of excuse if his poetry
were found to be * less good than usual * (* sua carmina excusari
postulasset, si solito minus essent bona '). Milton's answer is
that conviviality and poetry, ' Bacchus and the Muse,' are not
hostile to one another, but go well in company ; only that he
who would sing of high and holy themes, * of heaven and pious
heroes and leaders half divine' — he must live soberly and
severely, with chaste morals and stainless hands. The elegy
concludes with a mention of the Hymn on Christ's Nativity,
upon which the poet was at that time engaged, and which he
promises to submit to his friend for criticism (see on EpiU
Dam, 180).

After this we have no more direct information about Diodati
until Sept. 2, 1637, when Milton addressed to him a Latin
epistle, complaining of his long silence, and expressing a hope
that they might shortly meet in London. From this and the
following letter (dated Sept 23 of the same year) we gather
that Diodati was now in full medical practice, probably in
Cheshire, — * among the Hyperboreans,* as Milton jocosely
terms the natives of those parts, — that he made occasional
journeys for visiting and recreation, and that he had a regular
lodging in town, where Milton once expected to find him, but
was disappointed. Part of the second letter will presently be
quoted (in translation) in the note on /. 150 of the Epitaphium\
and towards the end of it Milton intimates his intention of
taking chambers in one of the Inns of Court for the purpose of
study ; but this plan appears to have been abandoned in favour
of the continental tour which took place early in the following
year (Masson, vol. i p. 601). It was during this journey (in
the summer or autumn of 1638) that Diodati died suddenly.
The place and circumstances of his death are alike imcertain ;
but we know that the sad news did not reach Milton till some
time afterwards, as the third Italian sonnet (beginning Diodati^

INTRODUCTION. 33

€ te'l dirb con maravtglia) must have been addressed to his
friend from Italy about, or more probably after, the actual time
of his decease (ib. p. .775). Prof. Masson argues very
plausibly that Milton heard the tidings first from John Diodati,
Theological Professor at Geneva, with whom he was staying in
June 1639, on his way back to England. But however this
may have been, we are sure that grief for the loss of so dear a
friend possessed the poet's mind to the temporary exclusion
even of those political anxieties which had been the cause of
his sudden return. Of this we have evidence not only in the
Epitaphium Damonis itself, which, notwithstanding its artificial
form and its pastoral conceits, is as true an outburst of the
bitterest sorrow as anything of the kind we know, but also in
Milton's own words forming part of a letter in 1647 to Carlo
Dati, one of his former friends at Florence {Epit. Dam, 137).
After recalling the recollection of their former intimacy, and
assuring Dati of his continued affection, he suddenly refers to
the memory of the deceased Diodati, and to the grief he had
felt at his death, which only the thought of the unmixed joy he
had tasted in the society of his Florentine companions could in
any way alleviate. We give the extract : — * Testor ilium mihi
semper sacrum et solenne futurum Damonis tumulum, in cujus
funere omando cum luctu et moerore oppressus, ad ea quae
potui solatia confugere cupiebam, non aliud mihi quicquam
jucundius occurrit quam vestrum omnium gratissimam mihi
memoriam revocasse. Id quod ipse jamdiu legisse debes,
siquidem ad vos illud carmen pervenit, quod ex te nunc primum
audio.' The * carmen ' referred to is in fact the Epitaphium
Damonis y a copy of which Milton had sent to Dati as a token
of his regard, on account of his name being mentioned therein
(137 1. c).

Of the poem itself we have already spoken incidentally in.
our observations on the Lycidas^ and much of what has been
said of the one applies with equal force to the other. It is,
however, more of a direct and avowed pastoral, and was evi-
dently suggested by the 'ETrirrf^wc B/wyov of Moschus, whence its

D

34 INTRODUCTION.

title is taken. We have had occasion to mention and partly to
examine that poem as a specimen of Greek pastoral (see p. 5),
and we then noticed how the real circumstances of the life and
death of Bion appear from time to time through the veil of
allegory imder which the poet has chosen to disguise his per-
sonality. The same fact is observable in several passages of
Milton's Epitaphiuniy in which the poet's actual self is blended
with the character of the ideal Thyrsis, and the person of the
real Diodati with that of the shepherd Damon. Nor is this
surprising ; the image of his lost firiend was too vividly im-
pressed upon Milton's soul, and his grief (like that of Moschus
for Bion) too sincere to allow him to sustain with absolute con-
tinuity his assumed disguise, which, be it remembered, he had
adopted merely in deference to the then prevailing fashion, and
would not, even on purely critical grounds, have felt himself
bound to keep with undeviating precision. Yet he never allows
this liberty to degenerate into a license : the strain of the poem
is pastoral throughout — far more so than in the case of the
LycidaSy whose variations and digressions have already been
discussed in detail. It is this very freedom of treatment which
gives the Epitaphium Danwnis its real value and interest, claim-
ing for it recognition as a record of one period in the life of a
great and distinguished man, about which we should otherwise
have had but scanty information. The following remarks by
Warton, in answer to some rather disparaging criticism of Dr.
Johnson on this poem, are very much to the point : * The pas-
toral form is a fault of the poet's times.' The poem * contains
some passages which wander far beyond the bounds of buco-
lick song, and are in his own original style of the more sublime
poetry. Milton cannot be a shepherd long. His native powers
often break forth, and cannot bear the assumed disguise.' We
subjoin a list of those passages, in which the pastoral allegory
is for the moment abandoned.

In /. 13, Thyrsis is described as sojourning Tusca in urbe^
Le. at Florence, where Milton was actually staying at the time
for literary purposes— *animi causa' as the Argument expresses

INTRODUCTION. 35

k. As a shepherd he would have no business there, so far
away from home and for such an object

Z/. 46-49 may be applied either way, but seem to convey
the idea of a student's rather than of a shepherd's fireside.

The * Attic salt ' of /. 56 admits of only one application.

LI. 1 13 foil, describe Milton's actual journey to Italy, which
has nothing to do with his assumed pastoral character. (Com-
pare the parallel instance of Callus, in Virgil's loth Eclogue,
see p. 23 of this Introduction.)

In //. 126-138 the accidental circumstance of Diodati's
Tuscan origin is mentioned in the middle of an imaginary
description of Tuscan swains, among whom the actual names
of Dati and Francini occur, not under a classical designation
(like Lycidas and Menalcas, /. 132), but just slightly Latin-
ised

Z/. 162-178. Here the poet is confused with the shepherd
— the intention of the real Milton to write a real British epic
being stated partly in plain language, partly under a pastoral
figure (i 68-1 71).

Z. 181. The name of Manso, Milton's Neapolitan host, is
introduced with scarcely any disguise, and the description of
the chased goblets which follows, though probably real (see
note ad /oc), is at any rate not drawn from the circumstances of
bucolic life.

Z/. 209-219. The pastoral imagery now entirely disap-
pears ; the name Diodatus is substituted for that of Damon,
and his present state of bliss among the saints in heaven is
described in Scriptural language, which is in the last line
curiously varied by a Pagan but not distinctively pastoral
metaphor — * bacchantur ' — * orgia ' — * thyrso.'

The scene is laid in England, as appears from the mention

of the Chelmer (/. 90 note) and of the Colne (/. 149), but the

associations are necessarily classical, owing to the form in which

the poem is cast Those who adopt what we have endeavoured

to represent as the right view of the requirements of a modem

pastoral will not blame Milton for this, but will transfer their

D 2

36 INTRODUCTION.

censure to the Roman poet, who by blending Sicilian with
Italian scenery originated the confusion. Still the introduction
of lions and wolves in //. 41, 42 would better have been
avoided, though a similar mistake is made by Virgil in his 5th
Eclogue (/. 26) without equal excuse for it.

The Epitaphium Damonis has been rendered into English
by Symmons (about 1804) in the Life of Milton appended to
his edition of the Prose Works ; also by Langhome (1760), as
far as /. 138 ; and again by Cowper. A new translation into
English hexameters is given by Professor Masson, in the second
volume of his Life of Milton^ which, by the courtesy of the
author, I am enabled to reprint entire.

Of detached pieces of criticism on the Lycidas the follow-
ing are given by Todd in his edition of Milton's poetical
works : —

1. Peck's Explanatory and Critical Notes^ &'c,y printed with
his New Memoirs of Milton (1740).

2. Remarks in Dr. Johnson's Lives of the Poets (Life of
Milton) (1781).

3. Critical Essay on Lycidas by John Scott (1785).

4. Cursory Remarks on some ancient English Poets , particularly
Miltony by P. Neve (1789). To these we need only add the
complete account and examination of this poem and the
Epitaphium Damonis in vols. i. and ii. of Professor Masson's
Life of Milton (1859 and 1871).

The Lycidcts was translated into I^tin by William Hogg
(Hogseus) in 1694, and into Greek by Plumptre, Canon of
Worcester, in 1797. Both these translations have been made
use of in the notes to this edition ; the former is reprinted
at the end of the volume.

As might be expected, the poem has found many imitators.
The first * imitations, or rather op^n plagiarisms from Milton '
(as Warton says), were made in 1647 by Robert Baron in a
poetical romance, entitled the Cyprian Academy (see Todd,
Appendix to vol. vi.). Into this he transferred whole lines
and phrases from nearly all Milton's early poems, th6n lately

INTRODUCTION. 37

published ; and from Lyddas was borrowed the greater part of
the floral description in //. 135-151. Samuel Boyse, in his
Vision of Patience (1741), laments the death of a Mr. Gumming,
lost at sea, under the name ' Lycidas,' but does not otherwise
imitate Milton's monody. In 1760 Robert Lloyd published
tfie Tears and Triumph of Parnassus^ containing an ode on the
death of the king (George II.), in which occur the lines we have
quoted on /. 75, beginning, 'Where were the Muses,' &c. In
the same note reference is made to a similar passage from Lord
L)rttleton's monody on the death of his wife. Michael Bruce,
in Daphnis (a monody on Mr. Amot), has these lines : —

So may I snatch his lays, who to the lyre
Wailed his lost Lycidas by wood and rill, &c. ;

and further on —

Where were the Muses ^ when the leaden hand
Of death remorseless closed your Daphnis' eyes ?

Fair was thy thread of life,
But quickly by the envious sisters shorn j
So Daphnis died, long ere his prime he fell,
Nor left he on these plains a peer behind.

The metre is arranged in long and short lines at irregular
intervals, like those in the Lycidas. We may also notice a
monody on the death of Queen Adelaide by Julian Fane,
among the Cambridge Prize Poems for 1850, which is closely
modelled (as the heading intimates) upon that of Milton. A
few extracts are subjoined as examples of the imitation : —

For she no more upon the dawning day

Listening their joyous lay,
Shall bend her wistful eyes for ever closed ....
Where were ye nymphs upon that fatal mom ? . . . .
Alc^y what boots it to enquire your place ?
For what could ye have done .?....
Last reverend Camus, as he footed slow, &c.

Besides these and more of the same kind, we have detached

38 INTRODUCTION,

expressions undique decerpta^ such as ' melt with ruth,' * but not
the wise/ &c. (speaking of Care tormenting the great and
proud), * hence with the blazing clarion of renown* (cf. Lye. i8,
and for the sentiment 76 foil.), &c The monody ends with
an apotheosis of the queen which nearly resembles that of
Lycidas — * Cease, Albion, cease to weep,' * She shall arise,' &c.,
* Now Albion weeps no more,* &c The latest reminiscence
appears in the London Lyrics by Mr. Locker (1872): —

And still the woodland rings, and stiU
The old Damoetas listens —

speaking of the youthful glow of life as compared to a laughing
leaping rill.

Among the various editions of Milton*s poems, which in-
clude the Lycidas^ we select the following :

1. The Cambridge Verses of 1638, already referred to
(p. 2). The English poems succeed the Latin, and are sepa-
rately entitled Obsequies to the Memorie of Mr, Edward King^
Anno Domini 1638.* The Lycidas is dated J. M., November
1637, in the MS. preserved in the library of Trinity College,
Cambridge. It has no tide in this first edition.

2. Poems of Mr. John Milton, both English and Latin,
composed at several times, collected and republished in 1645.
Here the heading, * In this Monody,* &c, is for the first time
prefixed.

3. Poems, &'C,, upon severed Occasions (1673, the year before
Milton died). This is a reprint of the former, with some addi-
tions, and containing the Hartiib Tractate on Education.

4. Successive editions for Tonson (1695-1747).

5. Baskerville*s Poetical Works of Milton (1758-1760).

6. Newton's editions (1752-1790). Of these Keightley
observes in his own preface that they are * the first English
instance of a Variorum edition, from MS. notes by Jortin,
Warburton, Thyer, Peck, Sympson, &c. Very respectable for
those times, when criticism was imperfect, and knowledge of
earlier English literature and language slender.'

INTRODUCTION, 39

7. Walton's editions of the smaller poems, except the
Paradise Regained, with notes (1785 and 1791).

8. Hayley's Poetical Works of Milton (i 794-1 797).

9. Todd's Poetical Works, dr^c, with the Principal Notes of
various Commentators (1801, 1809, 1826). Here the sub-
stance of Warton's notes is reproduced, with many additions by
the editor ; they consist of a mass of materials, for the most
part undigested and ill-arranged, and are chiefly useful for their
collection of parallel passages, though these (as Masson truly
remarks, vol. i. p. 534) * are pushed to the verge of the ridicu-
lous — interesting only as illustrations of similarity of thought
and expression among poets of a particular age.'

10. Keightle/s Poetical Works, &c (1859). The poems
are arranged chronologically, the spelling is modernised, except
in the case of a few words, such as ' sovran,' * highth,' &c., and
the punctuation carefully amended. There are no introduc-
tions to the separate pieces, the references in the notes are
given with the initials of those editors who first observed them,
though many of these, as Keightley tells us in his preface, were
noticed by himself independently. For the notes he claims
the especial merit of terseness and compression, and con-
sequently fails to give us the arguments on both sides in many
disputed passages, presenting merely his own conclusions or
those of others, without examination in detail, and often with-
out any reasons whatever.

11. English Poems by y^ohn Milton, edited by R. C.
Browne, King's College, London (1870). This edition comprises
much useful information within a small space, but does not
profess to enter upon a detailed investigation of mooted points.
The introduction has a great deal of original matter, well con-
sidered and clearly expressed. The editor frequently adopts
the' conclusions of Mr. Keightley, to whom he specially ac-
knowledges his obligation in a short preface prefixed to the
notes.

A new and complete edition of Milton is promised by Pro-
fessor Masson, and is expected shortly to appear.

40 INTRODUCTION.

The original MS. of Lycidas (together with those of the
Arcades^ Comus^ and some of the minor poems) is preserved in
the library of Trin. ColL, Cambridge. These were collected
by Charles Mason and Thomas Clark, Fellows of Trinity, in
1736, having been found among MSS. formerly given to the
College by Sir H. Newton Puckering, who was educated there,
and who died in 1 700 (Masson, vol. ii. p. 104). From them
Todd in 1801 collected his various readings in the three poems
above mentioned ; but as his copy of them is not quite
accurate, we append the following corrected list : —

/. 10. 'Who would not sing for Lycidas? he well knew.'
22. ' To bid faire peace,' &c. (To erased and And substituted.)
26. Glimmering corrected to opening,

30. *Oft till the ev'n starre bright/ (altered to that rose in

Ei/ning bright^

31. 'his burnishi weele,' (altered to westring weele.)

47. 'Their gay buttons weare.' {peare is then written and
erased, and wardrope weare substituted.)

51. *yor (y^«r erased) lov'd Lycidas.*

58. 'What could \h% golden-hayrd Calliope
For her inchaunting son,
When shee beheld {the godsfarre sighted bee)
His goarie scaipe rowle downe the Thracian lee*

After /. 59 is written in the margin —

' Whome universal nature might lament,
And heaven and hel deplore,
When his divine head downe the streame was sent'
{Head is first altered to visage, and then divine to
goarie^

69. ' Hid in the tangles,' (changed to Or with, &c.)
85. *. . . . thou smooth flood,' (altered \.o fanCd, and then
to honoured,) ' ^y^-sliding Mincius,' (altered to smooth-
sliding,)
105. ^ ScrauPd ore with figures dim,' (changed to Inwrought,)
no. ' Tow massy keys,' &c. (also * /^w-handed ' in /. 130.)
1 14. ' Anough of such,' &c.

129. '. . . . little sed.' {nothing is first written, but erased.)
138. '. . . . stintly (?) looks.' (First sparely, which is erased
and then replaced.)

INTRODUCTION. 41

The first correction is obscured by the tail of the / in the
superscribed sparely coming down in front of the first letter
(which may be either /or/). Mr. Aldis Wright, to whose
courtesy I am indebted for these amended readings, believes
the word to be faintly and not stintly,

L 139. * ^r/«^ hither,' &c., (corrected to Throw hither ^ &c.)
142 foil, originally stood thus : —

' Bring the rathe primrose that unwedded dies,
Colouring the pale cheeke of uninjoyd love^
And that sad flour e that strove
* To write his own woes on the vermeil graine ;

Next adde Narcissus yt still weeps in vaine^
The woodbine and ye pancie freakt wth jet,
The glowing violet.*

Afterwards Milton inserted the garish columbine^ but altered
iX,X,Q the well attir'd woodbine.

* The cowslip wan that hangs his pensive head,
And every bud that sorrows liverie weares.'

(First changed to sad escutcheon beares, then to im-
broidrie, and beares to weares,)

* Let Dafiadillies fille thire cups with teares.
Bid Amaranthus all his beautie shed.'

(These two lines were transposed, and the let was altered to
and,) The whole of the above passage is struck through with
the pen, and the substituted lines are written below.

/. 153. 'Let our j^ thoughts,* &c., (changed to fraile,)
154. ^ . . . Ye ^oods,^ &c,, {chanigGd to shoars.)
160. *. . . . Corineus old,' {Bellerus suhstituttd,)
176. *Zi>/^«/«^ the unexpressive nuptial song,' (altered to and
heareSf &c)

The imsettled state of orthography * in Milton's time makes

' In an article on English ortho- that it was settled by those who

graphy in the Philological Museum^ were more or less ignorant of the

the writer remarks that the uniform antecedents of our language, and

system now in vogue came in about maintained by compositors, by whose

the middle of the 17th century; influence certain modes of spelling

42

INTRODUCTION.

it unnecessary to notice in detail the varieties of spelling
which occur in various editions of this poem. We shall presently
(on /. 129) remark upon sed and blew (/. 192) as illustrating
the habit of writing to suit the eye as well as the ear ; in /. 130
doore is changed to dore in the MS. to coincide with moreva the
next line. For those who are curious in such matters we ap-
pend a few selected words from the four editions of 1638, 1645,
1673, and 169s (Tonson's), from which it will be seen that
in many instances the earlier ones had the correct ortho-
graphy, which afterwards got altered ; but this is purely acci-
dental

1638

1645

1673

1695

/.37
47
53

57

gone

wardrobe

lie

been

gon
wardrop

ly

bin

gon
wardrop

ly

bin

gon
wardrobe

ly

bin

82
112

perfect witnesse
mitred

perfet witnes
miter'd

perfet witnes
miter'd

perfect witness
miter'd

114
128

enough
wolf

anow
woolf

anow
woolf

anow
woolf

129

said

sed

sed

sed

140

turf

terf

terf

terf

175

oazie locks

oozy Lock's

oozy Lock's

oozy Locks

18s
186

perillous
oaks

perilous
Okes

perilous
Okes

perillous
Okes

192

blew

blew

blew

blew

In Milton's MS. the preterites and past participles in -ed
are almost uniformly spelt with the apostrophe, as destined,
honaur^dj &c. \ even mitred is thus given, where no vowel
is omitted. Honied seems to be the only instance in Lycidas
to the contrary. The forms in -/ are sometimes with and
sometimes without the apostrophe, as nur^t^ dandt, &c., by the

became established as the general
usage. He further observes that no
usage can make a blunder right, and
that the right spelling is that which

agrees best with pronunciation, ety-
mology, and the analogy of a word
to others of the same class to which
it belongs.

INTRODUCTION. 43

side of askt, freakf, &c. It should be noted that the use cf
the apostrophe began nearly about Milton's time, and continued
to be usual till quite lately. Spenser very seldom employs it ;
he generally omits the e altogether, as j'oyd, c/oyd, &a, some-
times placing it at the end, as sptde, obeyde^ &c. After k^ n, /,
J, &c, the letter / is used, as pluckt^ learnt^ topt^ tost, pusht^
some of which forms are still to be met with. Originally, as
in Chaucer, whenever -ed was written, it was meant to be
sounded ; hence arose these various contrivances to show when
it was mute.

Lycidas is the last poem, excepting the Sonnets^ which
Milton wrote in rime. In the preface, added in 1668 to
Paradise Lost^ he speaks of * rime * as being nothing but * the
invention of a barbarous age to set off wretched matter and
lame metre,' and congratulates himself upon having in that
poem set the first example in English * of ancient liberty re-
covered to heroic poem from the troublesome and modem
bondage of riming.* Yet the skilful arrangement of rimes in
Lycidas, and the exquisite cadences which his fine musical ear
enabled him to produce, without rule and apparently without
effort, are an evidence of how much may be done by means of
an expedient which he afterwards so unsparingly denounced ;
and there is perhaps no poem which exhibits these qualities in
equal profusion. The idea of the system, in which the rimes
occur sometimes alternately, but more often at longer and
irregular intervals, the ten-syllabled lines being now and then
varied by shorter ones of six syllables, is derived from the
Italians. The following extracts from choruses in Tasso's
Aminta and Guarini*s Pastor Fida will show what the originals
were like, but it will be seen that Milton has made considerable
variations upon his models.

I. From Aminta^ Act iv. Scene 2 : —

Ci6 che morte rallenta, Amor, restringi,
Amico tu di pace, ella di guerra ;

44 INTRODUCTION^.

E del suo trionfar trionfi e regni,
£ mentre due bell' alme annodi e cingi,
Cosl rendi sembiante al ciel la terra,
Che d' abitarla tu non fuggi o sdegni.
Non son vie Ik su ; gli umani ingegni
Tu placidi ne rendi, e V odio intemo
Sgombri, signor, da' mansueti cori,
Sgombri mille furori,
£ quasi fai col tuo valor superno
Delle cose mortali un giro etemo.

2. From Pastor Fido^ Act iv. Scene 9 ; —

O bella eti dell' oro,

Quand' era cibo il latte

Del pargoletto mondo, e culla il bosco ;

£ i cari parti loro

Godean le gregge intatte,

N^ temea '1 mondo ancor ferro n^ tosco.

Pensier torbido e fosco

AUor non facea velo

Al sol di luce eterna

Or la ragion, che vema

Tra le nubi del senso, ha chiuso il cielo.

Ond' h che '1 peregrin©

Va V altrui terra, e '1 mar turbando il pino.

Peck, in his New Memoirs of Milton (1740), fancifully com-
pares the Lycidas to a piece of music, consisting of so many
bars, which are represented by the paragraphs; each rime
being a chords and the lines without any answering rime being
discords. He cites the Pindaric odes of Cowley as examples
of similar irregularity in riming, only that in these there are no
discords or lines without rimes. The distinction between

* chords ' and ' discords ' (as if they were two different things
in music) is of course erroneous ; but, substituting phrases for

* bars ' and concords for * chords * in the above comparison, we
may allow that the effect upon the ear of an occasional unrimed

INTRODUCTION, 45

line bears some analogy to that produced by an unresolved
discord in harmony. Nevertheless so artistic is the whole
metrical arrangement of this charming monody that the sensa-
tions experienced by the most fastidious reader can never be
otherwise than agreeable, and to the judgment of such we con-
fidentiy leave the decision of the question, whether (as Dr.
Johnson) will have it) * the diction is harsh, the rhymes uncer-
tain, and the numbers unpleasing.'

LYCIDAa

»Oi

Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,

I] * Onoe more, amid my various
occupations, do I return to poetry,
that I may offer a tribute to the
memory of my deceased friend.* It
seems better to understand the allu-
sion thus than to restrict it (as Peck
and Newton have done) to * poems
on like occasions' with that of the
ZycidaSf such as the Ode on the
Death of a Fair Infant^ the Epi-
taph on the Marchioness of Win-
chester^ and the four Latin Elegies
of 1626. Since the production of
Comus in 1634, the poet's pen had
been unemployed, and we know
from his letter to Diodati of Sept.
^3* 1637, that he was now study-
ing ancient and mediaeval history,
in preparation for his Italian tour,
-which took place in the following
spring. Warton properly observes
that the plants specified in this and
the next line are not peculiar to
el^y> but 'symbolical of general
poetry.* As evergreens they are
also emblems of immortality, which
is perhaps the leading idea intended
to be conveyed. Cf. Drayton, 6th
Pastoral Eclogue : —

'Nor mournful cypress nor sad

widowing yew
About thy tomb to prosper shall
be seen;

But bay and myrtle, which is ever

new,
In spight of winter flourishing

and green.'

There seems to be no sufficient
ground for the distinction which
Newton draws between the laurel,
m3rrtle, and ivy, as representing the
poetic talent of the deceased, his
ripeness for love, and his learning
(Hor. Od. I. L 29) respectively.
Drayton, however, in his 3rd Ec-
logue, speaks of ^hzy^ that poets
do adorn, Aiid m3rrtle of chaste
lovers worn.*

2 brown] dark and sombre (It
druno) ; the pulla myrtus of Hor.
Od, I. XXV. 18.

ivy never sere] Cf. Sylves-
ter, Du BartaSy 70, * immortal bays
never unleaved.' Sere (O. E. sea-
rian, akin to ivp^s) occurs only
twice elsewhere in Milton, /*. Z.
X. 107 1 and Psalm ii. 27. Cf. Mac-
deth, V. 3, * the sear the yellow leaf;*
Spenser, Eel. i. 37, *My lustfuU
leaf r.is dry and sere,' where it is
explained in the Glossary as an
antiquated word, like guerdon, for-
lorn, and others, which have now
returned into use. Newton's state-
ment that * there are more obsolete
words in this than in any other of

48

LYCIDAS.

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,
And with forced fingers rude
Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year.
Bitter constraint, and sad occasion dear,

Milton's poems * may well be dis-
puted. (See note on /. 189.)

3-8] Those who imagine an allu-
sion to the untimely death of Mr.
King in the premature gathering of
the laurels, &c., seem to overlook
the fact that these plants represent,
not the lost friend, but the verses
offered to his memory. The meta-
phor by which an early death is
compared to the plucking of unripe
fruit (as in Cic. De Seneciute^ * Quasi
poma ex arboribus,' &c, quoted by
Dunster) has therefore no applica-
tion here, the reference being ob-
viously to the poet's efforts in verse,
which were, in his own opinion, yet
* harsh and crude,' but whose time
of maturity a pious duty compelled
him to forestall. Six years pre-
viously, in the Sonnet written at
the age of twenty-three, he had
expressed his resolution not to hasten
the time of his * inward ripeness;*
and in the accompanying letter he
says, * I take no thought of being
late, so it give advantage to be more
fit.'

5] Cf P. L, X. 1066. Shatter \&
a modem softening of scatter^ like
shave and scah^ sharp and scarps
Shipton and Skipton, &c.

meUowing] (mollis) would strictly
apply to fruit, not to leaves or
flowers. But the sense probably is,
'before the advancing year, which
ripens the fruit, causes your leaves
to fall.' Keightley remarks that
'these plants all shed their leaves
during the year, but gradually.' Cf.
Marlowe, Tamburlainey act ii. sc. I,
' And fall like mellowed fruit with
shakes of death.'

6] Plumptre's translation (1797),
TfLKpa iLyajKeda^ Kwphv Xf^l^'i &AA^

iro9e(y<(y, probably gives the right
sense of this line, i.e. an occasion
sad in itself, but concerned about a
dear object (Spens. F, Q. I. i. 53).
But dear may mean 'important,*
from its primary sense of 'costly*
(O. E. deore^ G. theuer), an inter-
pretation which is slightly favoured
by the occurrence of the word with
the same meaning and connexion
in Sidney's Arcadia, where Time is
addressed as ' the father of occasion
deare.' Hence arose the peculiar
use of 'dear' in a sense apparently
contradictory to its usual one, as in
Shakspere's 'dearest foe,' 'dear
peril,' &c., which is to be explained,
not (as Home Tooke supposes) from
deriauy ' to hurt,' but by a natural
transition from the original notion
of importance into that of strong
interest or emotion, whether of love
or hatred. (See Dyce's Glossary to
Shakspere, pp. 119, 120.)

The position of the noun between
the two epithets is very common in
Milton. Out of numberless in-
stances which occur, Peck quotes
P, L, V. 3, * temperate vapours
bland;* Ix. 1003, 'mortal sin ori-
ginal.* Cf. also/. ^ supra. Arcades,
49» 5i» to which may be added 'the
two-topt mount divine' of the
supposed Miltonic Epitaph — an ex-
pressio9 which Dean Stanley in his
letter to Prof Morley (Introd. to
JCing and Commons, p. xxxii.) pro-
nouncjsd to be 'Milton all over.*
This order of words is imitated from
the Greek (cf. Hes. Theog. 81 1,
X^Afccos oi^shar^fi^Ais ; Eur. Phan,
234, vi^fiokov 6fH>5 ip6v). In Latin
the adjectives are usually placed to-
gether, either with a conjunction, as
' Fatalis inccstus^«^ judex,* Hor. Od,

LYCIDAS.

49

Compels me to disturb your season due ;
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.
Who would not sing for Lycidas ! he knew

10

III. iii. 19, or without one, as *do-
mus exilis Plutonia,' Hor. Od. I. iv.
17; *suavis d9edala tellus,' Lucr.

i. 7.

7 compels] instead of compel^

the ' bitter constraint' and ' sad occa-
sion ' being so nearly identical as to
form one idea. Cf. Hor. Od. i.
xvii. 12, 'dis pietas mea £t musa
cordi est^ But, even without any
such connexion of meaning, the
Elizabethan writers and their imme-
diate successors commonly made
the verb agree in number with the
nearest preceding noun. Many in-
stances occur in the Bible, e.g. Prov.
i. 27 (where Luther's version also
has * Angst und Noth kommt '), ib.
ii. 6 ; Luke v. 10. Paul Bayne, in
one of his Letters (circ. 1600), says,

* You will be desirous of knowing
how my wife and her place agreeth ;'
Bacon, Essay on Masques^ observes
that *■ double masques . . . addeth
state and variety,' where no singular
noun precedes the verb. Even Mr.
Tennjrson, in a recent volume of
Poems, has the construction, *I
should know what God and man at.'
But many verbs apparently singular
are really examples of the Northern
plural in -J, — e.g. Shakspere, Corio-
lanus^ iv. I, * fortune's blows . . .
craves a noble cunning,' &c. &c.
James I. constantly uses this form
in his letters to Queen Elizabeth, as

• my articles desyr£r,' * your subjectis
preferir,' &c.

8 ere his prime] Being only
twenty-five years old.

9] Milton probably had in his
mind Spenser's Astrophely 7, 8.
There is a similar repetition of the
name, with marked effect, in the
ode on Death of a Fair Infant^

26. The present line is imitated by
Samuel Boyse (1741) in his Vision
of Patience^ * Young Lycidas the
learned and the good.'

peer] i.e. * equal,* from par,
Milton has used the word only
twice elsewhere in this original
sense, in P.L. i. 39, v. 812, though
he often applies it to the rebel
angels as a title of nobility — e.g.
*the grand infernal peers^^ &c. —
which is also its usual meaning in
Shakspere. With the present pas-
sage cf. P. Fletcher, Pise. Eel. vi.
I, *A fisher boy that never knew
his/d-^r;' Cowley, Death of Hervey,

* My sweet companion and my gentle
peer."* This is another of the words

(see note on sere^ I. 2) explained as
obsolete in the Glossary to the
Shepheard^s Kalendar ; it must have
been familiar in the 14th century,
as Wicklif, in his translation of Matt.
xi. 16, has 'children that crienunto
her/ftrtr,' i.e. 'fellows.' For the
history of the word see Du Cange,
Glossariuniy s. v. Pares.

10] Peck compares Virg. ^. x. 3,
' neget quis carmina Gallo ? '

he knew to sing] Cf. Comus,
87. These and similar expressions
are evidently intended as imitations
of the Latin and Greek verb-noun
infinitive— e.g. r ««^^ callebat, ^Seti/
ilirlffraro, &c. In Spenser's Ruines
of Tinie occurs the well-known
passage —

* Not to have been dipped in Lethe's

lake
Could save the son of Thsii^ from
to die:

(Cf. Eur. Aleestis^ II, ^y Bcofuv i^^v-
ffdfxriv.) But this construction is
unnecessary and even inaccurate in

so

LYCIDAS,

Himself to sing, and build tile lofty rime.
He must not float upon his watery bier
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,

Engli^ : first, because the infin. in
'ing (O. E.. -an) is the real equiva-
lent of the classical phrase ; and
secondly, because the sign * to ' was.
properly used with the gerund in
'anne or -enti^ to denote a pur-
pose. Probably our English poets,
not knowing that the form in -in^
Was really an infinitive, and con-
founding it with the present par-
ticiple, which it accidentally re-
sembles, thought that the only way
of reproducing the Latin and Greek
construction was by the use of the
sign * to * with the verb.

How far this estimate of King's
poetry is supported by facts we have
no adequate means oi ascertaining,
since only a few copies of his Latin
verses are extant (see Masson's
£t/e of Milton^ vol. i. pp. 603, 604),
which show a fair amount of scho-
larship, but are of no great poetical
merit. Milton may here be using
the language of exaggeration, or he
may have had other and more suf-
ficient grounds for his opinion than
such compositions as these would
afford.

build the lofty rime] Todd
compares Spenser, Ruiius of Rome,
stanza xxiv. —

* To build with levell of my loflie

style
That which no handes can ever-
more compyle ;'

also Eur. Supp, 998, koilh^ htvp-
ywr€j to which we may add Aristoph.
Rana, 1004, irvpyi&aots ^fxara atfivd.
The Latin * condere carmen ' (Lucr.
V. 2 ; Hor. A. P, 436, £pist, i. iii.
24) is probably here imitated ; but
the original expression does not ne-
cessarily contain any metaphor from
building, since condere simply means

*to put together," and is therefore
applied to any sort of operation
which might come under that general
notion, such as building, composing,
laying in the tomb, &c. ; it is more-
over used of prose writing as well as
of poetry. Gray, Death of f/oel, fol-
lowing Milton, has • build the lofty
verse,' and Merrick (circ. 1700), in
his Ode to Fancy , * build the rhyme.*
Rime^ • verse,' as in P,L, i. 16.
Elsewhere in Milton the word occurs
only in the Preface to Paradise Lost^
where 'rime' is distinguished from
blank verse. Since it is there written
rime^ but rhyme in P. L. i. 16, Bp.
Pearson suggested that Milton pur-
posely varied the spelling to signify
the difference of meaning. This idea
is at any rate not supported by the
present. passage, since our poet ori-'
ginally wrote rtme in his MS.,
though the printed editions of 1638
and 1645 both have rhyme. Hence
I have adopted in the text what is
now known to be the proper ortho-
graphy. (See Appendix I.)

12 bier] (O. E. Apt, L. fer-
etrum), because the waves dear the
body on their surface. Cf. Fletcher,
Purple Islatidy i. 210, 'The dying
swan . . . tides on her watrie hearse.'

13 welter] properly * to roll '
(w<z/-low,G.wtf/-tzen, L. vol-vo, Gr.
eIX-»). It was formerly used in a
wider sense than at present. Cf.
Od. Nat, 124; P. L. i. 78 ; Spens.
Eel. vii. 197, * These wisards wel-
ter in wealth'* caves.' Keble,
Christian Year (4th S. after Tri-
nity), speaks of * the deep weltering
flood,' For a very early use of the
word see the King's Quhair, by
James I. of Scotland, 1423, where
the turning of Fortune's wheel is
called ' the sudayn weltering of that

LYCIDAS.

51

Without the meed of some melodious tear.

Begin then, Sisters of the sacred well,
That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring ;
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.
Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse —
So may some gentle Muse

IS

ilk quhele.' Cf. Pope, Odyssey ^
xiv. 155, * he welters on the wave.*

Parohing] describes generally the
effect of exposure to the weather,
and is used of cold as well as of heat,
/*. L, ii. 594, where Newton comp.
£cclti5, 3diii. 21, * The cold north
wind . . . bumeth the wilderness.'
Cf. Virg. G. i. 93, *Boreae pene-
trabile frigus adurat ; ' Xen. Anab,
IV. V. 3, where the wintry wind is
said diroK aitiw wdrra.

meed] (G. miethe^ akin to fu-
(r06s). Cf. /. 84, the only other in-
stance of the word in Milton.
Shakspere uses it frequently. Cf.
Spens. F. Q, II. iii. 10, * honour
virtue's meed ;' Browne, Brit. Past,
* baye the learned shepherd's meede.'

melodious tear] » ' mournful
strain ; ' imitated by Mason in his
Monody on Pope^ * the loan of some
poetick woe.' Cooper, Tomb of
Shakspere, *the gurgling notes of
her melodious woe ; ' Shelley, Ado-
ttais, Hhe lorn nightingale Mourns
not her mate with such melodious
}>ain.' Hurd comp. Eur. Suppl.
454, HdiKpua 8* iroifid^ovffi ( = * a
dirge'). Cf. Virg. ^n, ii. 145, *his
lacrimis vitam damus,' i.e. 'to this
sorrowful appeal.' In the Epitaph
on the Marchioness of Winchester
Milton speaks of his verses as * tears
of perfect moan,' and Spenser en-
titles his elegy on Sir P. Sidney
Tears of the Muses.

15] The customary invocation of
the Muses is studied from the open-
ing lines of Hesiod's Theogony.
The * sacred well ' is Aganippe on

Mount Helicon (2{pos /iC7a re {ik%^6v
Tc), and not, as Keightley supposes,
* a fount of the poet's own creation,'
and the * seat of Jove ' is the altar
upon the same hill {^fihy ipiaOwtos
Kpoviayos). Cf. // Penseroso, 47,
48 ; Spenser, £c/. iv. 41, where the
name of the mountain is transferred
to the spring. * Well ' in the sense
of a natural fount occurs only here
and in P. L. xi. 416 (from Psalm
XXX vi. 9).

17 somewhat loudly] i.e. make
no uncertain answer to my appeal
(see next line). Todd quotes from
Drummond's Elegy on Gustavus
Adolphus —

' Speak it again, and louder louder

yet;
Else while we hear the sound we

shall forget
What it delivers.'

18 coy] (Fr. coi^ Lat. quietus),
formerly said of things as well as of
persons {P. L. iv. 310). Warton
instances from the Apology for Stmx-
tymnuus *a coy flurting style,' i.e.
one which deals in quibbling and
subterfuge, and thus eludes the
grasp of the understanding ; also
Drayton, Past. Eel. vii., 'these
things are all too coy (i.e. difficult)
forme.' Chaucer, Romaunt of the
Rose, has the verb cuoie^ ' to caress.'
Cf. Turberville (of Jupiter and
Danae), * when he coyde the closed
nunne in a towre. '

19 so may, &c.] probably sug-
gested by the * sic tibi,' &c. of Virg.
Eel. X. 4. Cf. Eel. ix. 40 ; Hor.

£ 2

52

LYCIDAS.

With lucky words favour my destined urn.
And as he passes turn,
And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud —
For we were nursed upon the self-same hill,

20

Od. I. iii. I. The sense is, ^ As
the Muses enable me to honour my
lost friend worthily, so may some
kindly poet honour my memory
when I am dead.' For Muse in
the sense of * poet * there seems to
be no classical authority. Keight-
ley instances Chapman, Horn. Od,
viii. 499, 'This sung the sacred
Muse.' Newton's reference to Sams,
Ag, 973 is not quite apposite, as
Fame is there introduced in her
proper character as a divinity,
though her gender is changed on
the poet's own responsibility. There
is some awkwardness here in the
use of * muse ' for the inspired poet
immediately after the invocation of
the Muses as the inspirers of the
song, but the general sense is clear.
In an Italian translation by T.
Mathias (1812) Muse' is properly
rendered * cantor.'

20 fkvoiir] ixoTSifavere ['ih^yM^
in its technical sense, Hor. Od,
III. i. 2.

my destined nm] i.e. the tomb
destined for me. For * urn' in this
sense cf. Shaksp. Cor, y. 5 —

• The most noble corse that ever

herald
Did follow to his urn.'

Dyce, Glossary,^ p. 477, quotes from
Fortiguerra's Ricciardetto, * aprir la
porta dell* uma ' { — tomba),

2.'i\ There seems to be no good
reason for rejecting the usual inter-
pretation of * shroud * in the sense
of grave- clothes. Dunster indeed
observes that it is ' the Miltonic
word for harbour, recess, hiding-
place,' and takes it here to mean

* tomb ; ' but as Milton's use of the
word (as a noun) is confined to this

and three other passages {Comta,
147; Od, Nat. 218; P. L. X.
1068), in all of which the context
shows that it is employed meta-
phorically, these references prove
nothing as to its meaning in the
present instance, where alone its
literal sense will apply. Mallet, in
his William and Margaret, has the
lines —

' And clay-cold was her lily hand
That held her sable shroud,'

where the sense admits of no dis-
pute. Todd's citations from Syl-
vester are still less to the point,
since two of them do not contain
the word at all, and in the third it
unquestionably means * dress of
mourning,' in its primary accepta-
tion (O. E. scrud) of clothes or
covering. Cf. Shaksp. Z. Lab,
Lost, V. 2, * A smock shall be your
shroud,* and (for the secondary
sense) Ezek. xxxi. 3, * a cedar with
a shadowing shroud.' Pennant, in
his London, mentions * a place
called the shrowds, a covered space
on the side of [Paul's] church. '

23] The poem now passes into
the pastoral form ; the new para-
graph should begin at /. 25, the
present line being connected with
/. 18, * I would lain sing for Ly-
cidas, for he was my companion,
&c.' Masson, Life of Milton y p. 611,
says, • The hill is Cambridge, the
joint feeding of the flocks is com-
panionship in study, the rural ditties
are academic iambics and elegiacs,
and old Damoetas is either Mr.
Chappell or some more kindly fel-
low of Christ's' (see on /. 36).
Among these college poems were
the Elegiacs to T, Young, 1626; the

LYCIDAS.

S3

Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rilU

Together both, ere the high lawns appeared
Under the opening eyelids of the Mom,
We drove a-field, and both together heard

25

Vacation Exercise^ 162S ; and the
Nativity Ode, 1629. King's Latin
verses have been already noticed
(/. 10). P. Fletcher, in his 1st
Piscatory Eclogue, describes his fa-
ther's early life under a similar alle-
gory drawn from the fisherman's
trade : —

• When the raw blossom of my

youth was yet
In my first childhood's green en*

closure bound,
Of Aquadune I learnt to fold my

net . . .
And guide my boat where Thames

and Isis heire,
By lowly Eton slides and Windsor

proudly faire.

But when my tender youth gan

fairly blow,
\ changed large Thames for Ca-
mus' narrower seas ;
There as my years, so skill with

years did grow,
And now my pipe the better sort

did please ;
So that with Limnus and with

Belgio
I durst to challenge all my fisher

peeres,
That by leam'd Camus' banks did

spend their youthful! yeares.'

25 lawns] P. L, iv. 252 ; VAt-
^gro, 71 ; Od, Nat. 85. ♦A lawn
is a plaine among trees ' (Camden).
Cf. L. saltus. The restriction of
meaning to grass kept smooth in a
garden is comparatively modem
(Wordsworth, White Doe of RyU
stone, canto iv. 45 ; Tennyson, In
Mem. 94, &c.). The word is va-
riously written Imvnd, laund, lande
in Piirs Plowman, Chaucer, Surrey,

Shakspere, &c.j it is the Old Fr*
lande, Sp. le^nda, Welsh llan, which
comes from the older Celtic Ian, * a
place,' and originally meant an
area or open space, hence a church-
yard and a church, as in Llan^
dudno, &c.

26] Milton's habit of early rising
is illustrated in the Apology for
Smectymnuus (quoted by Warton),
where he describes himself as ' up-
stirring in winter often before the
sound of any bell awakens men to
labour or devotion ; in summer as
oft as the bird that first rouses, or
not much tardier.' Cf. VAllegro^
41 folL; P, L, v. 1-25 ; ix. 192-
200.

opening] altered from ' glimmer-
ing' in ed. 1638, from the MS. first
draft ; the improvement is obvious.
The phrase is partly imitated by M.
Bruce in his Daphnis, when he
speaks of ' the closing lids of light.'
Cf. Crashaw, Musu^s Duel, * the
eyelids of the blushing day.' War-
ton cites Job iii. 9 (margin) ; xli.
18 ; Soph. Antig, 103, hfidpas $\4'
^apov ; Middleton, Game of Chesse
(1625), 'the opening eyelids of the
mom.'

27 drove] probably means 'drove
our flocks,' like 'drive the team
afield' in Gray's Elegy \ but the
word is often used intransitively
(like ^€t», agere), as in Gay's 3rd
Pastoral {Shepherds Week), * Now
the sun drove adown the western
road.* The a in 'afield 'is a dia-
lectic form an of the preposi'ion
on (Wyatt, Abused Lorver, 'now off,
now an^), of which the n was natu-
rally dropped before a consonant ;
before h it was sometimes omitted
('ahead,' &c.), sometimes retained

54

LYCIDAS.

What time the gray-fly winds her sultry hom,

Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,

Oft till the star that rose at evening bright

Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel.

30

{ * an hunting, ' &c. ) . * Fell on sleep *
occurs in Acts xiii. 36 ; in Cran-
mer's Bible the reading was 'a
building' in John ii. 20, but it is
now * in building.*

heard what time, fto.] a con-
densed expression for * heard the
horn of the gray-fly at the time
when she sounds it.* Comp. dico^-
ciy OT€j audire quum.

28] * The gray-fly or trumpet-fly '
(Warton). This cannot be the cock-
chafier, as some assert, since that
insect flies only in the evening.
Scott, Critical Essays^ observes that
the three parts of the day, morning,
noon, and evening, are clearly in-
tended. A writer in the Edinburgh
Kez'iew (July 1868) suggests that
the * gray-fly * may be the grig or
cricket, O. E. grag-hama, i. e.

* gray -coat,' from its colour. If so,
the use of * fly * as applied to this
insect may be compared with that
of * i^mt-worm * in /. 46 (see note
there).

sultry hom] according to thfe
classical usage by which an epithet
is employed for an adverbial phrase
denoting time. Farrar, Greek Syn-
tax ^ p. 81, instances (nforoToj ^Xdev,

* iEneas se matutinus agebat,' com-
paring them with Dryden's * gently
they laid them down as evening
sheep.*

29 battening] usually intransi-
tive, *to grow fat,' as in Shaksp.
Hamlet, iii. 4, * batten on this
moor.' It is used transitively in
J. Philips' Cider, bk. i., 'the mea-
dows here with battening ooze en-
riched,' and in Brown's Brit, Pas-
torals, bk. ii. 1st song, *thebatning
earth.' The root is bet- (in bet-ter
and O. E. bet-an, * to improve');

there was an older form, battel (cf.
Holland's Plutarch, ' battell soil '),
whence the college term 'battels.*
Batful= • rich ' occurs often in the
Polyolbion.

fresh dew4, &c.] Cf. Virg. G.
iii. 324-326; Eel. viii. 15.

30] See Various Readings. Keight-
ley remarks that the evening star
* appears, not rises, and it is never any-
where but on "heaven's descent,"*
and he endeavours to save Milton
from the charge of astronomical in-
accuracy by interpreting the allusion
of any star that rose about sunset.
But the passage from the Faery
Queene, III. iv. 51 (*the golden
Hesperus was mounted high in top
of heaven sheen '), which Keightley
himself quotes in his note on Comus,
I. 93, shows that another poet was
in fact guilty of the same error.
Probably both remembered the aw-
Xtbs curriip of Apollonius {Argonau-
tica, iv. 1630), which is the same as
Hesperus; and it is no necessary
imputation of ignorance against Mil-
ton to suppose that he meant this
star both here and in the Comus^
since he was far more likely to have
erred in company with the ancients
than to have corrected their mis-
takes by the light of modem dis-
covery (see on /. 168). The
amended line, inferior perhaps to
the original on account of its diffuse-
ness, is just such an expansion as a
poet might easily produce, if he
wished to lengthen the verse with-
out recasting the whole passage.

31 westering] originally *bur-
nisht,' which, as Todd observes, is
a conmion epithet of the sun in
older poetry. Milton, however,
has not so applied it elsewhere.

LYCIDAS.

55

Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute,
Tempered to the oaten flute ;

Between 1638 and 1645 he may
have recollected Chaucer's line in
Troilus and Cresseyde^ * the sonne
gan westrin &ist/ &c. A corre-
spondent in Nates and Queries (Feb.
1873) quotes from Whittier, * the
glow of autumn's westering day.*

* Wested ' occurs in Spenser's In-
troduction to the Faery Queene^
I. 8, * westing ' in Cook's Voyages,
Cf. Dryden, Virg. G. iv. 577, 'the
southing sun.' The northern Eng-
lish form * westling ' is used by
Allan Ramsay, Gentle Shepherd^ ii.
4, and often by Bums.

32] Imitated by R. West, Death
of Q. Caroline —

' Meantime thy rural ditty was not

mute,
Sweet bard of Merlin's cave.*

* Ditty* (dictum^ Fr. dictJ) means
properly the words of a song as dis-
tinguished from the tune. Cf.
Shaksp.v^j YouLikelt.s. 3, 'Though
there was no great matter in the^///y,
yet the note was very untuneable.*
Ilence it was applied to a short
pithy poem, generally on love and
its sorrows. Milton has ' amorous
ditties,' P. L. i. 449 ; xi. 584.
Cf. Comus, 86.

33 tempered] = * attuned,* P. L,
vii. 598. Warton compares Fletch-
er, Purple Island, ix. 20, * temper-
ing their sweetest notes unto thy
lay,' and Spenser, Eel. vi. 7. Gray,
Progress of Poesy, has —

'* Thee the voice, the dance obey,
. Tempered to thy warbled lay.'

Cf. Petrarch, Sonnet xxxviii. 2,

* Temprar potess* io in si soavi note
I miei sospiri.* The Latin tempe-
rare is similarly used, Hor. Od. iv.
iii. 18. Milton employs the word

* temper * in several senses, e.g. of
sword metal, P, L. ii. 813; vi.

322; of mental constitution, P, R,
iii, 27 ; of climate, P. L. xii. 636
(cf. Chaucer, Assembly of Fowles,
stanza 30, *the aire ... so a/-
tempre was *) ; of mixing in propor-
tion (cC £zek. xlvi. 14; Exod.
xxix. 2). All these come from the
general notion of dividing (r^/m-y-w,
/^;«-p-us, &c.), the prevailing idea
being that of regular distribution and
order.

oaten flute] C£ /. 88 ; Comus,
345 ; Spenser, Eel. L 72 ; x. 8, &c.,
&c. ; Collins, Ode to Evening, I. i.
*■ Pipes of com * are mentioned in
Shaksp. M. N. Dr. ii. 2 ; Spenser,
Eel. ii. 40. Although the oaten
pipe has been chosen by English
poets as the representative of pas-
toral music, the classical authority
for such usage is more than doubt-
ful. Theocritus speaks only of
reeds (ic(iXa/Aos, a&\bs, Swyo^, or of
the Pan's pipe (<rvpf70' Lucretius
in the celebrated passage, v. 1382
foil., adds the hemlock pipe {cicuta)
to the calamus and tUna. Perhaps
the. earliest instance oiavena in this
sense is in Virg. Eel. i. 2 (cf. Ov.
Met. viii. 191 ; TibuU. ill. iv. 71) ;
but it is a question whether the word
may not there mean any reed or
hollow stalk ; Pliny, N. H. xix. i,
uses it of the flax-plant, *■ tam gra-
cili avena.^ No argument can of
course be drawn from the stipula
of Virg. Eel. iii. i7, where the de-
signation is purposely disparaging.
So in an Elegy to Dr. Donne by
R. B.—

* all indeed
Compared to him, piped on an oaten
reed ;*

and in Tickell's mock-heroic poem,
Kensington Gardens, * the shrill
corn-pipes ' are a substitute for mar-
tial trumpets in a battle of fairies.

56

LYCIDAS.

Rough Satyrs danced, and Fauns with cloven heel
From the glad sound would not be absent long,
And old Damcetas loved to hear our song.

But oh ! the heavy change, now thou art gone.
Now thou art gone, and never must return !
Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods and desert caves,
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown,

3i

40

In this country the oaten pipe seems
to have been common among rus-
tics, and may still be met with.
Bums, in a letter to Mr. Thompson
(No. Ixiv.), speaks of *an oaten
reed cut and notched likt tluU you
see every shepherd boy have^ but the
sound is described as * abominable.'
Probably, therefore, our older poets
took the expression, not from actual
observation, but from an over-literal
rendering of avena in passages where
it ought to have been understood in
a wider sense.

34] Cf. Virg. Ed. vi. 27, * Tum
vero in numerum Faunosque feras-
que videres Ludere ; * Pope, Pasto-
ralSf ii. 50. Newton comp. also
Spenser, Past. yEgl. 116 —

*Ye Sylvans, Fawns, and Satyrs

that emong
These thickets oft have daunced

after his pipe.*

If Damoetas is Mr. Chappell, would
it be pressing the allegory too far
to make the Satyrs and Fauns repre-
sent the wilder and less studious
undergraduates of Christ's ? We
know at least from a letter to Gill,
1628, that Milton had to complain
of uncongenial companions at Cam<
bridge ( ' cum nullos fere studiorum
consortes hie reperiam, .&c.'), and
he may have felt some satisfaction
in paying them a passing compli-
ment.

36 Old DamoBtas] is a character
in Sidney's Arcadia^ the master of
the young shepherd Dorus, and

described as a ' suspicious, uncouth,
arrant, doltish clown.' If Milton
(who must have been familiar with
the Arcadia) had this Damoetas in
mind, the allusion to Chappell
under that name may possibly show
that he had not quite forgotten the
old disagreement with his tutor
which led to his temporary * rus-
tication ' in 1626 (see £leg. L
II-20, Masson's Life, vol. i. p.
141).

37-49] Scott in his Critical Es-
says remarks that there is *a peculiar
languid melody in these lines, the
proper language of complaint,' and
that Milton has here used * the
poetical licence by which sense is
attributed to inanimate existence to
great advantage.' Cf. Vii^. Eel,
X. 13, V. 62, for the sympathy of
natural objects with human sorrow
and joy.

39] Dunster cites Ovid, Met. xi.
43, where the beasts, woods, and
rocks are said to mourn for Orpheus^
For the structure of the line cf.
Virg. G. iv. 465, * Te, dulcis con-
junx, te solo in lit ore secum, &c. ; *
Spenser, E. Q. rv. x. 44, * Thee,
goddesse, thee the winds, the clouds
doe feare.*

40 wild thyme] not mentioned
elsewhere by Milton. Prof. Morley
quotes this line in defence of the ex-
pression * thymy wood * in the Epi-
taph, against the objection raised that
thyme does not grow in a wood.
He adds a reference to Hor. Od. i.
xvii. 5, and to Shaksp. M, N*

LYCIDAS*

57

And all their echoes mourn*

The willows, and the hazel-copses green.

Shall now no more be seen

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.

As killing as the canker to the rose,

Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,

45

Dream, ii. 2, where the scene is
laid in a forest.

Gadding] here simply describes
the straggling nature of the vine
(Cic. de Senect.y 'multiplici lapsu
et erratico^), without any allusion
to her desertion of the marital elm,
as Warburton suggests (Hor. Od*
IV. V. 30; Epod. ii. 10; Catullus,
Ixii. 49). Gad, from the past tense
oi go ox ga {yede and yode in Spen-
ser), was formerly a common word.
Warton quotes from a Norfolk Re-
gister of 1534 *the Gadynge with
S. Marye Songe,* i.e. the going
about with a carol to the Virgin.
Gadlyng = * vagrant ' in Chaucer,
Wyatt, &c. Cf. P. Fletcher, Pise,
Eel. i. 21, * the gadding winde ;'
Bacon, Essays, * Envy is a gadding
poison.' The word is however
specially used of wives roving from
home, as in Ecclus, xxv. 25 ; xxvi.
8, &c. A poet of the sixteenth
century (probably John Heywood)
speaks thus in praise of his lady —

'At Bacchus* feast none her shall
meet,
Ne at no wanton play ;
Nor gazing in the open street,
Nor gadding as astray.*

41] Cf. Moschus, Epit, Bien,
30, *AxA 8* Iv werpjitriif Mperai 8tti
iruncfj Shelley, Adortais, st. xv. —

* Lost Echo sits among the voiceless

mountains,
And feeds her grief with thy re-
membered lay.*

44 fanniiigl i.e. * moving like a

fan,* as in P. L. iv. 156, 'gentle
gales fanning their odoriferous
wings.* Spenser, F, Q. i. i, 17,
has 'threatening her angry sting,*
i.e. moving in a threatening manner.

45 oankerj a crab-like tumour
('cancra') in the rose, caused by a
caterpillar feeding on the blossom.
Here it is used for the insect itself.
Cf. Joel, i. 4, ii. 25 ; 2 Tim. ii. 17 ;
James v. 3. Warton gives several
references from iShakspere — e.g.
Tkvo Gent of Verona, i. i, *In the
sweetest bud the eating canker
dwells ;* K. John, iii. ^\M, N. Dr,
ii. 3, &c. &c. The term is also ap-
plied to the blossom of the dog-rose,
Mi^ch Ado, i. 3, * I had rather be a
canker in a hedge than a rose in his
grace.*

46] SirT. Browne, Vulgar Errors,
says : * There is found in the summer a
spider called taint, of a red colour. . . .
This by country people is accounted
a deadly poison unto cows and
horses.* Milton may have employed
the designation 'worm* by poetic
license in a wide sense (see on /. 28),
or he may have meant any worm
that causes a 'taint* or disease in
sheep.

weanling] a diminutive oiweanel,
from wean. In Spenser, EcL ix., 'a
weanell waste* « a weaned lamb;
Beattie translates depulsos a lacte
(Virg. Eel. vii. 15) 'my weanling
lambs.* This must not be con-
founded with * eanling* {Merch. of
Ven. i. 3), which means ' just dropt,*
from ean or yean (O. E. eacnian,
' to conceive in the womb*). * Weaa'

58

LYCIDAS.

Or frost to flowers that their gay wardrobe wear
When first the white-thorn blows ;
Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd's ear.

Where were ye, Nymphs, when the remorseless deep
Closed o'er the head of your loved Lycidas ?
For neither were ye playing on the steep,
Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie,

50

is O. E. weniarty G. ge-wohnen,
to accustom to do without the
breast.

47] Scott thinks 'simplicity is
violated by making flowers wear
their wardrobe.* It is difficult to
see the point of this criticism. For
the original reading * buttons,' cf.
Shaksp. Hamlet, i. 3 ; Browne,
Brit, Past, ii. 3, * Flora's choice
buttons of a russet dye. ' Hence the
name of the flower csilled * bachelor's
buttons.'

50-55] This form of appeal to
the Nymphs, complaining of their
absence from the scene of their vo-
tary's distress, has been a favourite
one with poets ever since Virgil
(Eel. X. 9) copied it from Theocritus
(i. 66). Milton has here borrowed
something from both,; from the latter
in makingthe locality of the Nymphs
suit that of the catastrophe (whereas
Virgil speaks of their usual haunts,
Parnassus, Pindus, and Aganippe),
and from the latter in identifying
the Nymphs with the Muses, whose
favourites both Gallus and Lycidas
are imagined to be. Keightley
refers to Aristoph. Nub. 269 foil.,
as the original source of the idea,
but the resemblance is hardly close
enough to warrant the supposition
that Theocritus was thinking of that
passage, the circumstances and lead-
ing sentiment being quite different
The form of address (rfr* — rfrc,
&c.) might better be compared with
that in //. 156 foil, of the present
poem. The lines which Warton

quotes from Spenser's Astrophel,
127 foil., are not much more than an
echo of the Greek and Latin ori-
ginals, since the remonstrance is
there addressed, not to the Nymphs,
but to shepherds and shepherdesses,
who were the actual companions of
Astrophel ; the office of stanching
the wound being in fact performed
by some strange shepherds, but too
late to save his life. Lord Lyttelton
on the Death of his Wife imitates
more closely : —

'Where were ye. Muses, when re-
lentless Fate

From these fond arms your fair
disciple tore ?

Nor then did Pindus and Castalia's
stream.

Or Aganippe's fount your steps
detain, . . .

Nor where Clitumnus rolls his
gentle stream.'

Cf. Shelley, AdoncUs, —

* where was lorn Urania,
"When Adonais died ?'

Ossian, Dar-thula, * Where have ye
been, ye southern winds, when the
sons of my love were deceived ?'

52] *The steep,' according to
Richardson, is the hill Ceryg y
Druidion in Denbighshire, the re-
puted sepulchre of the Druids.
Keightley su^ests the Penmaen-
mawr (between Conway and Ban-
gor), but the mention of the Druids,
in the absence of any special legend
connecting them with that locality,

LYCIDAS.

59

Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high,

Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream.

Ay me, I fondly dream !

Had ye been there — for what could that have done ?

55

seems to favour the former supposi-
tion.

54 shaggy top] Cf. P, Z. vi.
645 ; Copius^ 429. Drayton, Po-
lyolHon^ 1 2 th Song, speaks of
* shaggy heaths.' This description
of Anglesey was true only of the
olden time ; it was then called * the
Dark,' as Drayton tells us in the
9th Song of his Polyolbton^ where
Mona is made to say — * my brooks
... Of their huge oaks bereft
to heaven so open lie, That now
there's not a root discerned by any
eye.' We do not know whether Mil-
ton had any personal acquaintance
with these parts ; Masson thinks he
may possibly have visited his friend
Diodati's residence on the Dee
{.Eleg. i. 3).

55] Cf. Vcu:, Ex, 98 ; Spenser,
F, Q. IV. xi. 30 ; and the 'AkiSos
Uphv vho»p of Theocr. i. 69. Dray-
ton calls the Dee the * ominous ' and
the 'hallowed' flood in Polyolb,
loth Song ; this superstition was
based on the fact of its being the
boundary between England and
"Wales, whence —

* the changing of his fords
The future .ill or good of either
country told.'

In the nth Song the epithet 'wi-
sard ' is applied to the Weever, of
which it is said that —

'■oft twixt him and Dee
Much strife arose in their prophetick
skill.'

Hence probably arose the notion,
mentioned by Camden, that the
word meant * God's water,* and the
Roman name Deva may have been

partly owing to a similar association
of ideas. Col. Robertson, Topo-
graphy of Scotland^ p. 141, derives it
from the Gaelic da-abh {ddv) =
'double water' or confluence, and
this is further confirmed by its
Welsh name Dyfr-dwy^ signifying
the same thing.

56 Ay me!] i*'Ah me,' as in
/. 154; P, Z. iv. 86, &c. It is
probably the Spanish Ay de mi, and
is to be distinguished from the
affirmative Ay (G. ja). A cor-
respondent of Notes and Queries
observes that 'oh ja' is used in
Southern Germany as an expression
of woe — rather a curious coinci-
dence. The Italians also say
AhinU,

fondly] as foolishly, from the p. p.
of the old verb fonne, 'to make
foolish.* The modem sense of * in-
dulgent' obviously arose from the
idea of excessive love blinding the
eyes of reason. For the primary
use cf. P. L. iii. 470; xi, 59;
Shaksp. Coriolanus, iv. I, "Tis
fond to wail ; ' Spenser, F. Q. III.
viii. 25, * rudenes fond.'

57] These words will hardly bear
Newton's proposed construction —
* I dream of your having been
there.' Warton would supply the
ellipse after * there ' — * but why
should I suppose it, for what, &c. ; *
a construction resembling the Greek
kKKh yhp {iXK'ohyhp oTSa, &c.), but
hardly admissible in Euglish. A
simpler way would be to refer the
'for,' &c., to the words 'I fondly
dream,' i.e. 'I fondly dream when
I say Had ye been there, &c.;' the
question in /. 50 being of course
equivalent to a wish that the Muses
had been present.

6o

LYCIDAS.

What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,
The Muse herself for her enchanting son,
Whom universal Nature did lament,
When, by the rout that made the hideous roar,
His gory visage down the stream was sent,
Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore !

60

58-63] A comparison with the
various readings of the original
MS. will show that this passage is
the result of most careful revision.
Having first suhstituted the more
poetical description of Calliope as

* the Muse that Orpheus bore * for
the direct designation of her by
name, and having got rid of the
somewhat prosaic parenthesis, * the
gods farsighted bee,* Milton first
introduced in the margin the words

* and heaven and hel deplore ; ' but
afterwards erased them. * Divine
head * (of* the margin) was then
changed to * goary visage,* suggested
by the *goarie scalp' of the first
draft, and a final line was added to
close the paragraph and to complete
the rime. For the sentiment
compare an epitaph by Antipater
Sidonius, translated by Major Mac-
gregor from the Greek Anthology —

* No longer, Orpheus, shalt thou

charmed oaks lead ;

For thou art dead ! and much the
Muses grieved ;

Calliope, thy mother, most be-
reaved.

Why mourn we our dead sons,
since e'en their own

To save from death no power to
' gods is known? '

59 enohanting son] Cf. P, Z.
X. 353, *his fair enchanting daugh-
ter.' For the story see Ov. Met,
xi. 1-55, ^'» This passage is partly
repeated in P. L. vii. 34 foil. 'Pout
= * company ' is a favourite word
with Milton [Comus, 542 ; S, A,

443 ; P. L. i. 747, &c.). Shak-
spere has 'rout of rebels,* * merry
rout,' and similar expressions. Cf.
Spenser, F, Q. vi. ix. 8, *the
shepheard swaynes sat in a rout*
It is a question whether this word
has the same derivation as rout^a.
' defeat,' which comes from ruptus.
The sense of disturbance seems to be
later than the other one, and the
word may possibly be connected
with the Welsh rkawd^ which (like
turba) has both meanings. H<
Wedgwood, according to his favour-
ite theory of derivation from the
sound of words (see Introd. to his
Diet, of Etymology) J refers it to the
Swedish rjota, *to bellow,* com-
paring the O. E. krutan, * to
snore ; * a suggestion which the cri-
tical reader may examine for him-
self.

63] Milton has been blamed for
following the reading * volucrem
Hebrum'' in Virg. ALn. i. 317,
which was altered to 'Eurum* on
the strength of Servius' remark,

* nam quietissimus est (Hebrus).*
But Wagner and Forbiger defend
the MS. reading, and compare Sil.
Ital. ii. 73, * cursuque fatigant
Hebrum.* Coningt on observes that
the same unnecessary alteration of

* Hebro ' into * Euro ' was attempted
in Hor. Od. I. xxv. 20. The ra-
pidity of this particular river has
little to do with the matter ; swift-
ness was a general attribute of
rivers, and therefore became a com-
monplace poetical epithet of them.
Thus in Virg. y^n, iii. 76 Myconus

LYCIDAS.

6i

Alas ! what boots it with incessant care
To tend the homely, slighted shepherd's trade,
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse ?
Were it not better done, as others use,

65

is called *celsa,* but *humilis* in
Ov. Met, vii. 463, and the low-
lying Prochyta is designated *alta,'
^n. ix. 715, because this was a
general epithet of islands. Todd
comp. Davison, Poetical Rapsodit^
* Swift-flowing Hebrus staid all his
streames in a wonder ; ' and Mr.
Darby, in a letter to Warton (1785),
quotes a statement of the Jesuit
Catrou that the Hebrus is *un
fleuve d'une grande rapidity, * in
direct contradiction to the assertion
of Servius.

the Lesbian shore] Ov. Met xi.
55, /.r., * Methjrmnaei potiuntur litore
Lesbi.* According to common tra-
dition the head of Orpheus was
carried by the waves to Lesbos, and
there buried, for which pious office
the Lesbians were rewarded with
the gift of preeminence in song.

64-84] The pastoral landscape
now disappears, and the shepherd
merges into the poet (see Intro-
durtion), * What use is there in
all this laborious pursuit of learn-
ing, when life is so uncertain ? '
Phoebus interposes with * a strain of
higher mood,' reminding the ques-
tioner that fame, which is the re-
ward of noble deeds, lives on after
death in heaven. The rural muse,
though momentarily recalled at /.
85, does not permanently reappear
till /. 132.

what boots it] a frequent expres-
sion in Spenser, Shakspere, &c.
Cf. Richard II. i. 3 ; Winter's Tale,
iii. 2, &c. *Boot' is from beiany
' to improve * (see on /. 29).

incessant] in ed. 1638 *»»ces-
sant.* The two forms seem to have
been used indiscriminately about
this period ; we find ' unexpressive,^'

/. 176, Od. Nat, 116; *ingrateful,'
P, L. V. 407 ; ' increate,' ib. iii. 6.
Shakspere has * unpossible,' * un-
effectual,' *unperfect' (see Bible
version of Ps. cxxxix. 16) along
with *ingrateful,* *infortunate,' &c.
65] Cf Spenser, Eel, vi. 67,

* homely shepherd's quill.*

66 meditate the Knse] a literal
translation of Virgil, Eel, i. 2,

* Musam meditaris' (iti€A6Toy). This
is one instance among many of
Milton's habit of verbally adopt-
ing classical phrases (cf. 11, 20
supra). Perhaps the most remark-
able cases are the * thick drop se-
rene' {P, L, iii. 25), from gtUta
serena, and the * happy- making
sight' [Ode on Time, 18), from
Visio Beatifica, Virgil meant sim-
ply * compose a song^^ a meaning
which *Muse* will not bear in
English, although it cannot go with

* meditate ' in any other sense. It
is therefore doubtfiil whether Milton
intended * thankless ' to be intransi-
tive, i.e. *the poetry which gets
no thanks,' or transitive, i.e. 'the
Muse who though courted with
pains yet proves ungrateful.' For
the former sense cf. Surrey, Transl,
ef Virg, ALn, ii. 113, 'these thank-
less tales,' and the two meanings of
ingraius, 'ungrateful' and 'unre-
quited.'

67] The reading of 1638, * do '
for 'use,' is merely an error of the
press, caused by the word 'done,'
just preceding.

as others use] alluding to the
fashionable erotic poetry of the
day, with which Milton's severer
taste did not accord. From his 7th
Elegy, however, we learn that he
had once in his life yielded to a

62

LYCIDAS.

To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,

Or with the tangles of Neaera*s hair !

Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise —

That last infirmity of noble mind —

70

softer passion, which the more seri-
ous pursuits of college life soon dis-
pelled —

* Donee Socraticos umbrosa Aca-

demia rivos
Praebuit, admissum dedocuitque
jugum.*

It has been plausibly argued that
there is in the next two lines a spe-
cial reference to two Latin poems
by G. Buchanan (who was one of
Milton*s favourite authors), address-
ed to Amaryllis and Nesera respec-
tively. As regards the latter, the
allusion seems highly probable ;
since the poet distinctly describes
himself as a prisoner bound by
Cupid with a lock of Neaera's hair —

• Deinde unum evellens ex aurico-

mante capillum
Vertice captivis vincla dedit ma-
nibus.*

It is true that the Amaryllis of Bu-
chanan represents the city of Paris,
and not an actual lady ; but Milton
may easily have overlooked or ig-
nored this fact. The probability of ,
the reference is strengthened by the
first MS. reading, * Hid in the tan-
gles, &c. ;* since our poet would
hardly have committed the absurdity
of representing a lover sporting with
one mistress, and at the same time
being entangled in the hair of
another, unless some such literary
association had confiised the two
names in his mind. The present
passage is imitated by Soame Jenyns
in his Immortality of the Soul —

' Were it not wiser far, supinely laid,
'I'o sport with Phyllis in the noon-
tide shade ? '

68] Amaryllis and Neaera are two

of the common representative names
in ancient pastoral song. Cf. Virg.
EcL i. 31 ; ii. 14 ; iii. 3, 81 ; ix.
22. 'AfuipvAAis {h^pi)iT(Tw)j the
'sparkling beauty,' is the subject of
Theocritus' 3rd Idyll. Both names
occur together in Ariosto, Orl. Fur,
xi. 12.

69] Cf. Lovelace, To Altkea^

* When I lie tangled in her hair.'

70] This sentiment is common in
the classics. Newton instances Cic.
ProArckia, c. 10, * trahimur omnes
laudis studio, et optimus quisque
maxime gloria ducitur.' Cf. Spen-
ser, Tears of the Muses, 454, * due
praise that is the spur of doing well.'
It is vividly illustrated in the Faery
Queene, ii. vii. 46 foil., where Philo-
tim^ is described as holding a golden
chain reaching to heaven, * every
linck whereof was a step of dignity,'
and by which the crowd were striv-
ing * to climb aloft.' It reappears
mXh.Q Paradise Regained, iii. 24 foil.,
in an enlarged form from the mouth
of Satan tempting our Lord to am-
bition, where the phrase * erected
spirits ' (/. 27) may perhaps explain
the ^ clear spirit' of this passage,
i.e. purified by elevation into a
clearer atmosphere. Keightley takes
it to mean * illustrious,' It. chiaro.
The identical expression * clear
spirit ' is cited by Todd from Mil-
ton's Prose Works, vol. i. p. 161.

Scott ( Critical Essays) doubts the
correctness of representing Fame

* both as a motive and as a reward.'
But surely the desire of Fame acts
as a motive during the toil of action,
and when realised in attainment be-
comes its final reward.

71] Athenaeus in his Oeipnoso-
phista (xi. 15, § 1 16) represents Plato

LYCIDAS.

63

To scorn delights, and live laborious days ;
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
And think to burst out into sudden blaze.
Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life. * But not the praise,'
Phoebus replied, and touched my trembling ears,
' Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,

75

as saying icx^tfrov rhy rrjs 8d{i}s
X^Twya iy r^ 9a»d,rtf ahr^ &iro8v((-
/ic0a. Cf. Tacitus, Hist. iv. 6,
'etiam sapientibus cupido glorise
novissima exuitur/ of which the line
quoted by Warton from Massinger's
Very IVoman, * though the desire of
fame be the last weakness wise men
put off/ is nearly a literal transla-
tion. Of pride Bp. Hall says,
* Pride is the inmost coat, which we
put on first and put off last.'

73 guerdon] This word is not
elsewhere found in Milton's poems,
but is common in Spenser {K Q. I.
vii. 15 ; II. vi. 28, &c.). Though
it occurs at least as early as Chaucer,
it seems to have become obsolete in
the sixteenth century, being ex-
plained in the Glossary to the SAep-
heard* s KcUendar (see on /. 2) ; and
even as late as 1730 it was thought
to require a note in a poem by West
on Education. Most readers will re-
member the scene in Lav^s Labour* s
Lostf iii. I, where Costard the clown
exclaims, * O sweet guerdon^ better
than remuneration^^ taking each
word to mean a sum of money.
(For the derivation see Appendix
I.).

74] Cf. P, R» iii. 47, /. c. ; Chap-
man's Homer's II. xvii. 177, *that
frail blaze of excellence that neigh-
tx>urs death.' Pindar {Nem. x. 4)
uses ^XktwQoi in the same sense.

75 blind Fury] Cf. Spenser,
Ruines of Rome, st. 24. Milton
here purposely in indignation calls
Atropos a Fury, and not without

classical authority ; for in an Orphic
Hymn (quoted by Sympson) the
QwX fiaiipai are styled o<f>toirA(jjcafiot,
which is a proper epithet of the
Furies. Langhome in his £lif§y on
the Death of Handel speaks of * the
grim fury's breast.' Cf. Lloyd,
Tears and Triumph of Parnassus —

* Where were ye Muses (/. 50 supra)

when the fatal shears
The Fury raised to close his reve-
rend years ? '

For the 'shears of destiny' see
Shaksp. K. John, v. 2.

76] According to the old verse —

' Clotho colum retinet, Lachesis net,
et Atropos occatj*

For * slit ' in the sense of cutting
across, instead of lengthwise, Keight-
ley cites Golding's Ovid, Met, xii.
248—

' Like one that with an ax doth slit
An ox's neck in sacrifice.'

But not the praise] i.e. *the
praise is not intercepted ' (Warton).
This is a kind of zeugma, the verb
•slits' being strictly applicable to
the thread alone, but suggesting
another verb of similar meaning to
govern 'praise.'

77] From Virg. Eel. vi. 3, where
Conington remarks that touching
the ear was a symbolical act, the
ear being the seat of memory.

78] Cf. Pindar, Nem. vii. 45,
Tijuo 8i yiyv^ax, &c., i.e. * true
honour is theirs whose glorious fame

64

LYCIDAS.

Nor in the glistering foil

Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies,

But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes

80

the god exalteth, an aid to their
memory after death* {T€$youc6rwp
fioal96oy).

79, 80] Thus translated by Plump-
tre (1797)—
ov8* iy\ Ki$9'fiXois dperay iaXt&fuun

Kurcu
&yriya r&y woXX&y Biftfiei Koi dyd-

(frai ($x^o'*

And by Mathias (see note on /.

19)-

* Non mai d* orpel fallace

Con mentito splendor sfavilla al

mondo,

Dello spanto romor nemica, Fama.*

Milton's words admit of a twofold
construction. The first is — * Nor
is it (Fame) set off to the world in
(i.e. iy) the glistering foil, nor does
it lie (consist) in a wide reputation.'
In this case * foil ' must be under-
stood in a sense which it often bears
elsewhere, of a dark substance
(originally a thin leaf of metal), in
which jewels were placed to * set off*
their lustre. Cf, Shaksp. I^icA.

ir. i. 3—

' 2ifoil wherein thou art to set
The precious jewel of thy home re-
turn j*

I Hen, IV. i, 2 (quoted by Warton),

* And like bright metal on a sullen
ground, &c.* In Rich, III, v. 3
the stone of Scone set in the oak
chair of Edward I. is called

' a base foul stone.
Made precious by the foil of Eng-
land's chair.*

Chr. Brook in an £pithalamium
(speaking of a newly wedded bride)
says —

* Then let the dark foyle of the ge-

niall bed

Extend her brightness to his in-
ward sight.*

But this mode of taking the words
fails to give a suitable meaning to ,
the passage. It is not Fame itself
which is * set off to the world,* but
the life and actions of the man, the
display of which before the eyes of
the public constitutes fame — at least
according to the vulgar notion which
Milton is here combating. The
true sense seems to be this : * Nor
does it (true Fame) consist in the
specious appearance which is dis-
played to the world, nor in a wide-
spread renown.* FameynW then be
the subject of the verb lies, and set
off a participle agreeing with foil ;
the preposition in before * glistering
foil ' will have the same construc-
tion and sense as the in before

* broad rumour, ' both phrases being
constructed after lies. And the
meaning of *foil' will be, not ex-
actly * leaf-gold,' as Newton takes
it (comparing the * golden foile ' of
Spenser, F. Q. i. iv. 4), but tinsel,
i.e. some baser metal which glitters
like gold, and makes a fair show to
the eye. Scott doubts 'whether
the metaphor of "plant** is con-
tinued to this line or not,' and
imagines * a plant with leaves artifi-
cially gilded.' Perhaps the idea of

* foil ' {folium) was suggested by
the word * plant,' but the metaphor
itself is not resumed till /. 81 in the
words * lives and spreads,* which
describe the growth of a tree.

81 by] probably « *near,* i.e.
'in presence of.* Shaksp. Twelfth
Night, iii. I, * Thou mayest say the
king lives by a beggar, if a beggar
dwell near him.* So we still say
♦hardly.* This seems better than

LYCIDAS.

«

And perfect witness of all-judging Jove ;

As he pronounces lastly on each deed,

Of so much fame in Heaven expect thy meed.*

O fountain Arethuse, and thou honoured flood,
Smooth-sUding Mincius, crowned with vocal reeds,
That strain I heard was of a higher mood.
But now my oat proceeds,
And listens to the herald of the sea,

6s

8S

Keightley's explanation, ' by means
of.'

83 liMtly] in the somewhat un-
usual sense of * finally ' or * decisive-
ly ;' a literal rendering of ulti-
mum. Cf. Hor. Od. I. xvi. 19,
* allis urbibus ultima Stetere causae,
&c.,' i.e. the final (ultimate) cause
of their ruin.

84 meed] See on /. 14, and cf.
Spenser, F. Q. ill. x. 31, *Fame is
my meed and glory, virtue's pay.'

85-102] The return after the di-
gression is marked by an invocation
of the pastoral fountain Arethusa,
and of Virgil's native river, the
Mincius — a practical recognition of
the Sicili^ and Roman pastorals
as Milton's own originals (see In-
troduction). For the story of Are-
thusa see Ovid, Met. v. 579 foil.
In Moschus, Epitaphium Bionis^ 83,
Bion is said to have * drunk of
Arethusa's fount,' and in Theocr. Id.
i 117 the dying Daphnis exclaims,
XOip' 'ApiOovaa. Virgil {£ct. x. I)
invokes her as a Muse inspiring
his song.

honoured flood] imitated by West
in his Monody on Q. Caroline, * O
honoured flood with reeds Pierian
crowned, Isis ! ' Here the epithet
is given to the river because of its
association with Virgil.

86] Cf. Sylvester, £>u Bartas,
171, *the crystal of smooth-sliding
floods.' This and the * vocal reeds '
are from Virgil, Gtorg, iiL l4,Hardis

ubi flexibus errat Mincius, et tenera
pnetexit arundine ripas.' The epi-
thet 'vocal' is best illustrated by
the passage in Lucretius, v. 1383
foil., alluded to on /. 33.

87] An apology to the rural muse
for departing from the pastoral
strain, under the irresistible influ-
ence of Phcebus. A similar device
is adopted after the next digression

(/. 132).
mood] {P. L. i. 550 ; S, A. 661)

s= *■ character,' from modus, signify-
ing a particular arrangement of in-
tervals in the musical scale, the
study of which formed so important
an element in the Greek system of
education (Plato, Republic, B. iii. ;
Aristotle, Politics, B. viii.). The
word has nothing to do with a
* mood ' or state of mind, which is
from the German muth, * impulse,'
though the similarity of meaning
might easily cause confusion.

88] See on /. 33. Here the in-
strument, of course, stands for the
poem. A still bolder expression
occurs in the 6th Elegy, /. 89, where
patriis meditata cicutis means * com-
posed in my native tongue.' In
Landor's Imaginary Conversations
(Southey and Landor) this line is
curiously misquoted, *now my oar
proceeds ; ' upon which Southey is
supposed to remark, * Does the oar
listen ? '

89 listens] i.e. like a pupil
(oicptfaf^f), to learn what he is to say

66

LYCIDAS.

That came in Neptune's plea.

He asked the waves, and asked the felon winds,

What hard mishap hath doomed this gentle swain ?

And questioned.every gust of rugged wings

That blows from off each beaked promontory.

They knew not of his story ;

And sage Hippotades their answer brings,

90

95

upon the subject. The * herald * is
Triton, the son of Neptune ; his
instrument was the concha or spiral
shell (Vii^. yEn. vi. 171 ; x. 209),
and his office of herald is illustrated
in Ovid, Met, i. 333 foil., where he
is ordered to sound a retreat for the
waters of the deluge (' cecinit jussos
receptus*).

90] Keightley understands 'Nep-
tune's plea' to mean the judicial
enquiry which Neptune deputed
Triton to hold ; and he instances
the * Court of Common Pleas,^ &c.,
as examples of the word in this sig-
nification. But it seems better to
take it in its usual sense of a state-
ment made by the defendant to sa-
tisfy {placere) the court ; here the
excuse offered by Neptune and con-
veyed by Triton. Milton probably
intended to represent Neptune him-
self as involved in the blame, and
desirous to clear himself by a strict
enquiry applied to his subordinates.
Plumptre adopts this view when he
translates Yiwr^ihiMVo% dfAvvr-fip.

91 felon] (MS. * fellon ') =

* cruel,' from yW/, with the addi-
tional sense of 'criminal,' the winds
being introduced as culprits about
to be tried. For the etymology
see Appendix I.

93 wingB] misprinted * winds '
in Tonson's edition of 1705, and in
Newton's of 1785, probably on ac-
count of 'winds' in /. 91. *Gust
of wings* is the gen. of quality «=»
'winged gusts,' and * rugged ' =

* ragged,' i.e. broken by intervening

obstacles. Rugged and ragged seem
to have been used indiscriminately
about this period [JO Allegro^ 9 ;
Isaiah ii. 21), but they are dis-
tinct words, the former being the
O.E. hruh, * rough,' the latter from
racian, ' to tear,' akin to PAkos.

94] Warton compares P. L. xi.
746 ; Drayton, Polyolbion^ 1st Song,
' the utmost end of Comwal's fur-
rowing beak."* Pliny, Nat. Hist. x.
49, uses * rostrum ' for the promon-
tory of an island in the Nile.

95 his Btory] i.e. how to give
any account of him.

96] Warton observes that Hip-
potades is not a common name of
iEolus, and does not occur in Virgil.
He quotes Homer, Od. x. 2 ; Ovid,
Ma. iv. 661 ; xiv. 86, &c., and
passages from the Argonautica of
ApoU. Rhodius and Val. Flaccus.
The epithet ' sage ' implies authority
and responsibility. Dunster thinks
there is a special allusion to ' sciret '
in Virg. Ain. i. 63, which is how-
ever there qualified by the addition
of 'jussus' and of 'feed ere certo.'
Homer, Od. x. 21, represents
-^olus as acting by his own discre-
tion {iraviyLfvai ijS* 6py(tfi€y Hy ic* iB4-
Xpcri). Richardson understands
' sage ' of his foreknowledge of the
weather ; but this is a later and
rationalised form of the story, and
one which Milton as a poet is not
likely to h^ve chosen, since even
when writing history he professes
himself unwilling to give up the
myths entirely, rejecting only those

LYCIDAS.

67

That not a blast was from his dungeon strayed ;

The air was calm, and on the level brine

Sleek Panop^ with all her sisters played.

It was that fatal and perfidious bark,

Built in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark,

That sunk so low that sacred head of thine.

Next Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow,
His mantle hairy and his bonnet sedge,

100

which are ' impossible and absurd '
{Hist, of Britaifty c. I, and see
Grote, Hist, of Greece, vol. i. c. 17).

98 level brine] imitated by J.
Warton in his Enthitsiast (1740),
• the dolphin dancing o*er the level
brine.*

99 Fanope] one of the fifly
daughters of Nereus and Doris
(Hesiod, Theog. 250 foil.). The
name Wa»6ici\y denoting a wide view
over a calm expanse of water, is
significant here, as also in Virg.
Georg. i. 437, yEn. v. 240, 823.
Spenser (apparently on his own au-
thority) introduces her as an 'old
njrmph ' who kept the house of Pro-
teus [F. Q. III. viii. 37).

100] See the inscription prefixed
to the Cambridge Verses of 1 638,
' navi in scopulum allisa, et rimis
et ictu fcUiscente. '

loi] Warton comp. Shaksp.
Macbeth, iv. I —

* slips of yew,
Slivered (cut) in the moon's eclipse,'

used by the witches for their incan-
tations. The superstition about
eclipses as portents of impending
calamity is an old one (Virg. Georg.
i. 465 foil., and cf. P. Z: i. 597
foil.); hence might naturally arise
the belief that work done during an
eclipse was likely to fail of success ;
but there seems to be no evidence
to show that the ancients actually so
regarded it.

102 saorod] consecrated by friend-
ship, and therefore inviolable. Cf.
Tennyson, In Memoriam, xiv. 10,
* the man I held as half divine.'

103 Camus] So in Spenser's
Pastorall ^glogue the Thames,
Humber, Severn, and other rivers
mourn for their favourite bard Phil-
lisides. Cowley, Complaint^ I. 6,
speaks of * reverend Cam.' * Sire '
is the usual mythological designa-
tion of a river, as a presiding and
protecting power. Cf. Livy, ii. 10,
*Tiberine pater;' Virg. ^n. viii,
31. What follows is an adaptation
of the natural features of the locality
to the circumstances of mourning,
but without the unpleasant associa-
tions which appear in the *nuda
arva' and 'juncosas Cami paludes'
of the 1st Elegy, //. 13, 89. That
Milton had no great affection for
Cambridge is dear (see on //. 34, 36),
but this was not a fit occasion for
expressing any such feeling. With
' footing slow ' Keightley compares
F. Q. I. iii. 10, ' A damsel spied
slow footing her before.' Cf. Dun-
combe, Ode to C. P. —

* where sedgy Cam
Bathes with slow pace his acade-
mic grove;'

Those who are acquainted with the
locality will recognise the appro-
priateness of these descriptions; it
may not be out of place to mention
the fact, that in a report addressed

F 2

68

LYCIDAS.

Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge
Like to that sanguine flower inscribed with woe.
* Ah ! who hath reft/ quoth he, * my dearest pledge ? '
. Last came, and last did go,

105

to the Cambridge Improvement
Commissioners (Oct. 187 1) by Mr.
J. B. Denton, *the sluggish nature
of the river' is expressly noted as
one of the main difhculties in the
way of the proposed operations.

105J In the * figures dim' War-
burton sees a reference to the * fabu-
lous traditions of the high antiquity
of Cambridge.* Perhaps we need
hardly look for any such precise ap-
plication of the expression, which
may very well be a part of the
general picture of desolation. Pun-
ster's remark that * on sedge -leaves,
when dried, there are certain dim,
indistinct, and dusky streaks on the
edge,' is worth noticing, and the ori-
ginal reading * scrauled ore ' seems
to favour the probability of such an
allusion.

106] For the legend of Hyacin-
thus (to which Milton also alludes
in the Ode on the Death of a Fair
Infant^ 25 foil.) see Ovid, Met.
X. 210 foil. *• Ipse suos gemitus
foliis inscribit et Ai Ai Flos habet
inscriptum' (j^. 215). Hence Theo-
critus, X. 28, calls the flower a
7pairT& 6AKiy0oSf and Moschus, £pU.
Bion. I. 6, exclaims vvv ^kiv0€
\d\u rh ffit ypdfifMra. Cf. Drum<
mond, Epit. on Prince Henry —

* that sweet flower that bears
In sanguine spots the tenour of our
woe.*
107 reft] (O. E. re^ian^ to rob)
now commonly appears in its com-
pound be-reave. The simple verb
occurs nowhere else in Milton, but
is frequently used by the Elizabe-
than poets, e.g. Shakspere, Much
4do, iv. I, AlVs Well^ v. 3, &c.;
Surrey, passim ; Spenser, F, Q.
I. iii. 36, 41, &c. Sir W. Ra-

leigh, Cynthia^ says of the moon,
' she that from the sun reaves power
and might.'

pledge] = offspring, considered
as a security of conjugal fidelity.
Pignus in this sense is very com-
mon, cf. Propert. iv. xi. 73, *com-
munia pignora natos.' Milton has

* pignora cara, ' Eleg, iv. 42. War-
ton quotes from the Rime Spirituali
of Angelo Grillo *mio caro pegno.'
Cf. P. L, ii. 818 ; Ode At a Solemn
Musick^ I. I; Spenser, F, ^. i. x,4 ;
Bacon, Essay on Marriage^ * their
dearest pledges ; ' Lord Lyttelton,
on the death of Lady L. —

* Nor did she crown our mutual

flame
With pledges dear, and with a
father's tender name.'

108] Neve in his Cursory Re-
marks on some English Poets (1789)
observes that * as Dante has made
Cato of Utica keeper of the gates
of Purgatorio, Milton has here in
return placed St. Peter in company
with Apollo, Triton, &c.,' and that

* for the intrusion respecting the
clergy of his time die earliest
Italians have set plentiful example.'
See for instance St. Peter's animad-
versions upon the degeneracy of his
successors in Paradiso^ Canto 27,
which closely resembles the present
passage. Dante does not however
make Cato the * keeper of the gates *
(that office being given to an angel,
Purgat. ix. 78, 105), but the guar-
dian of certain wandering spirits
outside the place itself. For the
charge of irreverence ui^ed against
Milton for his alleged confusion of
thu)gs sacred and profane see Intro-
duction.

LYCIDAS.

69

The pilot of the GaHlean lake ;

Two massy keys he bore of metals twain —

The golden opes, the iron shuts amain.

He shook his mitred locks, and stem bespake

no

109 Pilot] is an addition to the
gospel narrative (Luke v. 3), where
there is no intimation that Peter
acted in that capacity towards the
others. He was doubtless the
steersman of his own ship, a sense
in which * pilot ' is often used (P. Z.
i. 204 ; S. A. 198). In /. 1044 of
the latter poem the * pilot ' and

* steersmate ' are distinguished.

110] Originally from Matt. xvi.
19, where the number of keys is
not mentioned. From the earliest
times St. Peter was represented
with two keys ; hence P. Fletcher
in his Locusts (quoted by Todd) says
of the Pope —

' In ills hand two golden keys he

beares,
To open heaven and hell and shut
againe ; '

and in the Purple Island, vii. 421,
Dichostasis (Schism) is invested with
the same authority. Dante [Inferno^
xxvii.) makes Pope Boniface say —

* Lo ciel poss* io serrare e disser-

rare,
Come tu sai ; per6 son due le
chiavi.*

In the ode In Quintum Novembris
Milton speaks merely of *Apo-
stolicae custodia clavis.* The dis-
tinction between the two metals —
one denoting the value of the bene-
fits secured by admission, the other
stem severity in exclusion — is our
poet's own ; in the parallel passage
of Dante, Purg. ix. 120 foil., lx)th
a golden and a silver key are used
by the angel to open the gate. The
Italian proverb quoted by Mr.
Bowles, * Con le chiavi d' oro s' apre

ogna porta/ alludes to the influ-
ence of money, and has therefore
nothing to do with the * power of
the keys.'

Ill amain] a * firmly, ' lit. * with
might,' from O. E. magan^ *to be
strong.' For the prefix a see on
/. 27.

112] It would be imfair to con-
strue this admission of the mitre
into a precise statement of Milton's
religious views at this period, or to
suppose with Warburton that *it
sharpened his satire to have the
prelacy condemned by one of their
own order.' As St. Peter here
speaks with episcopal authority, he
is made to wear the distinctive dress
of his order. So in the 3rd Elegy
(1626) on the Bishop of Winchester,
the glorified prelate is represented
with the * infula ' or mitre upon his
head (/. 56). In the Reason of
Church Government ^ c. vi. (1641)
Milton indeed uses very different
language, when he speaks of *the
haughty prelates with their forked
mitres, the badge of schism ; ' but
the events of the three intervening
years had produced a considerable
change in his attitude towards the
clergy, or at least had emboldened
him in the expression of opinions,
which had been long lurking in his
mind, and of which the present in-
vective is perhaps the earliest inti-
mation.

bespake] here used absolutely, as
in P. R. i. 43 ; Ode Nat. 76. Cf.
Spens. F. Q. i. ii. 32, *he thus
bespake.' The prefix be- is the
same as ^^ ( = * near ' or * to '), with
the addition of the person ad-
dressed. P, L, iv. 1005, * Gabriel

70

LYCIDAS.

* How well could I have spared for thee, young swain,
Enow of such as, for their bellies' sake,
Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold !
Of other care they little reckoning make.

1^5

. . . thus bespake the fiend.* At the
present day it usually = 'speak
yZ?r,' i.e. * secure beforehand,' and
sometimes 'declare' or *show,' as
in Cowper's Task^ B. ii., * His head
. . . bespoke him;' Poems by Jane
Taylor, *the cheerful chimes be-
speak the hour of prayer,'

1 13 - 131] Three grounds of com-
plaint are here adleged — (i) the
covetousness and moral corruption
of the clergy, (2) their false or im-
perfect doctrine, (3) another evil,
distinct from the former, but not
expressly defined, which is most
probably to be understood of the
increasing perversions to Romanism
so frequent at this period. (See Ap-
pendix II.).

114 enow] printed *anow* in
ed. 1645 (in the MS. * anough *). It
is spelt both ways in the Areopagi-
iica (1644). So *emong' and

* among,' &c. In Shaksp. Merck,
of Venice^ ii. 2, we find * aleven' for

* eleven ' (see Dyce cui loc. )

for their bellies' sake] Cf. Ezek.
xxxiv. 2,3. On what follows War-
ton remarks that Milton has copied
from Spenser's 5th Eclogue the
sentiments of Piers the Protestant
shepherd, which are quoted at full
length in the Animadversions on the
Remonstrant'' s Defence ( 1 641 ). Our
author's prose works abound with
specimens of similar language ; e.g.
in the Apology for Smectymnuus he
speaks of *the prelate, who being a
pluralist may under one surplice
hide four benefices ; * and many
similar passages might be quoted.
Compare also the following lines,
addressed to the clergy in the
tragedy of Baptistes^ translated from
the Latin of G. Buchanan in 1637,

and sometimes, but without sufficient •
reason, attributed to Milton —

* Then like dumb dogs that bark not

here, you fret
And fume about your sheepcotes ;

but the wolves
Which of you drive away ? The

wolves, said I ?
You are the wolves yourselves,

that flay your flocke.
Clothed with their wool ; their

milk don't slack your thirst,
Their flesh your hunger. Thus

yourselves you feed,
But not your flock.'

115] Cf P. L, iv. 193. T.
Becon, chaplain to Cranmer (about
1540), says in his Policy of War —
* They come into their benefices non
per ostium sed aliunde, for the desire
of filthy lucre' (St. John x. i). By
intrusion into the fold Milton does
not imply absence or invalidity of
orders ; his matured views concern-
ing a minister's credentials were
afterwards clearly set forth in the
treatise on Christian Doctrine^
c. 29, 31. These are * spiritual
knowledge and sanctity of Ufe,' to
be tested by previous trial, and the
choice is to belong to the people
collectively ; a mode of proceeding
which Hooker [Eccl. Pol. vii. 14)
argues to be a mere pretence, since
the elders * allow not their own
previous choice to be set aside by
their [the people's] disapprobation ; *
and he ludicrously compares it to
the way of * nurses with infants,
whose mouths they besmear with
the backside of the spoon, as
though they had fed them, when
they themselves devour the food.'

1 1 6, 117} Cf. Becon, Jewel of

LYCIDAS.

71

Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast,

And shove away the worthy bidden guest.

Blind mouths ! that scarce themselves know how to hold

A sheep-hook, or have learned aught else the least

120

Joy — *Our spiritual men are led
with no care of feeding Christ's
flock. . . Christ's threefold Pasce is
turned into the Jews' double Tolle.
They feed nothing except them-
selves, they toll and catch what-
soever they may.'

118 the worthy bidden gneit]
Matt. xxii. 8. Milton here allows
the principle of emolument for
ministerial services, since * the
shearers' feast' is the due reward
of honest shepherds ; latterly his
opinions on this subject were some-
what modified. In the Treatise en-
titled The Likeliest Means to remove
Hirelings and in the Christian Doc-
trine^ while barely admitting that
* the labourer is worthy of his hire,*
he restricts it to voluntary contribu-
tions, adding that * it is more de-
sirable to serve gratuitously,' and to
support themselves (if need be) ' by
th .' exercise of some trade or call-
ing' (C D. c. 31).

119] The phrase * blind mouths'
may be illustrated from the classical
usage of transferring to one bodily
sense the functions of another ; e.g.
Soph. CEd, T. 371, Tv^A^s TO 5to,
Val. Flacc. ii. 461, * caecus clamor, '
Plin. N. H. xxxvii. 18, * surd us
color,' &c. The shepherds are
emphatically termed * mouths,* first
for their gluttony, secondly in refer-
ence to their preaching. As regards
the former cf. Hesiod, 7^heog. 26,
where the Heliconian swains are
said to be ycurripes ohvt * nothing
but bellies.' Cf. yaorripts kpytd
(Mazy gluttons'), St.' Paul to
Titus, i. 12; Pliny, N. H. ix. 17,
30, * proceres gulae * ( * noble glut-
tons '). Hogg (1694) translates the

present passage ' O caci ventres, qui
vix comprendere dextra Pastorale
pedum, aut aliquid didicere, &c.'
Next by a bold figure of speech the
' mouths * are said * to hold a sheep-
hook,' with which Newton aptly
compares Hor. Sat, ii. IL 39 —

' Porrectum magno magnum spectare

catino
Vellem ait Harpyiis gtUa digna
rapacibus ;'

also /*. Z. V. 711, * the eternal eye
...saw... and smiling said! As to
the relative importance of preach-
ings Milton places it foremost
among ministerial duties, even
above the administiation of sacra-
ments (C D, c. 29). To a Puritan
*a non-preaching ministry' was a
crying evil, and even James I. at
the Hampton Court Conference of
1604 gives his opinion that * a
preaching ministry is best,' though
he orders * that praying be attended
to as well. ' At the same Conference
the daily use of the Book of Homi-
lies, originally set forth in 1 562 to
remedy the defects of the clergy on
this head [see Preface to Homilies) y
was strictly enjoined ; and some
twenty years later the Kin^s
Letters were issued for the express
purpose of restraining extravagances
in the pulpit (Fuller, Church Hist,
X. vii, 4).

120 iheep-hook] KopJioy, Theocr.
Id. y'li. 43; 'pedum,' Viig. Eel. v.
88. Cf. Treatise on Reformation
in England, B. ii., 'the pastorly
rod and sheep-hook of Christ'
(Psalm xxiLi. 4). Of unlearned
ministers Becon remarks in his Pre-
face, ' They leap into the pulpits

72

LYCIDAS.

That to the faithful herdman's art belongs !

What recks it them ? What need they ? They are sped ;

And, when they list, their lean and flashy songs

without shame, when they under-
stand not what pulpit matters mean.
They teach before they learn/ Mil-
ton's earlier opinions were in favour
of a learned clergy, as might have
been expected from the circum-
stances of his education. In a letter
to the elder Gill from Cambridge,
1628, he deplores the ignorance of
those * who without any acquaint-
ance with criticism or philosophy
engage in the study of theology*
{Epist. Fam. 3). But in the Like-
liest Way &*e. (1651) he contemp-
tuously designates all such learning
as * scholastical trash,' adding that
every requisite * may be easily at-
tained, and by the meanest capaci-
ties, if they seek the guidance of
the Holy Spirit,' an opinion which
is further developed in the Christian
Doctrine^ c. 31.

121 herdman's] ('heard^mans'
in the MS.), here = * shepherd's.'
The original meaning is simply ' one
who tends or watches ' (G. Herde^
hirtettf &c.) either sheep or larger
cattle, and the modem distinction
was not always observed. Spenser,
F. Q. VI. xi. 37, 39, uses * heards '
and * heardgroomes ' for keeper of
sheep, though he elsewhere {ib. ix.
10) makes a difference— *ne was
there heard^nt. was there shepheard^s
swayne.' In the Bible the spelling
is always *herdman' (Gen. xiii.
7 ; XX vi. 20 ; Amos i. I ; vii. 14,
&c.)

122 reokfl it them] (O. E. rec^
'care.') Cf. Comus, 401 ; Gower,
Confessio Amaniis^ B. v. , * him
reciceth not.* The verb is generally
personal, as in P. L. ii. 50; ix.
173; Spens. Eel. vii. 34, 'thou
rekes much of thy swincke (toil).'

they are sped] i.e. 'are provided

for ' (Keightley). So in the Mer-
chant of Venice^ ii. 9, the Prince of
Arragon, reading his fortune on the
scroll in the silver casket, fiiids the
words * Begone, you are sped. ' In
Judges V. 30 the mother of Sisera,
awaiting the return of her son whom
she supposed victorious, exclaims
* Have they not sped ? ' The same
sense of the word lingers in the ex-
pression *God speed you.' Of the
luxurious habits of prelates Milton
speaks in the Apology for Smectym-
nuuSf *■ They let hundreds of fami-
lies famish in one diocese, while
they themselves enjoy that wealth
that would furnish all those dark
places with ample supply.'

123 when they list] i.e. even
this miserable pittance is doled out
to the flock only at such time as is
convenient to the shepherds. • That
the * lean and flashy songs ' repre-
sent unsound oral instruction is
plain from the context ; but in the
pastoral prototype singing and
piping are the recreation^ not the
business of shepherds, and the
meaning ought simply to be that
the spiritual pastors amuse them-
selves instead of tending their
flocks. In that case however there
would be no point in the allusion
to the wretched quality of the
music, which could in no way affect
the welfare of the sheep. The con-
fusion of metaphor thus involved
needs simply stating to be apparent;
the true anal(^y lies in the un-
healthiness of pasture, to which a
sudden transition is made in /. 126.

flashy] Todd quotes from Mil-
ton's Colasterionj in which he calls
his opponent's arguments * ^eftashi-
est^ the fustiest that ever corrupted
such an unswilled hogshead.' Dry-

LYCIDAS.

73

Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw ;

The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,

But, swollen with wind and the rank mist they draw,

125

den, Transl. of Persius^ Sat. i., has
' flashy wit,* and Bacon, Essay on
Studies^ says * distilled books are
flashy things.'

124] Imitated from Virg. Ed. iii.
26, ' stridenti miserum stipula dis-
perdere carmen.* Plumptre trans-
lates (keeping the alliteration) —

oX KaKofuus, €&r* &u y* iBiXovri^ tovH'

pcus
KowfM ti4\i^ rplffdoyTfs iurapi^ &ir({-

jxowra KptKovri.

The word * scrannel ' does not seem
to have been used by any previous
writer j Newton does not remember
to have seen it elsewhere at all. He
might however have found it in
Langhome's Fables of Flora (pub-
lished shortly before his own edition
of Milton in 1784), where it is said
of an unearthly sound issuing from
a cave —

' But grinding through some scran-
nel frame
Creaked from the bony lungs of
death.*

No doubt Langhome copied the
word from Lycidas^ since he is
known to have been a student of
Milton, and a translator of the Epi'
tapkium Damonis and the Italian
poems. In the Lancashire dialect
it means * thin' or * meagre,* and it
is a question whether Milton was
aware of its existence there, or
whether he coined it to express the
sound, after the analogy of crane^
screech (G. schreien)^ &c. The
former hypothesis is more probable,
considering the extent of his infor-
mation, and the improbability of
his indulging in a license, which
would be questionable in point of
taste, and of which there would be

no other instance in his poems. It
has also been suggested that the
word may be connected with cranny
(G. krinne), and that if so, it would
well express the squeaking noise
produced from a pipe not perfectly
air-tight.

125] Cf. Epit, Dam, 67, where
the sheep mourn in sympathy,
' inque suum convertunt ora magis-
trum.'

are not fed] Cf. Reason of Church
Gov., ad fin. , *The swelling mood
of a proud clergy, who will not'
serve or feed your souls with
spiritual food.* One of the objec-
tions to the Kin^s Letters of 1 623
(see on /. 119) ran thus — * This is
the way to starve souls, by confining
them to one meal a day, or at best
by giving them only a mess of milk
for their supper ' (in reference to the
substitution of catechising for after-
noon sermons). To which it was
answered that * milk is best for
babes, which make up more than a
moiety of every congregation.'

126] Peck compares Dante,
Paradiso, Canto 29 —

* Si che le pecorelle, che non

sanno,
Toman dal pasco pasciute di
vento. '

Cf. Virg. Georg. iii. 504 (of the
cattle-plague), 'imaque longo Ilia
singultu tendunt,* and the Ai^^ ircv^
in Thucydides* description of the
pestilence at Athens (ii. 49). Here
of course there is a direct allusion
to the * windy' words of the
preacher, which may be illustrated
by the Homeric phrase hf^\k&KiVk
^iitiv {/I. iv. 355), and the Ger-
man windreden * to talk vainly.'
For the * rank mist ' cf. Song of

74

LYCIDAS.

Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread ;
Beside what the grim wolf with privy paw
Daily devours apace, and nothing said.

the Priest of Pan in Fletcher's
Faithful Shepherdess —

* Mists unsound,
Damps and vapours fly apace,
Hovering o'er the wanton face
Of these pastures, where they

come
Striking dead both bud and
bloom.'

127] Milton may here have re-
membered Lucretius, vi. 1 129 (of a
vitiated atmosphere) —

' £t cum spirantes mixtos hinc duci-
mus auras.
Ilia quoque in corpus pariter sor-
here necessest ; '

also iJb. 1235—

'nuUo cessabant tempore apisci
£x aliis alios avidi contagia morbi.^

Becon in his Supplication uses simi-
lar language of popish pastors,
' Instead of thy blessed communion
they feed thy sheep with vile stink-
ing devilish masses ; and into these
unwholesome and pestilent pastures
they drive the sheep.'

128] Those who with Pearce and
Newton believe Abp. Laud to be
the *wolf' here alluded to may
compare the continuation of the
passage just quoted — *and if any
refuse to taste of these pestilent
poisons, him they accite to appear
before that great 2w^[Bp. Gar-
diner], whose lips are fiill of deadly
poison.' Reasons against this in-
terpretation will be found in Ap-
pendix II. ; here it may be noticed
that the simile of wolves and sheep
assumes three distinct forms in the
New Testament — (i) the wolf in
sheep* s clothing (Matt. vii. 15), who
enters the fold under false pretences ;
(2) the shepherd who for lus rapacity

is said to devour the sheep (Acts
XX- 29) ; (3) the real wolf prowling
outside the fold and seeking an en-
trance. The last appears to be the
one here intended.

privy paw] So Diggon in Spen-
sePs 9th Eclogue, /. 160, speaks
of popish priests under the figure
of wolves ^ prvvely proUing to and
froe.' * Privy ' as an adjective,
though not used elsewhere by Mil-
ton, was common in his time, and
occurs in the Bible and Apocrypha
(Ezek. xxi. 14 ; Susanna, 18 ; Bel
and Dragon, 13, 21). Bacon in
his Essay on Building speaks of

* privy lodgings and privy gal-
leries.*

129] The spelling *sed' of the
MS. (cf L' Allegro, loi), altered to
*said* in ed. 1638, was replaced
in the editions of 1645 and 1673.
Warton in his History of English
Poetry observes that in the Elizabe-
than period the spelling of final
syllables was changed to satisfy the
eye as well as the ear. Hence in
Spenser we find such forms as

* bight,' * spight,' to rime with
'delight,* *dore' with 'restore,*
&c., &c. In the MS. of Lycidas
the last word of /. 193 is written
*■ blew ' for the same reason, and in
the 7th Sonnet * yeere ' and * neere '
are made to rime with *careere.'
Even in Pope's Essay on Man^ 148
(ed. 1 75 1), sour is spelt *sowr' to
rime with * pow'r.' In the present
passage some later editors, in ig-
norance of this custom, or mis-
taking the / for f altered * sed ' to

* fed,' to the destruction of the
sense. * Nothing ' was also changed
to ' little ' in 1638, but replaced in
the next edition. On the facts of
the case see Appendix II.

LYCIDAS.

But that two-handed engine at the door
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.*
Return, Alpheiis, the dread voice is past

75
130

130] If the *wolf* is not any
individual but a system, neither is
the * two-handed engine ' the axe
by which Laud was to lose his
head ; an event which no one could
easily have predicted in 1637. Mil-
Ion is merely using the familiar
simile of • the axe laid to the root
of the tree' (Matt. iii. 10), which
denotes a thorough and sweeping
reformation. Elsewhere he speaks
more explicitly of * the axe of God's
reformation hewing at the old and
hollow trunk of papacy,' and of the
duty of cutting away * the noisome
and diseased tumour of prelacy ;'
here^ he names neither institution
precisely, but alludes in general
terms to the religious corruptions of
the age and their speedy abolition ;
— *it is near, even at the doors'
(Matt. xxiv. 33).

Two other interpretations may
be dismissed as improbable— (i)
that the * engine' is the drawn
sword of St. Michael standing on
the Mount (1. 161), and the *wolf '
Satan; (2) that it refers to the
executioner Death with his scythe.
Warburton supposes that * St.
Peter's sword is turned into the
two-handed sword of romance,'
and compares P. L. vi. 251 ; but
this idea was probably siiggested by
the identity of the epithet * two-
handed ' in that passage, with
which the present has nothing else
in common. Keightley compares
the a.\iu^i^i\iov tribijpov of Eurip.
//tppoL 780.

engine] {ingenium) commonly
denotes a machine more or less
elaborately constructed. In P. L.
B. vi. the term is often used of
artillery in war (cf. Ezek. xxvi. 9) ;
Butler in Budibras applies it also to

a telescope, a fiddle, and to edged
tools ; horses are called * live en-
gines,' according to a theory that
they are mkchines made by geo-
metry. Its application to a mere
instrument wielded by the hand, as
here, is less frequent. Cf Pope,
Jiape of the Lock^ iii. 132 —

* he takes the scissors and extends
The little engine on his fingers'
ends.'

131 smite no more] Newton
compares i Sam. xxvi. 8. The
blow is to be sudden and decisive.

132] As the return from the for-
mer digression (/. 85) was marked
by the invocation of Arethusa, so
now the poet addresses Alpheus,
her legendary lover (Moschus, Id. 7;
Ovid, Met. v. 576 foil.) The stern
invective, which had scared away
the pastoral Muse, is now over, and
Milton reverts lovingly and enthusi-
astically to a strain more congenial
to his feelings. Scott in his Critical
Essays finds fault with the follow-
ing lines, chiefly on the ground that
* too many flowers are specified,
and spring flowers are injudiciously
blended with summer ones — the
primrose, cowslip, &c., with the
pink and rose.' Milton at least
must have thought otherwise, for
no passage in the whole poem has
been so carefully retouched as this
(see Various Readings). Masson,
vol. i. p. 614 note, remarks, * Mil-
ton hovered over this passage with
fastidious fondness, touching every
colour and fitting every word, till
he brought it to its present perfec-
tion of beauty.' Of these two
pieces of criticism utrum mavis
accipe /

the dread voice, &o.] a passing

76

LYCIDAS.

That shrunk thy streams ; return, Sicilian Muse,
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast
Their bells, and flowerets of a thousand hues.
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks ;
On whose fresh lap the swart-star sparely looks :

135

recognition of the superior power of
Christianity over Paganism. The
voice of St. Peter represents that of
Christ himself speaking to the
Church. Dunster cites Psalm civ.
6.

'33] The * Sicilian Muse ' is the
muse of Theocritus. Cf Virg. £ci,
iv. I ; vi. I. Bion and Moschus
make a similar acknowledgment in
JUxtKhv fi4\os and SdccAi/caT Moiacu.
So Milton speaks of * Himerides
Nymphae ' and * Sicelicum carmen *
in the opening lines of the Epita-
phium Damonis. It may be observed
that Theocritus himself does not
thus localise his muse ; he simply
says ti^x^* fiwKoK iKciSj Mvaai <pl-
Aai, dpx^T* ioiSas. In Virgil the

* Sicilian* epithet implies a pro-
fessed imitation of his Greek origi-
nal ; with Milton it has become a
general literary designation of pas-
toral poetry. (See Introduction.)

134 hither] i.e. on the hearse of
Lycidas, as if his body were actually
present (//. 152, 153). On the
custom of pinning verses to the
hearse see note on /. 151.

136 use] = 'haunt.' Cf. Spen-
ser, /l Q. B. VI., Jntrod. ii. 17,

* where never foot did use.'' May
translates Viig. Georg. iii. 418,
*■ Snakes that use within the house
for shade ' ( * tecto adsudus coluber ' ) ,
quoted by Newton and Todd. The
reverse order of meaning appears in

* wont,* which first signified * dwell-
ing ' (G. wohnen)^ and then * cus-
tom.' Cf. P. L. vii. 457, «the
wild beast where he worts.'' Both

verb and noun in this sense are
common in Spenser. Compare ^^ea
( * haunts *), from %Bo% (* custom '), in
Homer and Hesiod.

137 wanton winds] i.e. roving
at will (see Appendix I.). Cf Ar-
cades^ 47, * wanton windings \^ P. L.
ix. 517, *many a wanton wreath.'
Taken in its usual sense, the epithet
may remind us here of the mytho-
logical amours of the winds with
nymphs, such as that of Boreas with
Orithyia (Ovid, Alet. vi. 677 ; Plato,
Phadrus, c. i), and of Zephyrus
with Aurora {D Allegro^ 19).

138 swart- star] the dog-star,
* Sirius ardor ' (Virg. ^n. x. 273),
alluding to the effect of heat on vege-
tation. Newton quotes Hor. Od. III.
xii. 9, *Te flagrantis atrox hora Cani-
culae Nescit tangere ; ' he does not
say (as Warton alleges) that * Mil-
ton had an eye to Horace here,' but
merely compares the two passages.
For * swart' (a form of swarthy^
G. Schwartz)* cf ComuSy 436 ;
Shaksp. I Hen. VI. i. 2, * I was
black and swart before;' Keats,
Endymion^ B. ii., *some swart
abysm.' Caedmon speaks of * the
swart hell, a land void of light and
full of flame.'

sparely] the original MS. read-
ing restored by Milton's own hand.
(See list of Various Readings. )

The simple occurrence of the
word * looks ' is perhaps hardly suf-
ficient to justify Warton's conjecture
that the astrological * aspect ' of a
star is here intended ; yet such an
allusion is possible (cf. Arcades ^ 51 ;

LYCIDAS.

77

Throw hither all your quaint-enamelled eyes,
That on the green turf suck the honied showers,
And purple all the ground w»th vernal flowers.

140

P. L. vi. 313). We know that
astrology was much in vogue at this
period, the most famous professor
of the art being W. Lilly, who died
in 1 68 1, and was satirised in Hudu
bras under the name of Sidrophel.

139 qnaint] in its usual Miltonic
sense of * curious* or *{isintastic.'
Cf. P. Z. ix. 35 ; Arc. 47 ; Od.
Nat. 194. In Spenser, F. Q. IV.
vii. 45, * usage quaint * = odd be-
haviour. As applied to character
it means 'ingenious* or 'artful.'
Shaksp. 2 Hen. VI. iii. 2, *how
quaint an orator you are ; * Merch,
of Ven. iii. 4, 'quaint lies.* Its
primary meaning is * neat ' (of dress
or personal appearance), as in Much
Ado^ iii. 4, * quaint graceful fash-
ions,' from the Old French coint^
which is usually considered to re-
present the Latin comptus. Cf.
Du Cange, Gloss. s.v., * Galli coints
dicebant cultos, elegantes, compios.^
But Wedgwood properly follows
Diez in deriving it from cognitus^ the
idea being that of ' amenities arising
from civilised intercourse. ' The va-
rious stages of derivation are clearly
shown in the case of acquaint from
cuicognitare^ which latter word be-
came in Old French acointer, and
then ac{c)otntery whence followed in
due order acoint^ acqtteynt^ and ac-
qtuiint. Compare the different
senses of ' couth ' and * uncouth ' (/.
186 and note).

enamelled] painted as on enamel,
a favourite word with the older
poets. "Cf. P. L. iv. 149 ; ix. 525 ;
Arc. 84. Chaucer, Assembly of
Ladies^ 'flowers of right fine en-
amaile.* Drayton, Mttses Elysium^
* the enameled bravery of the beau-
teous spring.'

140 honied] like its Latin equi-
valent, mellituSi is one of the many
instances of adjectives formed with
the termination of a past participle,
without the intervention of an ac-
tually existing verb. Milton seems
to have been very fond of this for-
mation. Cf. 'mitred/ supra, 112.
The Nativity Ode alone contains
seven or eight examples, as * helm-
ed,* 'sworded,' 'mooned,' &c. It
is therefore strange that Dr. John-
son, writing in 1780, should con-
demn the practice in Gray's Ode to
Spring as unscholarlike, or speak of
it as having then but lately arisen.
Peck also is mistaken in his mention
of * honied * and ' roseate * among
the new words coined by Milton, for
the former occurs in Shakspere, Hen.
V. i. I ('honeyed sentences'), and in
P. Y\tX.c!ti^i^% Piscatory Eclogues, iii.
14 (• thy honied tongue'), the latter
in Drayton's Muses' Elysium ('ro-
seate anadem'), in Marlow's Trans-
lation of O-vid Eleg. iv. ( * roseate
buds'), and in a poem ascribed to
Sir W. Raleigh, The Shepherd and
the Flowers, written about 1590.

141 pnrple] usually 'empurple,*
P. L. iii. 364. The uncompounded
verb occurs P. L. vii. 30. Cf.
Purple Island, x. 81, 'Purpling
the scarlet cheek with fiery red.'
Here, like purpureus, it denotes
any bright colour, from a dazzling
white (Hor. Od. iv. i. 10) to a deep
red (Virg. ^n. ix. 349). Cf.
P. L. iv. 764, * his purple wings ; *
Spenser, F. Q. v. x. 16, 'the mor-
row next appeared with purple
haire ; ' Gray, Ode on Poesy, ' the
purple light of love* (Virgil's 'lu-
men juvenUs purpureum,' y£«. i.
594).

78

LYCIDAS.

Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,

142] Milton may or may not have
remembered the list of flowers in
Spenser, Ed. iv. 136 foil., of which
Mr. Bowles remarks that 'here is
an undoubted imitation,' but he
was certainly quite capable of in-
venting the following description
for himself. Many instances of a
similar enumeration occur in the
classics, e g. the elegy of Rufinus in
the Greek Anthology, beginning
irifiirto aolj 'PoSiJicActa, r6d€ aT4if>os,
&c (where the Kvayawyh iov is named
among others), and the list of
flowers gathered by Proserpine and
her maidens in Ovid, Fast. iv. 435
foU. When strewn upon the hearse
each had its own fancied signifi-
cance :— %

* Here fresh roses lie,
Whose ruddy blushes modest

thoughts descry.
The spotless lillies shew his pure

intent ;
The . flaming marigolds his zeale

present ;
The purple violets his noble minde.
Degenerate never from his princely

kinde ;
And last of all the hyacinths we

throw.
On which are writ the letters of
our woe * (/. 106 note).

{Elegy on Edward, son of Lord
Stafford^ by Sir J. Beaumont. ) Cf.
Purple Island^ ix. 319, * And strewed
with dainty flowers the lowly
hearse.*

rathe] (G. rath), * early;* one of
the really antiquated woids in Ly-
cidas (see on /. 189). Spenser has
*too rathe,* F. Q. ill. iii. 28;
'rather ( = earlier) lambs,* Eel. xii.
98. Cf Wither, Shepheard s Hunt-
ing, 4th Eel. (1614), * so ^ rathe a
song.* Warton quotes *the rathe
and timely primrose* from Eng-
land's Helicon (1614). Dryden

gives * rathe ripe * as the translation
oi precia (Virg. Georg. ii. 95), which
Servius explains by pmcoqua^

* early ripe.' Trench [English
Past and Present, p. 98), lamenting
the loss of this word, observes that
it is 'embalmed in the Lycidas of
Milton ; * he also quotes an instance
of the superlative ' rathest * in Bp.
Sanderson's Sermons. It is worth
noticing that rathe is still a common
word for early in certain districts of
South Wales.

forsaken] The first reading ' un-
wedded,* followed by the somewhat
obscure line, 'Coloring the pale
cheek of uninjoy'd love,* contained
an allusion to the fabled amours of
the Sun with certain flowers, and
was doubtless suggested by the
passage in Shakspere*s Winter's
Tale, iv. 4 —

*pale primroses
That die unmarried, ere they can

behold
Bright Phoebus in his strength ; —

a malady
Most incident to maids.*

But no such idea is involved in the
epithet as it now stands, which
merely suggests the modest nature
of the flower, blooming in retired
spots, and often fading unnoticed.

143 foil.] See original reading,
and cf. Quarles* Emblems, v. 2 —

* The purple vVlet and the pale-fac*d

lily,
The pansy and the organ columbine.
The flow'ring thyme, the gilt-breast

diaffodilly^
The lowly /*«/&, the lofly eglantine ;
The blushing rose, the queen of

flowers and best
Of Flora*s beauty ; but above the

rest
Let Jesses sov*reign flower perfume

my qualming breast.*

LYCIDAS.

79

The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet,

The glowing violet,

The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine,

With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head.

And every flower that sad embroidery wears ;

Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,

And daffadillies fill their cups with tears,

I4S

150

The last is a play upon 'jessamine,*
the real etymology of which is the
Persian jhsmin, * fragrant.' The
' crowtoe ' is probably the same as
'crowfoot,' a ranunculaceous plant,
the name being applied to those
species which have divided leaves.
It is also called the * kingcup,*
Spens. Eel. iv. 138 (Latham's
Johns. Diet. s. v. ). Richardson
identifies it with the hyacinth, the

* sad flower, &c.* of the first draft,
which was probably discarded be-
cause of the previous allusion to the
same story in /. 106. A simple
enumeration of the flowers is now
substituted for the learned descrip-
tions originally introduced. More-
over, three additional flowers — ^jes-
samine, pink, and musk-rose — are
put in the place of the one (»ar-
cissus) which is lost.

144] Cf. Comus, 851. The

* pansy * is the flower of thought
{pensie)^ as Ophelia says in Hamlet^
iv. 5 ; it is also called * love-in-
idleness* {Mids. N, Dream J ii. i),
and commonly 'heartsease.*

freaked]' = 'freckled,* G. fleek,
Gael, briete. Cf. Thomson, Win-
ter, 826, ' freaked with many a min-
gled hue.*

145] Plumptre translates Xwv Kva-
fovyhs Jkiarov from Rufinus, quoted
on /. 142 above.

146 well-attired woodbine] al-
tered from ' garish columbine.' The
latter epithet now occurs only in
II Penseroso, 141. Keightley com-
pares Cowper, Tcuky 167, ' Meze-

reon too, Though leafless, well'
attired.*

148 embroidery] from Old French
broder, to ornament with needle-
work (Gael, brod^ a needle) ; whence
the Low I^tin brodare^*z.oi pin-
gere,* Ducange, Gloss, s. v. In
P. L. iv. 700, it is used to describe
a field set with flowers. Cf. Chau-
cer, Prologue to Cant. Tales (of the
Squire) —

* Embrouded was he as it were a

mede,
Alle ful of freshe floures white and
rede.'

The usual derivation from border is
probably incorrect. Wedgwood,
however, considers brod and bord to
be identical in their origin, both
meaning the extremity of a thing.
He observes that the Icelandic
brydda signifies both ' to sharpen *
and 'to sew on an edging.* The
first reading, ' sorrow* s liverie,* is
illustrated by Todd from Wither' s
yuvenilia and Habington's Castara.
Cf. Fletcher, Purple Island j viii. 5,
' night's sad livery,' also JO Allegro^
62. In P. L. iv. 599, Milton
speaks of the * sober livery^ of twi-
light.

149 amarantlms] (a|^(£pavTos),
the unfading (i Peter i. 4), an em-
blem of immortality. It is placed
in Eden 'fast by the tree of life,*
P. Z. iii. 354.

150] Keats, Endymion^ B. iv.,

* brimming the water-lily cups with •
tears.' ' Daffodil ' « Aeur daspfio-

So

LYCIDAS.

To strew the laureate herse where Lycid lies. —
For so, to interpose a little ease,
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise ;
Ay me ! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas

diUj identified with Homer*s iunpS-
9f\os. The form 'daffodilly* occurs
in the Song to Pan in Fletcher's
Faithful Shepherdess ; Spenser, F.Q,
III. iv. 29 ; EcL iv. 60 ; * daffa-
downdillies ' in EcL iv. 140 of the
Shephearcfs Kalendar.

151] * The herse 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.'
(Stanley, Memorials of Westminster
Abbey, p. 341.) Cf. King's Elegy on
Donne —

*Each quill can drop his tributary

verse,
And pin it like the hatchments to
the herse.'

For the word see Appendix I.

lanreate] * decked with laurel*
{laureatus)j cf. /. I. Plumptre's
rendering, Batpvlvav, would mean
' made of laurel ' (laureus\ a sense
in which * laureate ' is sometimes
used, e.g. *laureat wreath,' Sonnet
xvi. 19. Laureattts is applied both
to persons and things, but usually
to the former, as a mark of honour ;
hence the title *poeta laureatus,'
first officially conferred on B. Jon-
son in 1619.

Lyoid] Cf. Keats, Sonnet mi. —

*0f fair-haired Milton's eloquent

distress.
And all his gentle love for Lycid
drowned.'

The older poets were fond of short-
ening classical names thus. Chau-
cer has Creysyd, Pandare, Adon,
&c. ; in Surrey we find Arge, Ide,
Sichee, &c. ; in Spenser, Archimag,
Acidale, Melibee, &c. Milton does

not so frequently avail himself of
this license, excepting in a few
commoner forms, such as Dian,
Hecat', Ind, &c.; otherwise the
name 'Erymanth' m Arcades, 100, is
almost a solitary instance.

152] *For' connects this line
with the preceding mention of the
hearse of Lycidas ; *for let us sup-
pose his body to be lying here
before us, though really it is far
away.* The structure of the next
sentence (placing a semicolon after

* surmise ') must be as follows :

* Let our thoughts dally, &c. [prin-
cipal verb], while the seas wash
thee far away, where'er thy bones
are hurled — whether beyond the
Hebrides (M^here thou visitest, &c.),
or whether thou sleepest, &c. (where
the great vision looks towards Na-
mancos and Bayona).' On the per-
son addressed in /. 163 see note
there.

153 dally] i.e. *play' or * trifle,*
from Dutch doll^n, to rave ; akin
to G. tdndeln and dahlen, to trifle.
Cf. Shaksp. Hamlet, v. 2, * you do
but dally.' In the Apocryphal Book
of Wisdom, xii. 26, God's judg-
ments upon the Canaanites are
spoken of as * that correction where-
in he dallied with them ... as
children without the use of rea-
son.'

Burmise] here =' fancy,' usually

* conjecture. '

154 Ay me !] See on /. 56.
Scott, Critical Essays, notices the

following lines as an instance of
poetical imagination of tbe right
kind, which 'should not produce
impossible fictions, but explore real
existence, and select from it cir-
cumstances as occasion requires.'

LYCIDAS.

8t

Wash far away,— where'er thy bones are hurled,
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,
Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide
Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world ;
Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,
Sleepest by the fable of Bellerus old,

155

160

the shorei— wash, fte.] This ex-
pression, though strange, is not the
result of oversight, since Milton de-
liberately 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. So
Celsus defines lUus^ *quousque
maximus fluctus a mari pervenit.'
Newton cites Virg. y^«. vi. 362,
* Nunc me fluctus habet, versantque
in litore venti,' which is a case in
point only on the assumption that
the latter clause cannot mean ' cast
up on the shore ; * a sense which
Heyne and Conington both adopt,
comparing Eur. Hec. 28, K6</tai t
iir* CLKTcus, &AXor' iv vSyrov ad\q>.
(In with the ablative occasionally
denotes motion, as in Phoedrus,
Fab. V. i. 15, *in conspectu meo
«udet venire.')

155 far away] here (according
to Newton) = * a/ a great distance, '
not to it. Keightley notes the ex-
pression as * ambiguous.* It pro-
bably means * far from the scene of
the shipwreck.'

156 whether, ftc.] Cf. Ode on
Death of a Fair Infant^ 38 foil. ;
Aristoph. Nubes^ 269 foil., referred
to on /. 50.

157] The first reading, 'hum-
ming,* for * whelming,' was inappro-
priate to the case of a dead man,
who could not hear the sound of

the waves. But Shakspere com-
mits the same error when he makes
Pericles (iii. i) apostrophise his
dead queen with the woixis, * And
humming water must o'erwhelm
thy corpse.* Warton compares
Virg. Georg. iv. 365, where Aris-
teeus, in his mother's ocean cave, is
said to be * ingenti motu stupefactus
aquarum.*

158 moiiBtroai] i. e. * full of
monsters,* the proper sense of the
Latin ending -osus^ as in saxosusj
&c. Monstruosus itself, however,
never bears this meaning, e.g.
'monsiruosa bestia,' &c.; and Mil-
ton elsewhere employs * monstrous *
in its usual acceptation, P. L. ii«
625 ; ComuSy 605, &c. Here he
seems to have remembered Hor.
Od, I. iii. 18, and Virg. y^n, vi.
729. Cf. Hom. Od, iii. 158, /tc-
yoic^Tca ir6vrov.

159 moiBt YOWi] i.e. *vows ac-
companied with tears ' (Warton).
Vota humida would be a correct
expression in Latin, though it does
not seem to occur. Martial, Epigr.
X. Ixxviii. 8, has *udo gaudio,' mean-
ing *joy mingled with weeping.'
Plumptre's translation, bypcus eC-
X<u^, is questionable.

•160 fable of BeUenis] » * fabled
abode of Bellerus* {sedes fabtUosa) ;
something like *fabulae Manes,' Hor.
Od, l.iv. 16 (for Manes fabulosi)^ * the
ghosts of olden story.' The name
is coined from Bellerium, now the
Land's End. Cf. Cowley, Plan-
tarum ZJber^ vi., *Belerii extremis
a coniibus Orcadas usque ; * Pope,
Windsor Forest^ 315, *From old

So

LYCIDAS.

To strew the laureate herse where Lycid lies. —
For so, to interpose a little ease,
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise ;
Ay me ! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas

d^/e^ identified with Homer*s ittrtpS-
HfKos. The form 'daffodilly* occurs
in the Song to Pan in Fletcher's
Faithful Shepherdess ; Spenser, F. Q,
in. iv. 29; Eel. iv. 60; 'daffa-
downdillies ' in Eel. iv. 140 of the
ShephearcTs Kalendar.

151] * The herse 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.'
(Stanley, Memorials of Westminster
Abbey, p. 341.) Cf King's Elegy on
Donne —

'Each quill can drop his tributary

verse,
And pin it like the hatchments to
the herse.'

For the word see Appendix I.

laureate] * decked with laurel*
{laureatus)^ cf. /. I. Plumptre's
rendering, Bcupvlvay, would mean
* made of laurel * (laureus), a sense
in which * laureate* is sometimes
used, e.g. *laureat wreath,' Sonnet
xvi. 19. Laureatus is applied both
to persons and things, but usually
to the former, as a mark of honour ;
hence the title 'poeta laureatus,*
first officially conferred on B. Jon-
son in 1619.

Lycid] Cf. Keats, Sonnet rx. —

'Of fair-haired Milton's eloquent

distress,
And all his gentle love for Lycid
drowned.'

The older poets were fond of short-
ening classical names thus. Chau-
cer has Creysyd, Pandare, Adon,
&c. ; in Surrey we find Arge, Ide,
Sichee, &c. ; in Spenser, Archimag,
Acidale, Melibee, &c. Milton does

not so frequently avail himself of
this license, excepting in a few
commoner forms, such as Dian,
Hecat', Ind, &c.; otherwise the
name * Erymanth ' in Arcades^ 100, is
almost a solitary instance.

152] 'For* connects this line
with the preceding mention of the
hearse of Lycidas ; ^for let us sup-
pose his body to be lying here
before us, though really it is far
away.' The structure of the next
sentence (placing a semicolon after
' surmise ') must be as follows :
* Let our thoughts dally, &c. [prin-
cipal verb], while the seas wash
thee far away, where'er thy bones
are hurled — whether beyond the
Hebrides (where thou visitest, &c.),
or whether thou sleepest, &c. (where
the great vision looks towards Na-
mancos and Bayona).* On the per-
son addressed in /. 163 see note
there.

153 dally] i.e. 'play' or 'trifle,*
from Dutch dollen, to rave ; akin
to G. tdndeln and dahlen, to trifle.
Cf Shaksp. Hamlet, v. 2, * you do
but dally.' In the Apocryphal Book
of Wisdom, xii. 26, God's judg-
ments upon the Canaanites are
spoken of as ' that correction where-
in he dallied with them ... as
children without the use of rea-
son.'

surmise] here = ' fancy,' usually
* conjecture. '

154 Ay me!] See on /. 56.
Scott, Critical Essays^ notices the

following lines as an instance of
poetical imagination of the right
kind, which 'should not produce
impossible fictions, but explore real
existence, and select from it cir-
cumstances as occasion requires.*

LYCIDAS.

8t

Wash far away,— where'er thy bones are hurled,
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,
Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide
Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world ;
Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,
Sleepest by the fable of Bellerus old.

IS5

1 60

the Bhores — wash, fto.] This ex-
pression, though strange, is not the
result of oversight, since Milton de-
liberately 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 sAore does
however literally mean * that which
divides the water from the land,'
and therefore includes the portion
sometimes covered by the tide. So
Celsus defines litus^ *quousque
maximus fluctus a mari pervenit.'
Newton cites Virg. y^n. vi. 362,
* Nunc me fluctus habet, versantque
in litore venti,' which is a case in
point only on the assumption that
the latter clause cannot mean ' cast
up on the shore ; ' a sense which
Heyne and Conington both adopt,
comparing Eur. Hec. 28, Kei/Acu ^
iir^ aKTCuSj AaAot' ip itSyrov ffd?^,
{In with the ablative occasionally
denotes motion, as in Fhoedrus,
Fab. V. i. 15, 'in conspectu meo
ftudet venire.')

155 far away] here (according
to Newton) =*a/ a great distance,'
not to it. Keightley notes the ex-
pression as 'ambiguous.' It pro-
bably means * far from the scene of
the shipwreck.'

156 whether, fte.] Cf. Ode on
Death of a Fair Infant^ 38 foil. ;
Aristoph. Nubes^ 269 foil., referred
to on /. 50.

157] The. first reading, 'hum-
ming,' for * whelming,' was inappro-
priate to the case of a dead man,
who could not hear the sound of

the waves. But Shakspere com-
mits the same error when he makes
Pericles (iii. i) apostrophise his
dead queen with the words, 'And
humming water must o'erwhelm
thy corpse.' Warton compares
Virg. Georg. iv. 365, where Aris-
teeus, in his mother's ocean cave, is
said to be * ingenti motu stupefactus
aquarum.*

158 monitrous] i. e. ' full of
monsters,' the proper sense of the
L.atin ending -osus^ as in saxosus^
&c. Monstruosus itself, however,
never bears this meaning, e.g.
'monstruosa bestia,' &c.; and Mil-
ton elsewhere employs * monstrous *
in its usual acceptation, P, L. ii,
625 ; ComuSy 605, &c. Here he
seems to have remembered Hor.
Od. I. iii. 18, and Virg. y^n. vi.
729. Cf. Hom. Od. iii. 158, /*6-
yoK^Tca •K6vrov.

159 moist vowi] i.e. *vows ac-
companied with tears ' (Warton).
Vota humida would be a correct
expression in Latin, though it does
not seem to occur. Martial, Fpigr.
X. Ixxviii. 8, has 'udogaudio,' mean-
ing 'joy mingled with weeping.'
Plumptre's translation, vypcus eC-
X<wJ, is questionable.

•160 fable of Bellerus] =: ' fabled
abode of Bellerus' {sedes fabulosa) ;
something like 'fabulae Manes,' Hor.
Od. I. iv. 1 6 (for Manes fabulosi)^ * the
ghosts of olden story.' The name
is coined from Bellerium, now the
Land's End. Cf. Cowley, Plan-
tarum Liber ^ vi., 'Belerii extremis
a coniibus Orcadas usque ; ' Pope,
Windsor Forest^ 315, 'From old

So

LYCIDAS.

To strew the laureate herse where Lycid lies. —
For so, to interpose a little ease,
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise ;
Ay me I whilst thee the shores and sounding seas

d^/e^ identified with Homer*s h.(r(f>6-
9e\os. The form * daffodilly* occurs
in the Song to Pan in Fletcher's
Faithful Shepherdess ; Spenser, F. Q.
in. iv. 29 ; £c/. iv. 60 ; * daffa-
downdillies ' in £cL iv. 140 of the
Shepheard*s Kalendar,

151] * The herse 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.*
(Stanley, Memorials of Westminster
Abbey ^ p. 341.) Cf. King's Elegy on
Donne —

*Each quill can drop his tributary

verse,
And pin it like the hatchments to
the herse.*

For the word see Appendix I.

laureate] * decked with laurel'
{laureatus)^ cf. /. i. Plumptre's
rendering, Bauf>vivay, would mean
' made of laurel ' (laureus\ a sense
in which ' laureate ' is sometimes
used, e.g. *laureat wreath,' Sonnet
xvi. 19. Laureattis is applied both
to persons and things, but usually
to the former, as a mark of honour ;
hence the title *poeta laureatus,*
first officially conferred on B. Jon-
son in 1619.

Lyoid] Cf. Keats, Sonnet -xi. —

'Of fair-haired Milton's eloquent

distress.
And all his gentle love for Lycid

drowned.'

The older poets were fond of short-
ening classical names thus. Chau-
cer has Creysyd, Pandare, Adon,
&c. ; in Surrey we find Arge, Ide,
Sichee, &c. ; in Spenser, Archimag,
Acidale, Melibee, &c. Milton does

not so frequently avail himself of
this license, excepting in a few
commoner forms, such as Dian,
Hecat', Ind, &c.; otherwise the
name * Erymanth ' in Arcades, 100, is
almost a solitary instance.

152] *For' connects this line
with the preceding mention of the
hearse of Lycidas ; *for let us sup-
pose his body to be lying here
before us, though really it is fe,r
away.' The structure of the next
sentence (placing a semicolon after

* surmise ') must be as follows :

* Let our thoughts dally, &c. [prin-
cipal verb], while the seas wash
thee far away, where'er thy bones
are hurled — whether beyond the
Hebrides (M^here thou visitest, &c.),
or whether thou sleepest, &c. (where
the great vision looks towards Na-
mancos and Bayona).' On the per-
son addressed in /. 163 see note
there.

153 dally] i.e. *play' or * trifle,*
from Dutch doll^n, to rave ; akin
to G. tdndeln and dahlen, to trifle.
Cf. Shaksp. Hamlet, v. 2, * you do
but dally.' In the Apocryphal Book
of Wisdom, xii. 26, God's judg-
ments upon the Canaanites are
spoken of as * that correction where-
in he dallied with them ... as
children without the use of rea-
son.*

Burmiie] here =' fancy,' usually
'conjecture.'

154 Ay me !] See on /. 56.
Scott, Critical Essays, notices the

following lines as an instance of
poetical imagination of the right
kind, which * should not produce
impossible fictions, but explore real
existence, and select from it cir-
cumstances as occasion requires.*

LYCIDAS.

8t

Wash far away,— where'er thy bones are hurled,
Whether beyond the stonny Hebrides,
Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide
Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world ;
Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,
Sleepest by the fable of Bellerus old.

155

160

the shores— wMh, ftc] This ex-
pression, though strange, is not the
result of oversight, since Milton de-
liberately 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. So
Celsus defines litus^ ^quousque
maximus fluctus a mari pervenit.'
Newton cites Virg. ALn. vi. 362,

* Nunc me fluctus habet, versantque
in litore venti,' which is a case in
point only on the assumption that
the latter clause cannot mean ' cast
up on the shore ; * a sense which
Heyne and Conington both adopt,
comparing Eur. Hec, 28, Kuyuax If
hr^ aKTCus, AaAot' ip nSvrov ffd\fp.
{In with the ablative occasionally
denotes motion, as in Phoedrus,
Fab. V. i. 15, *in conspectu meo
ftudet venire.')

155 far away] here (according
to Newton) = *«/ a great distance,'
not to it. Keightley notes the ex-
pression as 'ambiguous.' It pro-
bably means * far from the scene of
the shipwreck.'

156 whether, ftc.] Cf. Ode on
Death of a Fair Infant^ 38 foil. ;
Aristoph. Nubes^ 269 folL, referred
to on /. 50.

157] The. first reading, 'hum-
ming,' for * whelming,' was inappro-
priate to the case of a dead man,
who could not hear the soimd of

the waves. But Shakspere com-
mits the same error when he makes
Pericles (iii. i) apostrophise his
dead queen with the woixis, 'And
humming water must o'erwhelm
thy corpse.' Warton compares
Virg. Georg. iv. 365, where Aris-
teeus, in his mother's ocean cave, is
said to be * ingenti motu stupefactus
aquarum.'

158 monstrous] i. e. ' fiill of
monsters,' the proper sense of the
Latin ending -osus^ as in saxosus^
&c. Monstruosus itself, however,
never bears this meaning, e.g.
*monsiruosa bestia,' &c.; and Mil-
ton elsewhere employs * monstrous '
in its usual acceptation, P. L. ii«
625 ; Comus, 605, &c. Here he
seems to have remembered Hor.
Od. I. iii. 18, and Virg. ^n. vi.
729. Cf. Hom. Od. iii. 158, /ac-
•yoic^Teo irSvTov.

159 moist Yows] i.e. *vows ac-
companied with tears * (Warton).
Vota humida would be a correct
expression in Latin, though it does
not seem to occur. Martial, Fpigr.
X. Ixxviii. 8, has 'udogaudio,' mean-
ing 'joy mingled with weeping.'
Plumptre's translation, bypaus eC-
Xa», is questionable.

•160 fable of Bellerus] = * fabled
abode of Bellerus' {sedes /abulosa) ;
something like 'fabulae Manes,' Hor.
Od. I. iv. 1 6 (for Manes fabulosi), * the
ghosts of olden story.' The name
is coined from Bellerium, now the
Land's End. Cf. Cowley, F/an-
tarum Liber ^ vi., *Belerii extremis
a coruibus Orcadas usque ; ' Pope,
Windsor Forest^ 315, *From old

So

LYCIDAS.

To strew the laureate herse where Lycid lies. —
For so, to interpose a little ease,
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise ;
Ay me ! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas

£^/f, identified with Homer*s ktrtpS-
SfKos, The form * daffodilly* occurs
in the Song to Pan in Fletcher's
Faithful Shepherdess ; Spenser, F.Q,
III. iv. 29; Ed, iv. 60; 'daffa-
downdillies ' in Ed. iv. 140 of the
ShephearcTs Kalendar,

151] * The herse was a platform,
decorated with black hangings, and
containing an efHgy of the deceased.
Laudatory verses were attached
to it with pins, wax, or paste.*
(Stanley, Memorials of Westminster
Abbey ^ p. 341.) Cf. King's Elegy on
Donne —

*£ach quill can drop his tributary

verse,
And pin it like the hatchments to
the herse.*

For the tvord see Appendix I.

laureate] 'decked with laurel*
(laureatus), cf. /. I. Plumptre*s
rendering, So^vfyov, would mean
* made of laurel * (laureus\ a sense
in which 'laureate* is sometimes
used, e.g. 'laureat wreath,* Sonnet
xvi. 19. Laureatus is applied both
to persons and things, but usually
to the former, as a mark of honour ;
hence the title 'poeta laureatus,*
first officially conferred on B. Jon-
son in 1619.

Lycid] Cf. Keats, Sonnet yx. —

*0f fair-haired Milton*s eloquent

distress.
And all his gentle love for Lycid
drowned.*

The older poets were fond of short-
ening classical names thus. Chau-
cer has Creysyd, Pandare, Adon,
&c. ; in Surrey we find Arge, Ide,
Sichee, &c. ; in Spenser, Archimag,
Acidale, Melibee, &c. Milton does

not so frequently avail himself of
this license, excepting in a few
commoner forms, such as Dian,
Hecat', Ind, &c. ; otherwise the
name ' Erymanth' in Arcades^ 100, is
almost a solitary instance.

152] *For* connects this line
with the preceding mention of the
hearse of Lycidas ; ^for let us sup-
pose his body to be lying here
before us, though really it is far
away.* The structure of the next
sentence (placing a semicolon after

* surmise ') must be as follows :

* Let our thoughts dally, &c. [prin-
cipal verb], while the seas wash
thee far away, where'er thy bones
are hurled — whether beyond the
Hebrides (where thou visitest, &c.),
or whether thou sleepest, &c. (where
the great vision looks towards Na-
mancos and Bayona).' On the per-
son addressed in /. 163 see note
there.

153 dally] i.e. *play* or 'trifle,'
from Dutch dollen^ to rave ; akin
to G. tdndeln and dahlen, to trifle.
Cf. Shaksp. Hamlety v. 2, * you do
but dally.' In the Apocryphal Book
of Wisdom^ xii. 26, God's judg-
ments upon the Canaanites are
spoken of as * that correction where-
in he dallied with them ... as
children without . the use of rea-
son.*

Burmise] here = ' fancy,' usually
'conjecture.'

154 Ay me!] See on /. 56.
Scott, Critical Essays, notices the

following lines as an instance of
poetical imagination of the right
kind, which 'should not produce
impossible fictions, but explore real
existence, and select from it cir-
cumstances as occasion requires.'

LYCIDAS.

8t

Wash far away,— where'er thy bones are hurled,
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,
Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide
Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world ;
Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,
Sleepest by the fable of Bellerus old,

IS5

i6o

the shoTOB — wash, fto.] This ex-
pression, though strange, is not the
result of oversight, since Milton de-
liberately 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. So
Celsus defines litus^ *quousque
maximus fluctus a mari pervenit.*
Newton cites Virg. /En. vi. 362,
• Nunc me fluctus habet, versantque
in litore venti,' which is a case in
point only on the assumption that
the latter clause cannot mean * cast
up on the shore ; ' a sense which
Heyne and Conington both adopt,
comparing Eur. Hec. 28, icctfuu V
iir' OKTCuSy &\KoT* iy ft6vrov <r(£x^.
{In with the ablative occasionally
denotes motion, as in Phoedrus,
Fab, V. i. 15, *in conspectu meo
ftudet venire.')

155 far away] here (according
to Newton) —*at a, great distance, '
not to it. Keightley notes the ex-
pression as * ambiguous.' It pro-
bably means * far from the scene of
the shipwreck.*

156 whether, ftc.] Cf. Ode on
Death of a Fair Infant^ 38 foil.;
Aristoph. Nubes^ 269 foil., referred
to on /. 50.

157] The. first reading, 'hum-
ming,' for * whelming,' was inappro-
priate to the case of a dead man,
who could not hear the sound of

the \i'aves. But Shakspere com-
mits the same error when he makes
Pericles (iii. i) apostrophise his
dead queen with the words, 'And
humming water must o'erwhelm
thy corpse.' Warton compares
Virg. Georg. iv. 365, where Aris-
teeus, in his mother's ocean cave, is
said to be * ingenti motu stupefactus
aquarum. '

158 monBtrous] i. e. ' fiiU of
monsters,' the proper sense of the
Latin ending -osus^ as in saxosusy
&c. Monstruosus itself, however,
never bears this meaning, e.g.
'monstruosa bestia,' &c.; and Mil-
ton elsewhere employs * monstrous '
in its usual acceptation, F. L. ii«
625 ; ComuSy 605, &c. Here he
seems to have remembered Hor.
Od. I. iii. 18, and Virg. ^n, vi.
729. Cf. Hom. Od, iii. 158, fte-
ycuciirca ir6vTov.

159 moiBt yowb] i.e. Wows ac-
companied with tears ' (Warton).
Vota humida would be a correct
expression in Latin, though it does
not seem to occur. Martial, Epigr.
X. Ixxviii. 8, has *udogaudio,' mean-
ing *joy mingled with weeping.'
Plumptre's translation, ^pous c0-
Xau, is questionable.

•160 fable of Sellerns] » < fabled
abode of Bellerus' [sedes fabulosa) ;
something like 'fabulae Manes,' Hor.
Od. i.iv. 16 (for Manes fabulosi)y * the
ghosts of olden story.' The name
is coined from Bellerium, now the
Land's End. Cf. Cowley, Flan-
tarum Liber ^ vi., 'Belerii extremis
a coniibus Orcadas usque ; ' Pope,
Windsor Forest^ 315, *From old

S2

LYCIDAS.

Where the great Vision of the guarded Mount
Looks toward Namancos and Bayona's hold : —
Look homeward, Angel, now, and melt with ruth,

Belerium to the northern main. ' The
original reading was ^Corineus,'
whom Milton mentions in his l/is'
tory of Britain^ B. i., as a giant who
came over with Brute the Trojan,
and from whom Cornwall took its
name, being * assigned to him by
lot,* or, as Drayton says (Polyolb.
1st Song), given him for his victory
over Gogmagog the Cornish giant.
The change of reading may have
been made for rhythmical reasons, as
'Bellerus* runs more smoothly in
the line than * Corlneus.*

A writer in the Edinburgh Re-
view ^ 1 82 1, has the following re*
marks on Milton's treatment of
early British legends : — * Milton was
perhaps the first who dared dis-
avow his belief of the legends which
for centuries had been placed at
the head of the early history of
England. [See Hist, of Britain^
B. i.] Yet he deigns to relate them,
because the very belief in them was
characteristic of ^ nation ; because
they might contain some traces of
ancient tradition, and be an evidence
of manners, if not of events ; and
lastly as themes for the poet, on
which he had himself once medi-
tated to build a monument to the
glory of his country. ' [See Epist. ad
Mansum^ I. 78; Epit. Dam, I. 1 62. J
161] The * guarded (fortified)
Mount* is a steep rock opposite
Marazion near Penzance, accessible
from the land at low water. On it
are the ruins of a fortress and a mo-
nastery, with a church dedicated to
St. Michael ; at the summit is a
craggy seat called St. Michael's
chair, in which several apparitions
of the archangel are reported to
have been seen ; hence the * great
Vision * in the text. Carew, in his

Survey of Cmmwall^ alludes to the
Mount as a favourite resort of pil-
grims, quoting the lines —

* Who knows not Mighel*s Mount

and Chaire,
The pilgrim's holy vaunt ?*
Cf. Spenser, Eel, vii. 41 —
'St. Michael's Mount who does

not know.
That guards the westeme coast ? '

162] The question as to the lo-
cality of Namancos puzzled com-
mentators not a little, until Todd
(1809) referred to Mercator's Atlas
of 1636, 'in which the place is
clearly marked rather to the east
of Cape Finisterre, with the Castle
of Bayona on the south. Naman-
cos also appears in Ojea's map of
Galicia (1650), but seems to have
been afterwards omitted, as it is
not found in Nolin's map (1762),
nor in that of Lopez (1784), nor in
the Atlas Nacional de Espafta of
1838. Todd in his edition of 180 1
had suggested Numantia, and Dun*
ster, adopting this view, took Bayo-
na to be the French Bayonne ; but
it is plain that co one could * look
towards ' both these places at once
in a direct line from St. Michael's
Mount. Cf. Drayton, Polyolb.
23rd Song —

•Then Comwal creepeth out into

the western maine.
As lying in her eye she pointeth
still at Spaine.'

163] Notwithstanding the verbal
contrast between the *look home-
ward ' of this line and the looking
* towards Namancos, &c.' of the
one preceding, it seems impossible
to accept Warton's supposition that
St. Michael is the person here ad-

I.YCIDAS.

«3

And, O ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth.

dressed, or to go beyond the bare
admission that the one form of ex*
pression may probably have sug-
gested the other. If a full stop be
placed at 'surmise,' the present line
is required to complete the sentence
beginning at * whilst thee, &c. , * which
would otherwise be unfinished, and
of which Lycidas is the subject
throughout ; but, even with the
semicolon there (see on /. 152),
the fact still remains that St. Mi-
chael's apparition is merely intro-
duced parenthetically, as part of a
local description, and never directly
addressed. The sudden transition
from the idea of the spirit looking
down from heaven to that of the
body wafted by dolphins is doubt-
less awkward ; but the question is,
not what Milton might better have
said, but what he actually does say,
according to the laws of grammar
and the plain construction of the
sentence. Independently of these
considerations, the view we are de-
fending is rendered almost certain
by the coincidence of the present
passage and of //. 183 foil in
structure, language, and sentiment,
with certain lines in the 1st Eclogue
of Sannazaro {circ. 1520), in which
a dro\A'ned man is thus addressed
by his mourning friends :

* At tu, sive ahum felix colis aethera,

seu jam
Elysios inter Manes, &c. . . .
Aspice nos mitisque veni, tu numen

aquarum
Semper erisj semper latum piscanti-

bus amen.*

There can surely be no reasonable
doubt that we have here Milton's
original, and that, if so, the words

* look homeward, &c.' are said to
Lycidas, and not to the angel. As
to Warton's further objection that
the terms of the apostrophe are in-
appropriate, as forming part of an

address to the departed spirit, a
few instances out of many will suf-
fice to show that the sentiment is
both natural and common. Spen-
ser in his Elegy on Sir P. Sidney
invokes the * happy sprite ' to * look
down awhile ' upon his friends ;
Donne makes a similar appeal to
the soul of Lord Harrington, and
Habington entreats the spirit of
Geoi^, Earl of Surrey, to ' look
down with propitious eyes and smile
upon this sacrifice.' The language
of Cowley in his Death of Hervey
still more closely resembles that of
Milton, when he imagines 'the
glorious saints' as beholding their
friends * with holy pity ; ' and Young,
in his Night Thoughts, says of the
dead, * They live . . . and from an
eye of tenderness let heavenly pity
fall.* These, with other passages
that might be quoted, are a sufficient
answer to Warton's enquiry, * Why
is the shipwrecked person to melt
with ruth?'

ruth] Cf. Chaucer, Troilus and
Creyseyde, * have routh upon my
pains ; ' Sidney, Arcadia, B. i. Eel.
I, * thou my dog whose ridth (pity
for the flock) and valiant might,
&c.' Primarily the word means

* sorrow,' from *rue' (O.E. hr^mv-
an, G. reuen). Cf. B. Jonson,
Epitaph on his Daughter, * her pa-
rents' ruth.' 'Pity and ruth' are
joined in Milton's 9th Sonnet, I. 8,
and in Spenser, F. Q. i. vi. 12.
For the verb in its secondary sense
cf. Wyatt, 51st Psalm, *r«^onme,
Lord;' Watson (1593), \i%\. Sonnet,

* rew and pittie my vexations.'
' Ruthful ' occurs in Shaksp. I Jlen.
VI. V. 5, and elsewhere ; * rueful '
and * ruthless ' still survive.

164] Richardson refers to Pau-
sanias' statement about Palaemon,
*that a dolphin took him up and
laid his body on the shore at Co-
rinth, where he was deified ' (cf.

G 2

84

LYCIDAS.

Weep no more, wofiil shepherds, weep no more,
For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead.

i6^

//. 183-185). Stories of the amia-
bility of dolphins were common in
ancient times. Besides the familiar
legend of Anon (Herod, i. 24 ; Ov.
Fast, ii. 105 foil.), we have the one
quoted from Apion by Gellius,
Noct, Att. vii. 8, of a dolphin who
carried a boy on his back daily from
Baise to Puteoli, and on the death
of the boy pined away with grief.
Pliny, Nat. Hist. ix. 8, describes
the animal as *maxime homini
amicum ' (cf. Arist. De Animalibusy
ix. 35), and especially notices its
care of its own species, when dead
or wounded. Some of these tales
about dolphins may (as Liddell and
Scott suppose s. V. SeX^fs) be due
to the fact of their playing in
stormy weather, and so warning
mariners of danger ; the * curved
back' (Ov. /. c. 137) might sug-
gest the idea of carrying a burden.
Cf. Shaksp. Ant. attd Chop.
V. 2 —

*his delights
Were dolphin-like ; they showed

his back above
The element they lived in.*

165-185] * The common conclu-
sion of a funeral elegy is the beati-
fication of the deceased* (Scott,
Critical Essays). Here the classi-
cal apotheosis forms an additional
feature in the description (see on
/. 183, and the concluding lines of
iht Epit. Damonis). What follows
may be compared with Spenser,
Eel. xi. 169 foil. —
*Dido is dead, but unto heaven

hent ; . . ,
She reignes a goddess now emong

the saintes ; . . .
There drinckes she nectar with
ambrosia mixt, &c.*

Cf. Watson, Eclogue on the Death

of Melibceus (Sir F. "Walsingham),

1590—

* Injustlie judge we Melibceus' death.

As though his worth was buried
in his fate ;

Now Meliboeus in comparelesse
place

Drinkes nectar, eates divine am-
brosia.*
Contrast the sentiment of Moschus,
Epit. BioniSf 112-141, of a portion
of which we offer the following
paraphrase : * Alas ! the herbs wi-
ther and grow again ; while we the
mighty and the wise, all speechless
in the tomb, sleep the long endless
slumber that knows no waking
{h.rfpiJMva yirypirov fhrvov). . . . But
tune thou thy lay before the queen of
Hades, if haply thy music may win
a guerdon for thee, and thou mayest
return to earth once more.* On
the other hand, see Virgil*s apotheo-
sis of Caesar, under the name of
Daphnis, Eel. v. 56 foil., only ob-
serving that the glory which he
reserves for an extraordinary hero,
Milton, as a Christian, claims for
all pious souls. For *woful,' ap-
plied to persons, cf. Sidney's Ar-
cadia^ B. ii., 'the woeful Gynecia;*
Daniel, Civil Wars, * How many
woeful maidens left to mourn ! *

166 your sorrow] i.e. the object
of your sorrow, vester dolor. Cf.
Propert. I. xiv. 18, * Ilia etiam
duris mentibus (potest) esse dolor?
So mea desideria, *my love,* Cic.
Epist. Fam.

not dead] Cf. Death of Fair In-
fanty I. 29. Warton quotes from
the Lay of Clorinda (attributed to
Spenser) tlie lines beginning *Ah
no, it is not dead ne can it die.*
Cf. Epitaph on Sir W. Drury^ by
Bamabe Ritche, in the Paradise
of Dayntie De^eSj 1579: —

LYCIDAS.

85

Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor.
So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed.
And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore

170

* Your Drury is not dead !
He liveth he amongst the blessed

route. . . .
Wherefore, you worthy wightes,

leave of to wayle.*

167 floor] (G. Flur) is any level
surface {fsquor), Cf. Arcadia^ B. i.,
'the morning did strew roses and
violets in the heavenly floor.'
Schiller, in his poem entitled Das
Ideal und das Leben^ has *des
Lichtes Fluren,' « fields of light.'

168] The * day-star' may pos-
sibly, as Newton thinks, be the sun,
which is called the ' diurnal star ' in
P, Z. X. 1069. Cf. Pindar, Olymp.
i. 9, fi^Kctf* kKiov aK&rci &X\oBa\-
Tp&repov. . . iffrpop; Ovid, J*asf,
vi. 718, where *stella serena' is
said of Phoebus ; also Afgi. i. 429 ;
TibuU. II. i. 47, where * sidus ' is
similarly used. The chief advan-
tage of this interpretation would be
to save Milton from the astronomi-
cal blunder involved in making the
same planet a morning and an even-
ing star in one day ; but here, as in
/. 30 (see note), he is most likely
to have followed the usage of the
ancients, who commonly speak of
Lucifer and Hesperus in this way.
Catullus, Ixii. 34, describes the
evening star as returning next morn-
ing, * mutato nomine ; * Horace,
Od. II. ix. 10, measures a night's
duration by the rising and setting of
Hesperus ; and Virgil, £c/. viii.
17 and 30, makes Lucifer and Hes-
perus appear during the same day.
Moreover, the present passage is
evidently copied from Virg.-^«.viii.
5^» * Qualis ubi Oceani perfiisus
Lucifer unda, &c.,' compared with
the original in Horn. //. y. 6, thus

translated by Lord Derby : —

' like autumn's star, that
brightest shines
When newly risen from his ocean
bath.»

Compare also the closely similar
language in Giles Fletcher s CArisfs
THumph after Death, II. 89 foil.—

'So fairest Phosphor, the bright

morning-star.
But newly washed in the green

element.
Before the drowsy night is half

aware.
Shooting his flaming locks with

dew besprent,
Springs lively up into the orient.*

169 anon] sm one (moment),
immediately. The word is com-
mon in Shakspere ; see especially
the scene at the Boar's Head Ta-
vern, I Hen. IV, ii. 4. It occurs
twice only in the authorised version
of the Bible, Matt. xiii. 20, Mark

i. 30-

repairs] 'refreshes,' from repa*
rare, to get a frssh supply in place
of what is lost or damaged. Hor.
Od. IV. vii. 13, 'Damna tamen
celeres r^«ra»/ cselestia lunse.' The
line in Gray's Bard, I. \yj (of the
sun), * to-morrow he repairs his
golden flood,' quoted by Warton,
is probably a remin^cence of Milton.

1 70 tricks] sets in order, adorns.
Cf. H Penseroso, 123 ; Shaksp.
Merry W. of Windsor, iv. 4, * trick-
ings for our fairies.' Todd on //
Pens. I. c. quotes from Sandys*
Traveb, B. i. (of a Turkish bride),
* they trick her in her richest or-
naments.' (On the etymology and

86

LYCIDAS.

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,

Where, other groves and other streams along,

With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves,

175

senses of the word see Appen-
dix I.)

Bpangled] from Gaelic spang^ a
metal plate. Cf. Spenser, F. Q,
IV. xi. 45, * glittering spangs.' It
is rather a favourite word with
Milton (P. L. vii. 384, Od, Nat
21, Psalm cxxxvi. 35, &c.); like
tifisel [Comus^ 877) and others, it has
now lost somewhat of its dignity.
See Trench, Study of Words ^ P* 5^ ;
Eng, Past and Present^ p. 130.

* Spangled heavens * occurs in Addi-
son's well-known paraphrase of the
19th Psalm.

ore] =* golden radiance,* as in
Keats' Endymion^ B. ii., * a golden
splendour with quiver^jng ore,^ For
*ore' in the distinc^^ive sense of

* gold * (probably owing to an erro-
neous derivation from aurum) cf.
ComuSy 932 ; Shaksp. Hamlet^ iv.
I, * like some ore among a mineral
of metals base.* It is applied to
other metals, iron or copper, in
P. L. xi. 570. The word properly
signifies a vein of metal in the mine
(Dutch aare^ G. ader), P. Fletcher,
Purple Island^ ix.251, has the line —

* And round about was writ in
golden ore.^

171] Crashaw, Weeper ^ st. 2,

* Whatever makes Heaven's fore-
head fine.* Tennyson, Pelleas and
Etarre, *the virgin forehead of the
dawn.' Cf. *the eyelids of the
day,' supr. /. 26, and see note
there.

173] See Matth. xiv. 22-23.
Warton aptly observes that this is
*a designation of our Saviour by
a miracle which bears an immediate
reference to the subject of the poem. '

174 other groves, ftc] i.e. in
another and a better world. Todd
comp. Drummond's Mceliades^ I.

175—

* other hills and forrests, other
towers,
Amazed thou find'st excelling our
poor bowers.*

Cf. Italian poems, Canzone, I. 8,
*altri rivi, altri\\d\ t' aspettan, &c.,
i.e. the streams and shores of his
native land, as contrasted with those
of Italy.

along] s beside, amidst, without
the usual idea of motion. So in the
Circumcision Ode, I. 4, * sung your
joy the clouds along.'

175] Cf. Ode on Fair Infant, 49,
*thy nectared head.* Nectar with
ambrosia is said to have been used
by way of ablution to preserve im-
mortality, as well as for the food
and drink of the gods. Hom. 77.
xiv. 1 70 ; xix. 39. In Comus, 836
foil., the deification of Sabrina is
effected by * nectared lavers* and
* ambrosial oils.*

ooiy locks] Since *ooze* pro-
perly means moisture of any kind
(O.E. wosy * juice*), it would be
possible to understand ' oozy ' of the
effect of the nectar, according to
the common classical figure called
prolepsis ; like Virgil's * spicula
lucida tergunt,* i.e. *they scour
their lances so as to make them
bright.* But as the word is gene-
rally, if not invariably, used of
slime or mud, it probably here re-
fers to the sea water which is washed
away by the nectar, and may be
compared with Hom. //. xiv. /. r..

LYCIDAS.

87

And hears the unexpressive nuptial song,
In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love.
There entertain him all the saints above,
In solemn troops and sweet societies,
That sing, and singing in their glory move.
And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.
Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more ;
Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore.

180

Ai^/uara trdm-a KoBiipty. C£ Pope,
Odyssey, iv. 543, * His oozy
limbs.*

176 and hears] originally 'listen-
ing,* with an ellipse of the preposi-
tion, common in Elizabethan writers.
Cf. Shaksp. Macbeth^ ii 2, ''listen-
ing their fear. '

unexproBBive] not to be express-
ed, 'inenarrabile carmen,* Od, Ad
Patrem, 37. Cf, Od, Nat. 1 16.
Shakspere has 'plausive,* *insup-
pressive,* 'directive,' &c., used
passively for * plausible,* &c. New-
ton instances ' the unexpressive
she ' {As You Like It, iiL 2). The
grammatical terms * derivative,*
'adjective,' &c., aae also cases in
point. For the ' nuptial song *
Newton refers to Rev. xiv. 3, 4 ;
the reference should rather he Rev.
xix. 6, 7, the song at ' the marriage
supper of the Lamb.'

177] This line was onifitted, pro-
bably by a printer's error, in the
edition of 1638; it is inserted in
Milton's handwriting in his own
copy of that edition, preserved in
the Cambridge University Library.
' Meek,' i.e. peaceful, is a suitable
epithet of ' kingdoms,' and need not,
as Thyer supposes, be referred by
transpositioa lo 'joy and love.*
Nor is this interpretation sufjported
by the passage which Newton quotes
from P. L. ix. 318, where the epi-
thet * domestic * belongs quite natu-
rally to Adam as a loving spouse.

and does not require to be taken
with ' care.^

1 78] Warton's remark that * even
here Milton does not make Lycidas
an angel y ought not to have any
force against those who differ from
him in his explanation of /. 163.
One of Drummond's elegies is ad-
dressed * to the Angel Spirit of the
most excellent Sir Philip Sidney,'
aad the expression is amply justified
by popular usage.

179] There is obviously no allu-
sion in this line to the 'angelick
system,' which is set forth with
some minuteness in the Reason of
Church Gavemnieni, B. I. c. i.
(cf. P, L. v. 601 ; xi. 80), as
' saints * and not angels are here
specified. The Christian doctrine
of the Commumon of Saints needs
no illustration.

181] Rev. vii. 17 ; xxi. 4 ; Isai.
XXV. 8, where the act is attributed
to God Himself.

1 83 J See quotation from San-
nazaro on /. 163, and cf. Blacklock*s
Monody, Philauthes : —

' Still he, the genius of our green

retreat,
Shall with benignant care our
labour cheer.*

Many will agree with Todd in wish-
ing that ' alter the sublime intima-
tion of angels wiping the tears from
the eyes of Lycidas [he] had not
been converted into the classical

88

LYCIDAS.

In thy large recompense, and shalt be good
To all that wander in that perilous flood.

Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and rills,

185

Genius of the shore.* For although
the individual Genius is a concep-
tion in many poin s similar to that
of the guardian angel, the Genius
loci can have no counterpart in
modem rel'gious belief, being a
pn duct of that localising tendency
of Pagan theology which it was one
special aim of Chnstianity to abolish
(John iv. 21 foil.). His introduc-
tion here serves, somewhat inartis-
tically, to mark a return to the
pastoral form in which the poem is
chiefly set. Newton supposes an
allusion to the story of Melicerta,
told in the 6th book of Ovid's
Fasti, and referred to by Virgil,
Georg. i. 436 ; but the language in
the text is perhaps hardly definite
enough to make this reference cer-
tain.

184 in tliy large recompenBO]
i.e. *by way of ample requital to
thee (for thy sufferings).' The
phrase is doubtful English, but it
represents such Greek forms of ex-
pression as b c^j ir<j6oy = * regret
for thee,' where the possessive
stands for an oblique case of the
personal pronoun. See note on /.
166.

shalt be good, ftc] Thyer com-
pares Virg. EH. v. 64, * Sis bonus
o felixque tuis,' addressed to the
deified Daphnis.

185 perilouB] pronounced as a
di^yllable everywhere in Milton,
except in P. L. ii. 420. Cf. Spen-
ser, F, Q. II. vi. 38, 'that perlous
shard ;' Keats, Endymion, bk. iii.,
*in peBlous bustle.' Hence the
colloquial form 'parlous,' Shaksp.
Mids. N, Dream, iii. i, * a parlous
fear,' especially in the sense of
alarmingly clever, * a parlous boy,'
K. Rich, III. ii. 4.

186-194] *The shepherd elegi-
ast, who has not yet been formally
introduced, is now set before us
among his oaks and rills' (Scott,
Critical Essays). Keightley, in his
Life and Opinions of Milton, ob-
serves that these last eight lines
form a perfect stanza in ottava rima,
which is imitated by Mason in his
Mnsaus.

186 uncouth] It is doubtful
whether this word is to be taken in
its literal sense of * unknown ' (O.E.
r«*5, p. part, of cunnan), or in the
usual modem acceptation of ' rude,'

* uncultivated.' The former would
be a natural expression of a young
poet just entering upon a career of
fame (cf. /. 3 and note), but Milton
does not seem to have used the
term elsewhere of persons with this
meaning. In P. L. ii. 407 Satan's
journey towards this world is called

* his uncouth way,' and in vi. 361

* uncouth pain' means 'unusual.'
Cf. Spenser, F. Q. i. xi. 20. In
P. L. v. 98. and probably in VAl-
i^S^Ot 5? *^^s sense is combined
with the secondary one of * hideous,*
to which the transition is complete
in »S'. A. 333, where Manoah speaks
of the prison at Gaza as * this un-
couth place.* The modem applica-
tion to manners, from the idea of

* strange' or *out of place,' is ob-
vious and easy (see note on *■ quaint, '
/. 139). This and the following
lines are thus imitated by M. Bruce
in his Daphnis x —

* A homely swain tending his little

flock,
Rtide, yet a lover of the Muses'

lore,
Chanted his Dori^: strain till close

€>f day.*

LYCIDAS.

89

While the still Mom went out with sandals gray ;
He touched the tender stops of various quills,
With eager thought warbling his Doric lay ;
And now the sun had stretcht out all the hills.
And now was dropped into the western bay.
At last he rose, and twitcht his mantle blue ;
To-morrow to fresh woods, and pastures new.

190

187] Cf. P. R. iv. 426 :—

* till morning fair
Went forth with pilgrim steps in
amice gray.

188] A * stop 'is properly that
which covers the ventholes in a
flute or similar wind instrument ;
hence it is applied to the holes
themselves. The best illustration is
that quoted by Warton from Ham-
let ^ iii. 2 : — * Govern these vent-
ages with your fingers and thumb.
. . . Look you, these are the stops, ^
Cf. Camus, 346, whence Collins
took his * oaten stop or pastoral
song,' Ode to Evenings /. i. The
stops of an organ are only a more
elaborate contrivance for applying
the same principle to a number of
pipes together ; these are mentioned
in P. L. xi. 561.

▼ariouB qnilU] in allusion to the
varied strains of the elegy (at //.
76, 88, 113, 132, 165). This al-
most amounts to a recognition on
the part of the poet of the irregula-
rity of style, the mixture of different
and even opposing themes, which
some have censured as a defect.

* Quill' ^L. calamus, G. kiel) is lite-
rally a reed-pipe. So Spenser, EcU
vi. 67, speaks of the * homely shep-
herd's quill ; ' Collins, Superstitions
of the Highlands, * thy Doric quill ; '
Fletcher, Purple Island, xi. 10,

* my oaten quill.' Johnson explains
it of the plectrum with which the
strings of the lyre were struck, in-

stancing Dryden's Virg. ^n, vi.
646, *his harmonious quill strikes
seven distinguished notes ' ( ^pectine
pulsat ebumo ') ; but this is not the
usual sense of the word.

189 Doric lay] Awpis h.oiZd, Mos-
chus, Epit. Bionis, 12, which is said
to have perished with Bion. Here
it stands for pastoral poetry, in re-
ference to Theocritus (see on //.
85, 133), not, as Newton supposes,
to ardhaisms of language, which are
not so frequent in this poem as to
justify his remark quoted above on
/. 4.

190 stretcht out, &c.] Milton
has here added something of his
own to the Virgilian picture in Eel.
i. 84, ^majoresque cadunt altis de
montibus umbra;.'

192 twitcht] i.e. snatched up from
where it lay beside him, Kvdveoy
8* ou^p ^AAojSfv tlfM (Plumptre's
Translation). Or, according to
Keightley, *drew tightly about him
on account of the chillness of the
evening.' In any case the word
expresses haste, as if the setting sun
had surprised him while * eager ' in
his singing.

193] Newton comp. Fletcher,
Purple Island, vi. 538, ' to-morrow
shall ye feast in pastures new.' Pro-
fessor Masson observes that this is
* a parting intimation that the ima-
ginary shepherd is Milton himself,
and that the poem is a tribute to his
dead friend rendered passingly in
the midst of other occupations'

90

LYCIDAa

(see note on /. i). It is better to
refer these words to the projected
Italian tour, with which his mind
must now have been occupied, than
to any political intentions at this
time. Milton could not have fore-
seen the events of the next few
years ; and we know that the com-
motions which began in 1638-9
recalled him suddenly from abroad,

where he had meant to stay for
some time longer, and that the
whole complexion of his future life
was determined by them. It
should be remembered that the
next poem of any importance which
he wrote was the Paradise Losty
begun probably in or about 1658,
some two years before the Restora-
tion.

APPENDIX I.

On the Etymology of some Words in tlie * Lycidas.^

Sime (/. ii). It is, or ought to be, now generally known that the
common spelling of this word {rhyme) owes its origin to a pedantic
formation from pv^yof , made by those who claimed for it a Greek
derivation, but that it is really the O.E. rim^ 'number,' H.G.
m;«, Dutch rijm, &c., and that the true orthography is rime.
Dr. Latham, in his new edition of Johnson's Dictionary, makes it
a main ground of objection to this statement, that the Teutonic
forms themselves may have been originally connected with pi'Ofio^: —
a question obviously irrelevant to the matter in hand, which is
simply to discover how and whence the word first came into our
language. Nor is this a difficult task, since the older authorities
all combine to prove that it was an English word from the first ;
for instance, in Havelok, the Ormulum, Shoreham, Hoccleve, and
Horn (see Stratmann's Old English Dictionary), the spelling is always
rim or riffie. We find indeed in Chaucer, Spenser, &c., a variant
form ryme^ but this is really of no importance, since / and y were
constantly interchanged, as fire and fyre^ time and tyme, &c. ; and
ryme may have been so spelt for the special reason of distinguish-
ing it from rime, * hoar-frost.' This evidence from the earlier
orthography ought to be decisive ; nor does an examination of the
meaning and uses of the word throw much additional light upon
the matter. We know that it was at first a general term for * verse'
(as in the present line), and that after the introduction of blank
verse in the i6th century it was applied to 'rhyming' poetry for
the sake of distinction. But the general primary sense would be
compatible with a derivation from pn /loc as well as with one from
rtm^ since in both words the 'measured intervals' (numeri) of the
verse form the leading idea. I had been unable to discover the
exact date of the introduction of the h into the word rhyme, but

92 LYCIDAS.

since writing the first draft of this note my attention has been
directed to a letter from Mr, F. J. Fumivall in Notes and Queries^
Nov. 29, 1873, in which he cites a line from Daniel in 1595, * Railing
rhymes were sowed/ as the earliest instance of the false mode of
spelling. If this be so, the case is complete in favour of rime (or
ryme\ and no one ought to hesitate about writing the word in one
or other of these two ways. Another argument against the deriva-
tion from pvy/iof is the parallel case of the Italian rima^ which, like
rime^ meant poetry in general. Cf. Ariosto, OrL Fur. i. ii., ' cosa
non detta in prosa mai ne in ri?na^ whence Milton took his line
P. L, i. 16. This, Diez truly observes, could never have come from
pv /zrii, though he is wrong when he goes on to say that the Italian
equivalent must be * rimmo ' or ' remmo,' because, as a matter of
fact, it happens to be 'ritmo.' But when H. Wedgwood {Diet.
Etym, s. v. Bhyme) objects to the former assertion of Diez on ac-
count of the analogy of the French r/»«^ from the older form
rithme^ he seems to overlook an important difference between the
two languages in their respective methods of derivation from the
Latin. When the original word has two consonants coming
together in successive syllables, the Italian either retains the first
(chang^ing aspirates to mutes), as in ritmo, atmosfera^ &c., or else
assimilates it to the second, as in ammirare from admirare^ &c. ;
while in modern French the former consonant usually disappears
with compensation, as in route, soumis, avocat (true French avoui\
from rupta, submissus^ advocatus. Hence rhythmus would natu-
rally pass through Hthme into rime, whereas in Italian it could only
produce ritmo (or else rimmo or remm/i), but not rimo, still less
rima, Tliere is, however, no reason for doubting that both rima
and the French rime are cognate with the Teutonic forms rim,
reim, &c., above mentioned.

Onerdon (/. 73). The received etymology of this word is the
O.H.G. widarlSn, O.E. wiherlean, which became in Low Latin
widerdonum, by association with donum, * a gift,' since the word
originally meant ' a reward in return for services.' Burguy, in his
Grammmre de la Langue d^Oil, gives the various forms gueredon,
geredon, werdon, and werredon, also the verbs guerredoner and
re-werdoner ; and quotes a sentence from the Sermons of S. Ber-
nard, *Li granz rewerdoneres est venuz,' i.e. *Le grand r^mundrateur
est venu.' Another derivation, at first sight very plausible, is given
by Manage, who refers the origin of the word to the Old German
Werdung, which took the form Werdunia in Low Latin, and meant

APPENDIX I. 9.3.

pretii asiimatio. The existence of this latter word is shown by a
passage which he quotes from Vossius, De Vitiis Sermonis Latini
(B. ii. c. 20), where instances occur both of Werdunia and of a
compound Cinewerdunia^ which Ducange also gives in his Glossary^
though Werdunia itself is not to be found there. The first part of
this compound is of doubtful import and derivation. Chevallet has
suggested what is really the same etymology, for he ^myts guerdon
from PfVr</ (Modern German Werth)^ meaning 'price' or 'value;'
but this is rejected by Scheler {Diet d^ Etymologie Fran^aise^
1863), who pronounces the derivation from widarldn to be 'au-
dessus de toute contestation.' It is true that guerdon might come
from Werdung according to the rule by which the letter w was
regularly replaced by g or gu in those Teutonic words which the
Franks introduced into Gaul (see Max Miiller, Lectures on the
Science of Language, 2nd Series, p. 265) ; but by the same rule it
might equally well be derived from widarldn, and that it was so
derived seems to be a well-established historical fact. The really
fatal objection to Menage's theory is the existence of the Italian
word guiderdone, which could not possibly have had its origin in*
Werdung, though it would naturally be produced from widarldn
by the change of w into gu above mentioned. The older spelling
guerre-don no doubt arose from the idea that the term had some-
thing to do with remuneration for service in war.

Eelon (/. 91). The derivation from /ell, given in the note, is no
doubt the true one. This is probably connected with the Gaelic
/eall, * wicked,' for examples of which see H. Wedgwood's Diet of
Etymology, s. v. felon. Du Cange says that ^felo * « ' perfidus,'
'rebelHs,' 'crudelis,' &c., from A.S.felt Chaucer, in the I^omaunt
of the Rose, takes pains to establish this connexion in the lines —
* Daunger that is so feloun Felly purposeth thee to werrey, which
is full cruel, the sooth to say.' Cf. Lyndsay, Monarchic, 'that
felloun flood ;' Pope, Odyssey, iv. 712, 'his felon hate.' From this
general sense of * wickedness,' felony became a recognised legal
term for the higher class of crimes ; and since such were formerly
punished by the forfeiture of land and %Qods, felon was erroneously
supposed to be a compound of ^^ and Ion, i.e. the price of a feof
or beneficiary estate (Spelman in Blackstone's Commentary), The
Italian fello and the French felle, ' cruel,' are doubtless traceable
to the same root.

Wanton (/. 136). Authorities differ as to the origin of this
word. H. Wedgwood {Did. of Etymology, s. v.) considers it to be

94 LYCIDAS.

a compound of the O.E. negative prefix wan (as in wan-hope^
* despair *) and iogen^ the past part of teon (G. Ziehen), * to draw.'
Its meaning would therefore be * untrained,' and hence * irregular
in conduct.' This theory is made very probable by the existence
of an intermediate form wantowen, of which Wedgwood quotes an
instance from a Sermon on Miracle Plays — *■ We waxen wantowen
or idiL' He also notes the expressions * untowen/ * wel itowen,'
*ful itowen,' in the Ancren Riwle, a treatise of the 13th century
on the Rules of Monastic Life. But the meaning of the last word
is not, as he gives it, 'fully educated,' but *undiscipUned' or * ill-
educated,' from the O.E. y^/«='foul.' (See the Ancren Riwle,
edited by the Rev. J. Morton for the Camden Society, pp. 108,
140, 244, 368.) An alternative derivation is that given by Webster
and others, from a Welsh adjective gwantan, 'roving,' 'fickle,'
which is referred to the verb gwanta, *to separate' (probably
cognate with chwant, 'lust,' Greek x'"'-*^, Lat. hi-o, kisco, &c.).
The precise similarity both in form and meaning between gwantan
and wanton would no doubt go very far towards establishing a
\:ommon origin ; we cannot, however, certainly say which is the
older of the two, and there is a bare possibility that the Welsh may
have borrowed the word from our language. But supposing that
gwantan was the earlier form, and that from it wanton was derived,
its resemblance to the real English word wantowen might very
well give rise to the theory which Wedgwood adopts, especially if
at any time after its introduction wanton got to be spelt wantoun
or wantown. All this, however, is purely hypothetical ; the exist-
ence of a form wan-togen would, if proved, be almost conclusive
in favour of the first-named derivation. We may obser\'e that
Edward Miiller in his Etytnologisches Worterbuch der englischen
Sprache (1867), accepts the theory propounded by Webster.

Herse (/. 151). This word was employed in three distinct
senses, of which the last now alone remains in use. These are
(i) Xh^fiineral monument (Spenser, /^ Q. 11. viii. 16) ; (2) the coffin,
as in Shaksp. i K, Henry VI. i. i, where *a wooden coffin' is
presently spoken of as * King Henry's hearse ;' (3) the funeral
carriage. Richardson, wrongly supposing this last to be the
primary meaning, derives the word from the O.E. hyrstan, 'to
decorate ' (see also Home Tooke's Diversions of Purley^. It really
comes from the French herce, Low Latin hercia (herpex\ *a
harrow' (Ducange, Glossary, s. v.), and originally meaut a tri-
angular frame for candles, placed at the head of the corpse. Thus

APPENDIX I. 95

in the account of the battle of Crecy in Froissart's Chronicles,
c. 130 (Lord Bemers' translation), we are told that 'the archers
stode in maner of a herse^ i.e. in triangular form. And since
this burning of candles was the distinctive feature in the obsequies,
the term ' hearse ' came to be used either of the whole ceremony or
of its various appurtenances (Wedgwood, Diet, of Etymol. s. v.).
In the Faery Queen y ill. ii. 4.8, Spenser has wrongly applied the
phrase 'holy herse' to the church service, as if the word were
connected with 'rehearse;' and perhaps the same mistake is made
in the Shepheards Calendar , xi. 60, where ' herse ' is explained in
the glossary to mean ' the solemn obsequie in funeralles.'

Triek (/. 170). The main senses of this word (as noun and
verb) are — (i) Artifice, (2) Peculiar habit or manner {King Lear^ iv. 6,
*The trick of that voice I do well remember'), {3) Ornament (//
Penseroso, 123 ; Shakspere, King Henry V, iii. 6, ' trick up with new-
tuned oaths;' Merry W. of Windsor, 'trickings for our fairies'),
(4) Heraldic devices (Jonson, Poetaster, ' they are blazoned, they
are tricked '), (5) Collection of cards taken up by the winner. All
these find a common origin in the Dutch trek, a * draught,' ' pull,'
or ' stroke,' which answers to our word ' draw' in all its senses, and
has also the secondary meanings of ' deceit,' and of a * feature' of
the face or character. (Cf trait from tractus^ which means in
French both 'feature' and 'trick.' Faire des traits -faire des tours,)
To the same root trek Diez refers tricher (It treccare), ' to cheat,'
though he derives in-triguer, trigaud, &c., from the Latin verb
tricari. This is unquestionably right, although at first sight
tricher, with its cognate triquer, might seem a natural formation
from trirari, like miche from mica, indiquer from indicare, &c.
But, as Diez observes, the radical e in the older form trecher is
fatal to such a derivation, and the Teutonic origin of tricher may
therefore be considered as established. There cannot be any con-
nexion (however remote) between the Latin tricari and the root
we have been considering; since we know that the former is
derived from tricce, originally Tricae, a small town in Apulia, whose
name widi that of the neighbouring Apinae came to be used of
anything trifling or insignificant. (Cf. Pliny, Nat, Hist, iii. 16;
Martial, Epigr, Xiv. i. 7, ' Sunt apinae tricaeque et si quid vilius
istis;' Erasmus, CA/7/W. Cent, 2, Adag, 43, 'Tricas et Apinas
vulgo TQsfutiles et nugatorias dicebant.') Thus Cicero {ad Atticum,
X. viii. 9) contrasts ' domesticas tricas ' with ' publicam cladem.'
Hence tricari was applied to shuffling and petty meanness of con-

96 LYCIDAS.

duct (Cic. adAtt xiv. xix. 4 ; XV. iii. 5), a sense which is accidentally
almost the same with that of tricher and treccare. This may be
noted as one of those curious coincidences, by which words without
any etymological connexion obtain in different languages a similar
form and meaning. A further illustration of this is seen in the
German triigen {triegen)^ * to deceive/ regarded as a collateral form
of tragen, and thus connected with traho^ draw, drag, &c. Another
meaning of tricce (that of * perplexity' or ' entanglement*) seems to
have produced the later Latin tricare, 'to loiter;' and this was
absurdly derived from trica {Opit), 'a knot of hair/ for a full
account of which see Ducange, Glossarium, s. v. trica. This verb
also meant * to deceive/ whence came tricatores « * deceptores, qui
res impediunt vel implicant.'

We may therefore assume trek to be the original of trick in all
its senses, as well as of tricher and treccare ; it only remains to
reject the derivation given by Dr. Johnson and Richardson of trick,
in the sense of ornament, from the trica above referred to, since
the idea of ornament springs most naturally from that of delineatioHy
especially when used of heraldic devices (see No. 4 supra). The
only instance given of the word as actually meaning ' a knot of
hair' is from Jonson's Poetaster, 'your court curls or your tricks ;'
but this need not be anything more than a general term for * orna-
ment.' (See the quotation from Sandys' Travels^ given in the note
upon /. 170.)

APPENDIX II.

On the Allusions in IL 128, 129.

Those who have read Professor Masson's examination of this
passage in his Life of Milton (vol. i. p. 641 foil.) will hardly fail to
agree with him in interpreting the * grim wolf' to mean that system
of perversion to Romanism, which seems to have reached its height
in or about the year 1637. The view partially adopted by Newton,
that the Primate is the person here intended, might seem at first
sight to be supported by an entry in Laud's diary, to the effect
that in July 1637 a libel was pasted on the Cross at Cheapside,
designating him * the arch-wolf of Canterbury.' But so common an
expression as this is barely sufficient of itself to enable us to draw a
positive conclusion, while the language which Milton here employs
respecting the * wolf presents at least a twofold objection to such
an interpretation. First, the evil is clearly an external one, being
distinguished from the abuses previously mentioned as existing
ifjithin the fold — the word * besides ' indicates this — and secondly,
the expression 'privy paw,' denoting secresy, would be a most
unfit one, if it were intended to describe the doings of Laud and the
High Commission Court, whose attacks on Nonconformity were
open and undisguised ; nor was there perhaps any character more
prominent at this time than that of the Archbishop. Both the
required conditions are satisfied, if we adopt Newton's alternative
explanation, * besides what the Popish priests privately pervert to
their religion,' in support of which view Masson in his Life of
Milton brings forward the instances of Sir Toby Matthews, Sir
Kenelm Digby and others, who had been most active in this
matter for some years before the publication of Lycidas, He goes
on to show that Laud himself strongly disapproved of these per-
versions, as appears from his letter of remonstrance to Sir K.
Digby (March 27, 1636) upon his change of rehgion, and from his

H

98 LYCIDAS.

strict injunctions to Dr. Bayly, Vice-chancellor of Oxford (Aug. 29,
1637), to take strong measures against the Jesuits, who were
seducing the students in that University. It may have been the case
that * as he valued his theory of a possible union of the churches,
the floating off of atoms vexed and annoyed him ' (Masson /. c) ;
but even the fact that he did desire such a union is mainly sup-
ported by the assertion of Montague, Bp. of Chichester, to Panzani,
a Papal agent sent to decide certain disputes among the English
-Catholics, but with special instructions not to have any dealings
whatever with Laud (Lingard, Htst of England^ vol. vii. c. 5).
Taken in connexion with this injunction, the circumstances attend-
ing the offer of a cardinal's hat made to Laud a short time before,
and rejected by him on the ground of dissatisfaction with Rome
*as it then was' {Diary ^ Aug. 4, 1633), serve to show that the
distrust between the two parties was at least mutual; for it is
certain that this offer was made without cognisance of the Pope,
who even refused to ratify it when the request to do so was laid
before him. We know also that the news of Laud's death in 1646
was hailed at Rome with great rejoicing, on the ground that ' the
greatest enemy of the Church of Rome in England was cut off, and
the greatest champion of the Church of England silenced.' (Tes-
timony of Sir Lionel Tolmache, as reported by the Rev. J. Whiston,
his chaplain about 1666). All this agrees very well with Laud*s
own assertions in answer to the charges brought against him by
the Puritans in 1640, *that he hath traytorously endeavoured to re-
concile the Church of England with the Church of Rome, and per-
mitted a Popish hierarchy in this kingdom, &c.' To this he replies,
* I did never desire that England and Rome should meet, but with
the forsaking of error and superstition, if some tenets of Rome on
one side and some deep disaffections on the other have not made
this impossible, as I much doubt they have. But that I should
practise with Rome as it now stands is utterly untrue. Secondly, I
have hindered as many from going to the Roman party, as any divine
in England hath done. (Twenty-two names are here quoted, many
of whom are of high rank and quality.) Thirdly, many Recusants
think that / have done them and their cause more harm than they
which have seemed more fierce against them,* The obvious fact is
that the vital differences between the religious theory of Laud and
that of the Roman Church, patent to either party and too great to
allow the possibility of a union, were ignored by the Puritans in their
zeal against the Laudian movement, which they either did not care to

APPENDIX II. 99

distinguish from actual Popery, or considered as even something
worse. (See speech of Lord Falkland, Feb. 9, 1641.) Nor is it
likely that Milton, young as he was at this time, surrounded by
Puritan influences, and having a strong natural bias in the same
direction, would be enabled to form a juster estimate of the fact$
than the rest of his party did; it is therefore quite likely that h^
may have wished to include Laud among even the foremost of the
Romanisers in the Church of England, though we deny that the
allusion in the present passage is directly or exclusively intended
for him.

The expression ' nothing said ' (altered from * little said ' of the
first draft) is plainly an imputation upon the Court and hierarchy
for their remissness in dealing with the evil we have just been con^
sidering. As regards the latter, if we take Laud as its represen-
tative, it is probable (to quote again from Professor Masson) that
'the Puritans, not knowing his measures [against the Catholic
agents], or not thinking them enough, found in the increasing
number of perversions a fresh condemnation of him and his ad-
herents.' But the policy of Charles I. towards the Papists was by
no means uniform. His treaty of marriage with the Princess
Henrietta in 1624 had contained a promise of immunity to the
Catholics for the peaceable exercise of their worship, though he
had sworn in conjunction with his father only the year before, that
in case of his marriage with a Catholic the said immunity should
extend only to herself and her own family. In 1631 he adopted
a middle course, exempting them from the extreme penalties of
recusancy— i.e. not .forcing them to attend the services of the
established Church — yet not allowing them absolute freedom in their
own religious worship ; and even this concession was loudly repro-
bated by the Puritans. At the present time (1637) the queen's
private influence was considerable. It was at her house that the
negotiations on Romish union chiefly took place, and it is nearly
certain that a large number of English clergy and laity, with Bishop
Montague at their head, were favourable to such a union, though
not perhaps to the extent stated by that prelate to Panzani. On
the whole therefore we may conclude that Milton's words little (or
nothing) said are a rather moderate statement of the real grievance,
and one with which the Puritans generally would by no means have
contented themselves.

Warton is surprised that the University should have allowed
these lines, and that they should have escaped *the severest anim-

H 2

loo LYCIDAS.

adversions' from the High Court of Commission and the Star
Chamber. But there was a strong Puritan element at Cambridge
at this time, the leading man being Dr. Preston, Master of Emanuel,
^ the greatest pupil-monger in England ' according to Fuller, for-
merly a favourite with the Duke of Buckingham, and one of the
king's chaplains (Masson, vol. i. p. 94). As to the civil and
«piritual tribunals, perhaps Milton was then too obscure to demand
their notice; we know at least that he afterwards managed to
escape the fate which befell others of his party, and that even after
the Restoration in 1660 he was included in the Act of Indemnity,
and was released after three days' imprisonment, although his
Eiconoclastes and Defensio Populi Anglicani were ordered to be
burnt.

TRANSLATION OF LYCIDAS INTO LATIN

HEXAMETERS,

By William Hogg, 1694.

Paraphrasis Latina in duo Poemata {quorum alterum a Miltono^
alterum a Clievlando Anglice scriptum fuit) quibus depto-
ratur Mors juvenis praclari et eruditi^ D. Edvardi King^
qui NavCy qua vectdbatur^ Saxo illisa in Oceano Hybernico
submersus est,

ft

Authore Gulielmo Hogceo.

Author lamentatur amicum eruditum, infeliciter Mari Hybemo
submersum, postquam a Cestria solvisset, 1637. Et, odcasione
oblata, corruptorum Clericorum ruinam praedicit, qui tunc temporis
pro libitu in sublimi dignitatis gradu vitam agitabant : —

Rursus odoratae myrti laurique virentes,

Vestitae aureolos hedera serpente corymbos,

Rursus ego vestras redeo decerpere baccas,

Quanquam acidas, nee dum mature sole recoctas ;

Et vestras spoliare comas et spargere passim, 5

Frigora quanquam absunt procul autumnalia, nee dum

Hispidus arboreos Aquilo populatur honores.

Me dolor, me duri necopina injuria fati

Tempora vestra meis cogunt turbare querelis.

Occidit heu ! tenerae Lycidas in flore juventae, 10

Occidit heu ! dulcis Lycidas, nuUumque reliquit

lUe parem. Blandi Lycidae jam funera justis

Deplorare modis quis non velit? Ipse canendi

Arte Sophocleum didicit transire cothumum.

Arva per aequorei infletum fluitare profundi 1 5

Tene decet ? nuUis digna an tua fata querelis,

Dum te fluctus habet, versantque per aequora venti ?

Nunc utinam eloquii charites, et vivida vocum

T02 ' LYCIDAS.

Gratia, quas olim est veteriim turba impia vatum

Aonias mentita deas, mihi protinus adsint, 20

Jucundaque novam modulentur arundine musam.

Forsitan et nostras pariter comitabitur umbras

Carmine Musa pio, cinerique precabitur hospes

Praeteriens, * Tacita placidus requiesce sub uma.'

Unicus amborum pariter juvenilibus annis 25

Mons nutritor erat, pariter quoque pavimus unum

Ambo gregem gelidos jucundi fontis ad ortus,

Aut rivi salientis aquas, aut arboris umbram.

Ambo simul teneras ad pascua laeta capellas

Duximus, ante oculis quam pulchra Aurora reclusis 30

Reddiderat lucemque orbi rebusque colorem.

Et simul exiguae jucundo niurmure muscae

Noctivagam resonare tubam exaudivimus ambo

Per placid OS Lunai^ cursus, jam rore recenti

Nectareos spargente gregis per vellera succos. 35

Ssepe etiam haud serae libuit decedere nocti,

Donee ab Eoa nitido quae vespere lympha

Stella exorta fuit medii transivit Olympi

Culmen, et Hesperias cursum convertit ad undas.

Interea, harmonicas digitis moderantibus auras, 40

Agrestem inflamus calamum, choreasque pilosi

In numerum ducunt Satyri, Faunique nequibant

Capripedes nostris cohibere a cantibus aurem ;

Ipse senex nostra Damoetas gestit avena.

Heu male mutatae Fortunae injuria ! vadis, 45

Vadis ad aeternas (nunquam heu ! rediture) tenebras.
Te, Pastor, sylvae umbriferae, viridesque recessus
Antrorum, quot ubique thymo vel vite teguntur,
Undique jure dolent, resonatque dolentibus Echo.
Ah ! salices cessant virides humilesque myricae 50

Nunc resonare tuae ramosque mflectere Musae.
Ut nocet atra rosis aerugo, ut pestis acerba est
CEstrum immane boum, glacialia frigora flores
Qualiter infestant tunica variante decoros.
Cum niveus primum florescere coepit acanthus ; 55

Sic quoque pastores (triste ac miserabile !) lethi,
O Lycida dilecte, tui dolor urit acerbus.

Quae nemora, aut qui vos saltus habuere, puellae
Naiades, immensis Lycidas cum est obrutus undis ?

LYCIDAS. 103

•

Nam ncque duxistis choreas super ardua rupis 60

Cttlmina praeruptae, Druidum monumenta priorum ;

Nee vos saxosse tenuere cacumina Monae,

Nee Deva fatidicas ubi late exporrigit undas)

Cur ego vana loquor ? praesens si vestra fuisset

Tota cohors, huic ecquid opem auxiliumque tulisset ? 65

Orphei Calliopaea suo quam ferre valebat

Tristis opem ? nil Musa suo succurrere nato,

Cujus ad interitum rerum natura dolebat.

Tunc potuit, cum foemineae furor iraque turbae,

Discerptum latos juvenem quae sparsit in agros, 70

Sanguineum caput Orpheia cervice revulsum,

Hebre, tuis injecit aquis, quod adusque cucurrit

Littora, quae miseri letho bene nota Leandri.

Quid juvat assiduis frustra tabescere cur is,
£t pastoralis studium contemnere vitae, 75

£t vanum ingratae Musae impendisse laborem ?
Nonne fuit satius sociorum more per umbras
Suaviter arboreas sectari Amaryllida dulcem,
Atque, Ncaera, tuos leviter prensare capillos.
Fama viros, quorum sublimi in pectore virtus 80

Se generosa locat, cohibere libidinis aestum
(Pessima nobilium solet esse haec lema virorum)
Incitat, et duros etiam sufferre labores.
Ast ubi paene tibi illustris tetigisse videris
Culmen honoris, adest Lachesis cum forcipe dira, 85

Et fragilis vitae filum secat At mihi Phoebus

* Fama tamen post fata manet, secura sepulchri '
Dixerat, et tremulas leviter mihi vellicat aures ;

* Fama est planta solo minime prognata caduco ;

* Fortunae secura nitet, nee fascibus ullis 90

* Erigitur, piausuve petit clarescere vulgi.

' Judicis ante Jovae purissima lumina lucem

* Ilia cupit fulgere suam ; quieunque verendum

* lUius ante thronum laudemque decusque reportat,

* Hujus in aethereo fama effulgebit Olympo.' 95

O Arethusa, et tu, fluvius eeleberrime, Minci,
Undique vocali redimitus arundine frontem,
Lene fluens, quae nunc recito mihi dicta fuerunt
Haeo longe graviore sono, graviore cothurno ;
Sed mea propositam repetat nunc fistula Musam. 100

I04 LYCIDAS.

Tunc quoque cseruleus vada per Neptunia Triton
Circumagebat iter liquidum, fluctusque sonoros,
Perfidaque j^olios interrogat agmina ventos,

* Unde haec saeva bono pecoris data fata magistro?*
Quaecunque altisonis ullo de monte procellis 105
Horrida flabra volant, rnptaeve cacumine rupis,

I lie rogat ; miseri cuncta hsec tamen inscia fati.

Hippotadesque sagax cunctoriim nomine tales

Reddidit ore sonos, — * Nullius ilamina venti

Nuper ab iColiis sese effudere cavemis/ 1 10

Ridebant taciti tranquilla silentia ponti,

£t placido lapsu Panope centumque sorores

iCquora plana legunt stratamque aequaliter undam.

Perfida navis erat, crudeli dedita fato,

Quae rimis accepit aquam, sacrumque repente 1 1 5

Mersit in ima caput, medioque sub sequore texit

Proximus incessu senior tardissimus ibat
Camus, et hirsuta velatus veste ; galerus
Carice factus erat, variis obscura figuris
Quem textura notat, quem circum vitta colori 1 20

Par, Hyacinthe, too, questus inscripte, cucurrit.

* Heu ! mihi quis rapuit carissima pignora?' dixit
Ultimus hue vejiit, rediitque hinc ultimus, undae
Cui Galilaeanse custodia creditur ; illi

Duplex clavis erat duplici formata metallo, 125

(Aurea portam aperit, subito quam ferrea claudit).
Tempera turn nitida quassans omata tiara
Talia fatus erat tetricae cum murmure vocis.

* Quam bene nunc pro te, si verterc fata liceret,

* Quani bene nunc pro te, juvenum carisstme, multos 130
' Concessissem alios, stimulante cupidine ventris

*' Qui furtim ac tacite irrumpunt et ovilia scandunt !
' Unica cura quibus pecorum fuit usque magistri

* Vi rapuisse epulas, avidique hausisse paratas,

* Convivasque alios audaci pellere dextra. 1 35

* O caeci ventres, qui vix comprendere dextra

* Pastorale pedum, aut aliquid didicere, fideles

* Quod juvat atque decet pecorum praestare magistros !

* Quid curant ? quid curae opus est ? bene vivitur illis ;

' £t licet his, ubicunque libet, sub vindice nullo 140

LYCIDAS. 105

' Stridenti miserum stipula disperdere carmen.
' Interea pecudes languentia lumina volvunt,

* Tabescuntque fame, miseris quia pabula desunt ;

* Sed ventis nebulisque tument, sensimque putrescunt

* InteriuS) sparguntque sui contagia morbi. 145

* Insuper et teneras vis quotidiana luporum

* Clam discerpit oves avidamque immergit in alvum.
' Machina sed gemino ad portas armata flagello

* Protinus his uno parat ictu accersere fatum.'

Nunc, Alphaee, tuos iterum convertere cursus 150

Incipe ! nunc vox dira abiit, vox dira quievit,
Quae fluvium terrore tuum retro ire coegit.
Tu quoque, pastoris Siculi modulamine quondam
Edita Musa, redi, nemorumque umbracla colores
Hue ilorum innumeros simul injectare jubeto. 155

Vos quoque nunc valles humiles, ubi florea Tempe
Et venti placidis resonant fluviique susurris,
Quarum baud ssepe sinus Cancri ferus attigit ardor.
Undique gemmantes oculos conferte, virenti
Nectareos quicunque bibunt in cespite succos ; 160

Floribus et vemis totam depingite terram.
Hue rosa, jucundi quse dicta est primula veris,
Quae moritur, si spreta jacet, pulcherque hyacinthus ;
Hue quoque cum niveis vaccinia nigra ligustris,
Hue quoque sylvarum cum garyophillide cana 165

Moschitaeque rosae violarum et amabile germen,
Atque periclymenos fulgenti omatus amictu ;
Paralysisque etiam, fulvo quae tota metallo
Pallet, et in terram pendente cacumine vergit,
Et quicunque gerit tunicam flos luctibus aptam, 170

Conveniant, pariterque locum glomerentur in unum.
Huc, Amaranthe, veni, quem non borealia laedunt
Frigora, quem aestiferi non torrent brachia Cancri !
Hue, Narcisse, veni, lacrymis tua pocula replens
Suavibus ! hue flores veniant, quoscunque vocavi, 1 75

Laurigerique tegant Lycidae venerabile bustum.
Gaudia sic moestis juvat interponere curis,
Solarique animos ficta sub imagine nostros ;
Dum te fluctus agit, ventisque sonantia volvunt
^quora vasta, trahuntque tuum retrahuntque cadaver. 180

io6 LYCIDAS.

Sive ultra aestifcris ferventes Hebridas undis,

(Hie tu forte lates rapido sub gurgite tectus,

Imaque monstriferi visis penetralia mundi,)

Sive remotus abes procul hinc, longumque soporem

Carpis, ubi sedem tenuit Bellerus avitam, 185

Pristina quern veterum celebrant mendacia vatum,

Mons ubi praesidio circumdatus undique spectat

Namancon, spectatque tuos, Bayona, recessus ; —

Ad patrias sedes precor o precor, Angele, rursus

Respice nunc miseros non aversatus amicos ! 190

Vos quoque, delphines, juveni supponite tergum,

Perque plagas vasti vitreas portate profundi !

Nunc pecorum placidi fletus inhibete magistri.
Non periit letho Lycidas cessitve sepulchri
Legibus, aequorea jaceat licet obrutus unda. 195

Haud aliter Phoebi se praevia Stella profundum
Mergit in Hesperium, diversis rursus ab undis
Mane novo surgens, multo spectabilis auro,
Erigit ilia caput primoque ardescit Eoo.
Sic Lycidas primum ima petit, dein ardua scandit, 200

Praeside nempe illo, tumidi qui terga profundi
Haud secus ac siccam pedibus peragravit arenam,
Spumeaque intrepidis calcavit marmora plantis.
Hie alios inter sylvae nemoralis honores,
Atque alios longe fluvios se nectare puro 205

Obruit, atque suos miro lavit amne capillos,
iCtheriosque hilari ketus trahit aure hymenaeos
In regnis ubi floret amor et pura voluptas.
Hie quoque Sanctorum chorus ilium ampleetitur omnis,
Ordine qui juncti pariter coelestia cantant 210

Carmina et aetherias ducunt cantando choreas,
Atque oculis abigunt lacrymam procul illius omnem.
Nunc pecorum placidi Lyeidam lugere magistri
Absistunt ; tu, littoreas dum carpis arenas,
(Haec tibi in Elysiis durabunt praemia campis) 215

Semper eris quovis meliorque et faustior astro
Puppe periclosam trepida tranantibus undam.

Talia concinuit peregrinus carmina pastor
Quercubus alticomis fluviorum et lenibus undis,
Dum croceis Aurora rotis invecta redibat ; 220

LYCIDAS. 107

Mutabatque sonos relegens, orisque recursu
Dissimili tenuem variabat arundine ventum.
Jam sol majores umbras super alta tetendit
Culmina et Hesperiis post paulo absconditur undis.
Tandem iterum rediit viridemque remisit amictum ; 225
* Cras sylvas peragrare novas, nova pascua, cordi est.'

Notes.

In /. 75 the English has end misprinted for tend,
L 92 Qy. yovis ? but yavce is clearly printed.
/. 213, Now Lyddas the shepherds weep no more in the
English.

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Argumentum,

Thyrsis et Damon, ejusdem viciniae pastores, eadem studia sequuti, a
pueritia amici erant, ut qui plurimum. Thyrsis animi causa profectus
peregre de obitu Damonis nuncium accepit. Demum postea reversus,
et rem ita esse comperto, se suamque solitudinem hoc carmine de-
plorat. Damonis autem sub persona hie intelligitur Carolus DeodtUus
ex urbe Hetrurise Luca patemo genere oriundus, caetera Anglus; ingenio,
doctrina, clarissimisque cseferis virtutibus, dum viveret, juvenis egregius.

HiMERiDES nymphse (nam vos et Daphnin et Hylan,

Et plorata diu meministis fata Bionis),

Dicite Sicelicum Thamesina per oppida carmen :

Quas raiser effiidit voces, quae mnrmura Thyrsis,

Et quibus assiduis exercuit antra querelis, 5

Fluminaque, fontesque vagos, nemorumque recessus ;

I Himeridei] of Himera in
Sicily. Symmons, in his Life of
Milton (appended to the Prose
Works), aptly observes that Warton
should not call it *the famous bu-
colic river of Theocritus,' since none
of his scenes are laid there, and the
river is only mentioned twice in the
Idylls (v. 124 ; vii. 74).

Hylan] The first syllable is short,
as appears from Theocr. Id, vii. ;
Viig. E. vi. 43, G, iii. 6. Milton
himself has *raptus HJlas * in
EUg. vii. 24. Possibly he may
have been thinking of Hylseus in
Virg. G. ii. 457- Daphnis, Hylas,
and Bion are lamented in Theocr.
i. 13, andMoschus, Id, iii., respect-
ively.

3] Virg. G. ii. 176, *Ascraeum-
que cano Romana per oppida car-

men.' ' Thamesina' fixes the locality
to Horton and its neighbourhood,
where the Colne (/. 149) joins the
Thames.

4 Thyrsii] (who of course* repre-
sents Milton himself) is also the
name of the attendant Spirit in
Comus. It is adopted from Theocr.
Id, i, (I. c).

5 exerouit antra] something like
•exercere diem' in Virg. yEn. x.
808. The notion is that of keeping
the caves hard at work in echoing
his lamentations. Cf. /. 8 and note.

6 fluminaque fontesque] an ob-
vious imitation of Virg. yEn. iii. 91,
'liminaque laurusque dei.' It is
doubtfiil whether this instance jus-
tifies the licence of the present line,
Virgil's practice being confined to
those cases in which the next word

no

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Dum sibi praereptum queritur Damona, neque altam
Luctibus exemit noctem, loca sola pererrans.
Et jam bis viridi surgebat culmus arista,
Et totidem flavas numerabant horrea messes,
Ex quo summa dies tulerat Damona sub umbras,
Nee dum aderat Thyrsis ; pastorem scilicet ilium
Dulcis amor Musae Tusca retinebat in urbe :
Ast ubi mens expleta domum, pecorisque relicti
Cura vocat, simul assueta seditque sub ulmo,
Tum vero amissum tum denique sentit amicum,
Coepit et immensum sic exonerare dolorem.

lO

begins with a liquid (as above), a
double consonant, as * Eurique Ze-
phyrique,* G. i. 371, or with the
letter j, as *Chloreaque Sybarim-
que,* y£«. xii. 363. Mr. Nettle-
ship, in his Excursus at the end of
the third volume of Conington's
Virgily points out that in this re-
spect Virgil has strictly followed
Homer.

8 exemit] * released' from the
task of repeating his lament. Prof.
Masson well translates the passage,
* compelling even the midnight
Into the sound of his woe.* * Luc-
tibus ' is probably the ablative, that
being the usual construction in
the Augustan age; but the dative
is used by later writers. Cf. Tac.
Ann, xiv. 48, *ut morti eximeretur.'

9 bis] i.e. in 1638 and 1639.
The Epttaphium Damonis was writ-
ten towards the end of the latter
year, and Diodati seems to have
died in the summer of 1638 (Masson,
Life of Milton^ vol. i. p. 776).

13 Dulcis amor Masse] See in
the Argument the words * animi
causa profectus peregre. ' Milton here
refers to his second visit to Florence
in the beginning of 1639, which
lasted two months. Of the first he
thus speaks in the Defensio Se-
cunda pro populo Anglicano : * Illic
multorum et nobilium sane et doc-

torum hominum familiaritatem sta-
tim contraxi, quorum privatas aca-
demias assidue frequentavi. ' Among
these friends were Carlo Dati and
Francini (/. 137), the former of
whom addressed to him the Latin
letter inscribed *Joanni Miltoni
Londiniensi, &c.' ; the latter the
complimentary Italian ode begmning

* Ergimi all* etra o Clio.' The

* private academies ' were literary
societies for the mutual acquaint-
ance and friendship of learned men,
for admission to which each member
had to give some 'proof of his talent
or learning,' as Milton tells us in the
Reason of Church Government. He
probably there recited some of his
early Latin poems, which won for
him the encomiums above referred
to (Masson, vol. i. pp. 719 foil.).

15 assueta sub ulmo] i.e. at his
father's house at Horton ; possibly
the *dilectas villarum ulmos' men-
tioned in the seventh of the Prolu-
siones Oraiorice^ delivered at Cam-
bridge. Elms still form a promi-
nent feature in the scenery about
Horton. Warton compares the 'ac-
customed oak,' // PenserosOj 60.
For the postposition of -que, cf.
Propert. II. xvi. 11, 'ferratam Da-
naes transiliam^w^ domum ;' Tibull.
I. iii. 55, ' Messalam terra dum
sequitury»^ man.'

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. iii

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Hei mihi ! quse terris, quae dicam numina coelo,
Postquam te immiti rapuerunt funere, Damon ! 2p

Siccine nos linquis, tua sic sine nomine virtus
Ibit, et obscuris numero sociabitur umbris ?
At non ille, animas virga qui dividit aurea,
Ista velit, dignumque tui te ducat in agmen,
Ignavumque procul pecus arceat omne silentum. 25

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Quicquid erit, certe nisi me lupus ante videbit,
Indeplorato non comminuere sepulchro,
Constabitque tuus tibi honos, longumque vigebit
Inter pastores : lUi tibi vota secundo 30

Solvere post Daphnin, post Daphnin dicere laudes,
Gaudebunt, dum nira Pales, dum Faunus amabit :
Si quid id est, priscamque fidem coluisse piumque,
Palladiasque artes, sociumque habuisse canorum.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni. 35

Haec tibi certa manent, tibi erunt hsec praemia, Damon ;
At mihi quid tandem fiet modo ? quis mihi fidus

23] Hor. Od. I. xjciv. 15 : * Non 28] Cf. Lycidas^ 14. Warton

vanae redeat sanguis imagini, Quam quotes Ovid, Trist III. iii. 45.
virga semel horrida . . . Nigrocom- 31] Cf. Virg. E. v. 78-80, where

pulerit Mercurius gregV (/. 25). For Daphnis, the great pastoral hero,

* aurea' cf. Horn. Od. x. 277, where is promised divine honours equal
Hermes is called }(pu<r6^^airts. Lu- to those paid to Bacchus and
cian has the same simile, ain-hs . . . Ceres.

&aitfp n cuir6\iov hBp6ovs aWohs rf 33 priflcamqne fidem, fte.] * the

pdfi9eif (Tofioty. faith of the old and the loyal'

25 silentum] ufed absolutely of (Masson), i,e. the good old-fash-

the dead in Virg. y£«. vi. 432. The ioned rustic faith. Keightley ques-

* ignavum pecus' is from G. iv. 168, tions the correctness of this use uf
where it has quite a different appli- * pium* as a substantive. It certainly
cation. Keightley notes the expres- sounds somewhat harsh in connex-
sion * pecus' as Strange,' but its ion with * fid em,' but the expression
use here is justified by * gregi ' in the itself may be paralleled by the
passage from Horace quoted above. *honestum,* * utile,' &c., so common

27 nisi me, ftc] i.e. 'if I do not in Cicero's philosophical treatises,

lose my power of utterance.' See which are imitations of the Greek

Virg. £. ix. 54 for the superstition th «ca\^y, &c.

that if a wolf saw a man first, the 37 modo] probably an adverb of

latter became dumb. time « *now.' It is more commonly

112 EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Haerebit lateri comes, ut tu saepe solebas

Frigoribus duns et per loca feta pruinis,

Aut rapido sub sole, siti morientibus herbis ? 40

Sive opus in magnos fuit eminus ire leones,

Aut avidos terrere lupos praesepibus altis ;

Quis fando sopire diem, cantuque, solebit ?

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Pectora cui credam ? quis me lenire docebit . 45

Mordaces curas, quis longam fallere noctem
Dulcibus alloquiis, grato cum sibilat igni
MoUe pjnrum et nucibus strepitat focus, et malus Auster
Miscet cuncta foris et desuper intonat ulmo ?

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni. 50

Aut sestate, dies medio dum vertitur axe,
Cum Pan gesculea somnum capit abditus umbra,
Et repetunt sub aquis sibi nota sedilia nymphae,
Pastoresque latent, stertit sub sepe colonus ;
Quis mihi blanditiasque tuas, quis tum mihi risus 5 5

Cecropiosque sales referet cultosque lepores ?

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
At jam solus agros, jam pascua solus oberro,
Sicubi ramosae densantur vallibus umbrae ;

employed with past tenses than with There is a slight confusion between

the future. the notion of midday and that of

39 fetaprniniB] Virg. ^«. i. 51, the earth's turning on its axis;

*locay9/a ftirentibus Austris.* 'medio* implying that the revolu-

43 BOpire diem] like ' condere tion is half completed,

soles,* Virg. E. ix. 52. 52] From Theocr. Id. i. 16,

46] Todd comp. * eating cares,' where the goatherd refuses to accept

L'AllegrOy 135, and * curis morda- Thyrsis' invitation to sing, for fear

cibus,' Lucan, Phars. ii. 681. of disturbing Pan during his midday

48 nueibns] probably 'chest- siesta.

nuts,' sc. 'castaneis.' Cf. Virg. ^. 53] A partial reminiscence of

ii. 52. Virg. Mn. i. 167. *Sibi' is pro-

49 miscet cuneta] * blurs all the bably to be taken after *nota,' but
landscape.* (See also Masson's is not wanted in the sentence,
'i'ranslation.) Cf. Virg. G. i. 359, 56 Geeropios] = Atticos. Viig.
^n. iv. 160. G. iv. 177. For * Attic salt' cf.

51] Lucan, Phars. iii. 423, Mart. Epigr. ill. xx. 9, 'lepore
'medio cum Phoebus in axe est.' tinctos Atticos sales.'

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Hie serum expecto ; supra caput imber et Eurus
Triste sonant, fractseque agitata crepuscula silvae.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Heu, quam culta mihi prius arva procacibus herbis
Involvuntur, et ipsa situ seges alta fatiscit !
Innuba neglecto marcescit et uva racemo,
Nee myrteta juvant ; ovium quoque taedet, at illae
Moerent, in que suum convertunt ora magistrum.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Tit)rrus ad corylos vocat, AlphesibcEus ad omos,
Ad salices Aegon, ad flumina pulcher Am)aitas ;
* Hie gelidi fontes, hie illita gramina museo,

113
60

65

70

60 serum] Livy, vii. 8, * serum
erat dieiJ' Neither Ovid nor Virgil
appears to have used the word as a
noun in this sense.

61 agitata erepnseula sUtsb]
= silva per crepusculum agitata.
Keightley explains it of *the twi-
light or doubtful light caused by the
foliage, * and refers to the * shadows
brown* of // Penseroso, 134, and
the * chequered shade' oi L AlUgrOy
96. Symmons quotes *also from
Cowper, Tflj^, B. i. 347 —

* so sportive is the light,
Shot through the boughs, it dances

as they dance,
Shadow and sunshine intermingling

quick.'

64] Keightley well observes that the
land' cracks astu not situ (Virg. G,
i. 72),' but he is wrong in supposing
that * seges' cannot mean the ground
itself, since it is distinctly used in
this sense by Virgil in G. i. 47 and
iv. 129. In the former passage
* seges ' is the land after ploughing,
but before any seed is sown, and in
the latter it is the soil with reference
to its future produce. Here how-
ever the addition of 'alta' (which
must mean taU) seems to force us to

translate 'seges' 'afield of standing
com,' which will not make any
sense with 'fatiscit.' Masson's
translation, 'the tall com sickens
with mildew,' does not accurately
render the Latin verb.

65] For the * marriage' of the vine
with larger trees, see the passages
cited on Lycidas^ 40; also P. L.
V. 215 foil. 'Uva' here must be
the vine itself, as in Vii^. G. iL 60,
* fert uva racemos.' It is difficult to
see the force of Keightley's objec-
tion to its being 'joined with "ra-
cemo," which is a part of it.' The
latter is of course a modal ablative,
or else the ablative absolute.

67] Referred to on Lycidas^ 125.

69] 'Tityms' &c. are all from
Virgil's Eclogues. ' Milton may or
may not have had particular ac-
quaintances of his in view under
these names' (Masson).

71] Partly imitated from Gallus'
invitation to Lycoris, Virg. E,
X. 42 ; the original is in Theoc. v. 33.
'Illita,' which means 'smeared'
or * spread on the surface,' does not
accurately express the idea of moss
growing among 'grass. Perhaps con -
sitOf or intersita (omitting 'hie'),
would have been better.

114

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

' Hie Zephyri, hie placidas interstrepit arbutus undas : '
Ista canunt surdo, fhitices ego nactus abibam.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Mopsus ad haee — nam me redeuntem forte notarat — 75

(£t callebat avium linguas, et sideia Mopsus,)

* Thyrsi, quid hoc ? ' dixit, * quae te coquit improba bilis ?
' Aut te perdit amor, aut te male fascinat astrum ;

' Satumi grave saepe fiiit pastoribus astrum,

* Intimaque obliquo figit praecordia plumbo.' 80

' Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Mirantur nymphse, et * Quid te, Th)nrsi, futurum est ?

73] * Surdo canere' was a pro-
verb. Cf. Virg. £. X. 8, * non
canimus surdis;* Propert. iv. viii.
47, *cantabunt surdo.' Langhome
ludicrously misunderstands the latter
part of this line, when he translates it
*/ aU my shrubs {}^ and careless
walked away.'

76] So in Virg. j^n, iii. 360,
i^neas addresses Helenus, ' qui
sidera sentis, £t volucrum linguas
et praepetis omina pennae ; ' and in
X. 176 Asilas is named as the seer
* cui sidera parent £t linguae volu-
crum.' Keightley is probably right
in observing that 'avium ' should be
long by position, as ' ariete' &c. in
Virgil. As an instance most closely
resembling the one in the text, cf.
Virg. G. i. 482, *fluviorum rex
Eridanus.'

77] For *coquere,' denoting men-
tal disturbance, cf. Virg. y£«. vii.
345, *curaeque iraeque coquebant;'
also Silius Italicus, xiv. 103, *quos
ira metusque coquebat.'

78] For the lengthening of *am5r '
cf. Viig. E, X. 69 ; ^n. ii. 369,
xi. 323, and other passages. Mr.
Nettleship, in his Excursus re-
ferred to on /. 6, ascribes this usage
in Virgil to the influence of Ennius,
who always makes these endings in
-or long because of the original

Greek -«p ; but he thinks Viigil was
ignorant of this reason, since h^
never indulges in the license except
in arst. Hogg has done the same
in his version of Lycidas^ 208.

fascinat] said of the evil eye in
witchcraft, Viig. E. iii. 103. For
the supposed influence of the stars,
see on LycidaSy 138.

79] Warton quotes Propert iv.
i. 84, 'et grave Satumi sidus in
onme caput,' as showing that this
planet was considered to be gene-
rally noxious ; although there is
no apparent reason why shepherds
should be specially affected by it.
Possibly the Saturnine melandioly
and gloom (see opening lines of //
Penscroso) may be intended by way
of contrast to the joyous ideal of
pastoral life.

80 obliquo] partly continues
the allusion contained in ' fascinat,'
the notion being that of a sidelong
envious glance. Cf. * obliquo oculo, '
Hor. Ep. I. xiv. 37. 'Plumbo,'
because lead was Saturn's metal in
alchemy.

82 nymphsB et] For the hiatus
cf. Virg. E, iii. 6 ; G\. i. 4, * pecori
et,' &c.

quid te fatomm est] There
seems to be no authority for this use
of the verb ' esse ' with the ablative.

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

"5

* Quid tibi vis ? ' aiunt ; * non haec solet esse juventae

* Nubila frons oculique truces vultusque seven ;

* Ilia chores lususque leves et semper amorem

* Jure petit : bis ille miser qui serus amavit'

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Venit Hyas Dryopeque et filia Baucidis Aegle,
Docta modos citharaeque sciens, sed perdita fastu ;
Venit Idumanii Chloris vicina fluenti ;
Nil me blanditiae, nil me solantia verba,
Nil me si quid adest movet, aut spes ulla futuri.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Hei mihi ! quam similes ludunt per prata juvenci,
Omnes unanimi secum sibi lege sodales !
Nee magis hunc alio quisquam secemit amicum
De grege ; sic densi veniunt ad pabula thoes,
Inque vicem hirsuti paribus junguntur onagri :
Lex eadem pelagi ; deserto in littore Proteus

85

90

95

* Quid rsMtfiet* would be an ordinary
phrase, as well as * de me* or * mihi.*

83 nubila frons] Cf. Hor. Ep.
I. xviii. 94 *Deme supercilionubem.'

86 bis] is certainly short, as
appears from Ov. Met. xiv. 386,
*Tum bis ad Occasum, bis se con-
vertit ad Ortum,* and from its com-
pounds, as *bifidus,* *bimaris,* &c.
For the sentiment, Langhome com-
pares Guarini, Pastor Fido^ Act i.
Sc i:

' Che se t* assale a la canuta etate
Amoroso talento,
Avrai doppio tormento ;
E di quel che potendo non volesti,
E di quel che volendo non potrai.*

88] * Aegle Naiadum pulcherri-
ma,* Virg. E. vi. 20. Keightley
suggests that these may have been
real ladies of Milton*s acquaintance
(see on /. 69). The particular de-
scription which follows makes this
very probable. We know how-

ever from the lines appended to the
7th Elegy, that the charms of the
other sex had no great attractions
for Milton. (See note on Lycidas,
68, 69.)

89] From Hor. Od. iii. ix. 9,
* Dulces docta modos et citharse
sciens.*

90 Idumanii fluenti] the Chel-
mer, in Essex. Drayton, PolyolHon^
19th Song, 95 foil.

95 secum sibi] perhaps an un-
necessary pleonasm (as in /. 53), but
scarcely * indistinct,' as Keightley
objects.

97 thoes] probably 'jackals,'
Pliny, N. H, viii. 34. ecSey, Horn.
//. xiii. 103.

98 onagri] Virg. G. iii. 409.
Keightley observes that * the onager
is not "hirsutus." *

99] For the story of Proteus and
the sea-calves, see Hom. Od. iv.
402 foil. ; Virg. G. iv. 432 foil.

I 2

ii6

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Agmina Phocarum numerat, vilisque volucnim
Passer habet semper quicum sit, et omnia circum
Farra libens volitet, sero sua tecta revisens ;
Quem si sors letho objecit, seu milvus adunco
Fata tulit rostro, seu stravit anindine fossor,
Protinus ille alium socio petit inde volatu.
Nos durvim genus, et dins exercita fatis
Gens homines, aliena animis et pectore discors,
Vix sibi quisque parem de millibus invenit unum ;
Aut si sors dederit tandem non aspera votis,
Ilium inopina dies, qua non speraveris hora,
Surripit aetemum linquens in saecula damnum.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Heu quis me ignotas traxit vagus error in oras
Ire per aereas rupes Alpemque nivosam !
Ecquid erat tahti Romam vidisse sepultam,
(Quamvis ilia foret, qualem dum viseret olim,
Tityrus ipse suas et oves et rura reliquit ; )
Ut te tam dulci possem caruisse sodale !

ICO

105

no

"5

105 socio] can properly only
apply to the bird when actually
mat^; yet this sense would be
inconsistent with * petit,' which
describes the object of its flight.

106] Cf. Virg. G. L 63, 'homines
. . . duram genus.*

exereita latis] Virg. y£«. v. 725,
* Iliacis exercite fatis.* So 'exer-
cita curis,* ib. 779.

107] By substitutijig a comma for
the semicolon after * discors,* the
sentence *nos, &c.^ becomes an
anacoluthon, continued by * quisque
. . . invenit.*

108 parem nnnm] ' one kindred
mind' (Cowper).

114] According \o Milton's own
account of his travels {Defensio Se-
cunda pro Pop. Angl.) he did not
go into Italy over the Alps, but

from Paris into Provence, and thence
by ship from Nice to Genoa.

115] Taken (as Warton remarks)
from Virg. E. i. 27, * Et quae tanta
fuit Romam tibi caussa videndi?'
The direct reference to that passage
in the next line makes this certain ;
otherwise the present line is not so
closely imitated from Virgil as to
warrant Prof. Masson's assertion that
it is * all but a quotation. ' The sense
is, * Was it so well worth my while
to visit Rome in ruins, even if it
had been now as great as it was in
the days of old?'

116 dum viseret] Mn his desire
to visit,' lit, * so long as he might
visit ; ' dum = dummodo, Cf. Virg.
G. iv. 457, *dum fugeret ;* ^n. i. 5,
*dum conderet urbem.*

I {8 Boclale] usually 'sodali,' be

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

117

Fossem tot maria alta tot interponere montes,

Tot silvas tot saxa tibi fiuviosque sonantes ! 1 20

Ah certe extremnm licuisset tangere dextram,

Et bene compositos placide morientis ocellos,

Et dixisse, * Vale, nostri memor ibis ad astra.'

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agnL
Quamquam etiam vestri nunquam meminisse pigebit, 125

Pastores Tusci, Musis operata juventus,
Hie Chans, atque Lepos ; et Tuscus tu quoque Damon,
Antiqua genus unde petis Lucumonis ab urbe.
O ego quantus eram, gelidi cum stratus ad Ami
Murmura, populeumque nemus, qua moUior herba, 1 30

Carpere nunc violas, nunc summas carpere myrtos,
Et potui Lycidae certantem audire Menalcam !

cause originally an adjective. The
abl. in e does however sometimes
occur, e.g. Plin. Epist. ii. 13,

* sodale jucundius.*

119] Warton compares Eleg.
iv. 21 (to Diodati)—

* Hei mihi, quot pelagi, quot monies

interjecti
Me faciunt alia parte carere
mei ;*

on which he • refers to Horn. //.
i. 156—

• ^€1^ /tdXa iroAA& /xrra^d

c(r(ra,
and to Ovid, Trist. iv. vii. 21 —

* Innumeri montes inter me teque,

viaeque,
Fluminaque et campi, nee freta
pauca jacent.'

125] Keightley is mistaken in
supposing that * vestri ' ought to be

* vestrum.' Zumpt, in his Latin
Grammar (§431 of Schmitz' trans-
lation), draws the distinction thus :

* The forms ending in -um are^ used

as partitive genitives, e.g. uterquf
nostrum^ &c. ; but miserere nostri,
&c.' He notes however that z/^r/n/w
does occur 'without any partitive
meaning, e.g. "frequentia vestrum
incredibilis," Cic. in RulL ii. 21 ;
but these are exceptional cases.'
' 126] See note on /. 13.

127 Tuscus] See on Diodati's
family in the Introduction to Ly-
cidas.

128] Lucca was said to have been
founded by Lucumon, an Etruscan
king. During his second visit to
Florence, Milton visited the place,
no doubt on account of its connex-
ion with Diodati (Masson, Life of
Milton^ vol. i. p. 771).

132 eertantem] i.e. at the 'private
academies' referred to on /. 13.
* Ly cidas' and *Menalcas' are of
course pastoral names for members
of these societies ; not * unknown,'
as Keightley asserts, for Milton, in
the sketch of his own life quoted
above, enumerates Gaddi, Fresco-
baldi, Coltellini, Buonmattei, and
Chimentelli, besides Dati and Fran-
cini, who are mentioned below

ii8

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Ipse etiam tentare ausus sum ; nee, puto, multum

Displicui ; nam sunt et apud me, munera vestra,

Fiscellae calathique, et cerea vincla cicutae : 135

Quin et nostra suas docuerant nomina fagos

Et Datis et Francinus, erant et vocibus ambo

£t studiis noti, Lydorum sanguinis ambo.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Haec mihi tum laeto dictabat roscida luna, 140

Dum solus teneros claudebam cratibus haedos.
Ah quoties dixi, cum te cinis ater habebat,
Nunc canit aut lepori nunc tendit retia Damon,
Vimina nunc texit, varies sibi quod sit in usus !
Et quae tum facili sperabam mente futura 145

Arripui voto levis et praesentia finxi ;
* Heus bone ! numquid agis ? nisi te quid forte retardat,
Imus ? et arguta paulum recubamus in umbra,

(/. 137). Professor Masson (vol. i.
p. 722 foil.) has given a full and
detailed account of every one of
them. On what follows, he remarks
(vol. ii. p. 90, note) that there is
'a distinct reference to the two
written encomiums by Dati ^d
Francini/ and that the * fiscellae,'
&c., are doubtless * poetical names
for little presents actually received
from Florentine friends.*

135 eerea yinola cicntse] = ' ci-
cuta cereis vinculis compacta,' Viig.
E. ii. 32, 36.

136 docnenmt, ftc] Cf. Virg.
E. i. 5.

138] For the tradition about the
Lydian origin of the Etruscans, see
Herod, i. 94: Tvptrnvhv. . . iwoirA€€iy
Kvrh filou TC Ktd t^s C^rrioiVf is h
awiKeoBou is *OfifipiKobSf Ma iviZpi-
aturBouiroXias. Virg. yEn. viii. 479,
*ubi Lydia quondam Gens bello
pi-aeclara jugis insedit Etruscis.'
Warton refers to Hor. Sat. I. vi. i.

14Q ]i»o] i.e. the thoughts ex-

pressed in /. 143 foil.

roscida luna] Virg. G. iii. 337.
Warton compares Lycidas^ 29, and
lor * cratibus* the * wattled cotes'
in Comus, 345, and Hor. Epod.
ii. 45, ' claudensque textis cratibus
Isetum pecus.'

142 cinis ater] a confusion be-
tween the mould of the grave and
the ashes of the dead ; for which,
however, Milton has the aif^ority
of Virgil, ^n. iv. 633.

144] Virg. E. ii. 71 :

* Quin tu aliquid saltem potius quO'
rum indiget tisus
Viminibus mollique paras dttexere
junco.'

Possibly 'paras' in this passage
may have induced Milton to
write ' imus ' and ' recubamus '
(/. 148) where we should expect
*eamus' and *recubemus,' or else
the future ; since it is doubtful
whether the pres. ind. can be so
used without the *■ quin.' As, how*

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

119

* Aut ad aquas Colni aut ubi jugera Cassibelauni ?

* Tu mihi percurres medicos, tua gramma, succos, 150
' Helleborumque humilesque crocos foliumque hyacinthi,

* Quasque habet ista palus herbas artesque medentum.'
Ah pereant herbae, pereant artesque medentum
Gramina, postquam ipsi nil profecere magistro !

Ipse etiam, nam nescio quid mihi grande sonabat 155

Fistula, ab undecima jam lux est altera nocte,

ever, ire (like ieVoi) has in itself the
sense of the future, * imus ' might
be allowed to stand, and the actual
form of its tense may have in-
fluenced that of the other verb.

149] The river Colne flows by
Horton (see on /. 3). *Jugera
Cassibelauni' are the district of
St. Albans, the dominions of the
British king Cassibelaun. Cf. Caesar,
B. G. V. II, * Cassivellauno, cujus
fines a maritimis civitatibus flumen
dividit quod appellatur Tamesis.'

150 foil.] in allusion to Diodati's
practice of medicine (see Introduc-
tion to Lycidas). He is the * shep-
herd-lad' in Comus^ 619, *well
sldlled In ever}' virtuous plant and
healing herb.' There is a charac-
teristic passage bearing upon this
subject in Milton's letter to Diodati
dated Sept. 23, 1637 : ' You wish me
good health six hundred times,
which is as much as I can desire,
or even more. Surely you must
lately have been appointed the very
steward of Health's larder {salutis
condum promum), so lavishly do
you dispense all her stores, or at
least Health should now certainly
be your parasite, since you so lord it
over her {prorege iegti-is\ and com-
mand her to attend your bidding. '

153] Todd quotes the words of
Phcebus to Daphne, Ovid, Mtt. i.
524, * nee prosunt domino quae pro-
sunt omnibus artes. '

1 55-1 78] For a detailed examina-

tion of this interesting passage con-
sult Masson, vol. ii. pp. 93-97.
The two main points to be noticed
are: (i) That Milton was already
(in 1639) forming a plan of writing
a British epic, which should extend
from the legendary times of the
Trojan Brutus to the reign of King
Arthur ; (2) That he had deter-
mined henceforth to write no more
in Latin, but in English, so as to be
read by all his countrymen from the
Thames to the Humber, and from
Cornwall to the Orkneys. This idea
had occurred to him even while in
Italy, and was fostered, if not first
suggested, by the compliments of
his Florentine friends upon his
former productions; — 'that by la-
bour and intent study, joined with
the strong propensity of nature, I
might perhaps leave something so
written to aftertimes, as they should
not willingly let it die ' {Reason of
Church Government^ B. ii.). He
soon afterwards abandoned the pro-
ject in favour of a poem on a Scrip-
tural subject, which ultimately took
the form of the Paradise Lost, the
materials he had collected for the
British Epic being employed in his
History 0/ Britain, about 1649 or
1650.

155 grande, &o.] Cf. * the strain
of higher mood,' Lycidas, 87.

156] From Virg. E. viii. 39,
* alter ab undecimo tum jam me
acceperat annus ;' where Conington

I20

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS,

Et turn forte novis admoram labra cicutis,

Dissiluere tamen rupta compage, nee ultra

Ferre graves potuere sonos : dubito quoque ne sim

Turgidulus, tamen et referam ; vos cedite silvae. i6o

Ite domura impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.
Ipse ego Dardanias Rutupina per aequora puppes
Dicam, et Pandrasidos regnum vetus Imogeniae,
Brennumque Arviragumque duces, priscumque Belinum,
Et tandem Armoricos Britonum sub lege colonos; 165

Tum gravidam Arturo fatali fraude logemen,
Mendaces vultus assumptaque Gorlois arma,

remarks that the twelfth, and not
the thirteenth, is meant, according
to the * inclusive mode of counting.'

159 graves] applied both lite-
rally to the low tones of the pipe,
and metaphorically to the dignity
of the subject. Co wper's translation,
' the deep-toned music of the solemn
strain,* well expresses both these
ideas.

160 turgidulus] inflated with
pride ; but this use of the word is
barely classical, though 'turgida
oratio' is said of a 'bombastic
speech.*

cedite bIIvsb] Cf Virg. E. x.
63, where Gallus bids farewell to a
woodland life, because it cannot
cure his passion, with the words
* concedite silvae.*

162 foil.] For the legends con-
nected with each of these names,
see Milton's History of Britain^ B.
i. ii., and Geoffrey of Monmouth,
whence he derived the account.
Brutus the Trojan, having rescued
his countrymen from their servile
condition under the Grecian prince
Pandrasus^ marries his daughter
Imogen^ and sets sail with his fol-
lowers towards the west. He finally
lands in Britain, on what is now the
Kentish coast {Rutupina cequora)^
and establishes a kingdom. Brett-

nus and Bdinus are the . sons of
Dunwallo Molmutius, king of
Cornwall. Some twenty genera-
tions after Brutus, ArvtraguSy son of
Cunobelin (Cymbeline), by per-
sonating his slain brother Guiderius,
is said to have gained a victory over
the Roman emperor Claudius. The
* Armorici -coloni ' were Britons
who fled from the Saxon invaders
in the time of Vortigem to Armo-
rica, now Bretagne. The last legend
(found in Geotfrey of Monmouth,
but not told by Milton in his own
History) is that of Uther Pendragon,
who by Merlin's magic art assumed
the form of Gorlois, king of Corn-
wall, and thus obtained access to
his wife logeme at Tintagel Castle,
by whom he became the father of
the famous Arthur.

165] Cf P. L. i. 581. Armorica
was peopled in the fourth century
by a Welsh colony, under the Ro-
man general Maximus and Carron,
prince of Meiriadoc or Denbigh-
land. Thierry {Norman Conquest,
B. i. p. 16) says: *They found
people of their own stock there, and
this agglomeration of branches of
the Keltic race and language pre-
served that western nook of France
from the irruption of the Roman
tongue.'

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

121

Merlin i dolus. O mihi turn si vita supersit,
Tu procul annosa pendebis, fistula, pinu,
Multum oblita mihi ; aut patriis mutata Camenis
Brittonicum strides, quid enim ? omnia non licet uni,
Non sperasse uni licet omnia, mi satis ampla
Merces, et mihi grande decus (sim ignotus in aevum
Tum licet, extemo penitusque inglorius orbi,)
Si me flava comas legat Usa et potor Alauni,
Vorticibusque frequens Abra et nemus omne Treantae,
Et Thamesis meus ante omnes et fusca metallis
Tamara, et extremis me discant Orcades undis.

Ite domum impasti, domino jam non vacat, agni.

170

175

169] Virg. E, vii. 24, * Hie
arguta sacra pendebis fistula pinu,'
a sign that he intended to sing no
more. The sense should therefore
be, * Either I will abandon poetry
altogether, or else change it from
Latin verse into English.' But if
Prof. Masson is right in explaining

* fistula ' of Latin poetry in particu-
lar, the alternative * aut — aut ' is
merely formal, the real meaning
being this : * I will abandon Latin
verse for English.' * Patriis Ca-
menis ' will then signify * its native
Muse,' i.e. the Latin.

171 Btrides] in reference to the
rougher warlike themes he was
about to celebrate. See Masson's
translation, * the British war-
screech,* and compare the lines pre-
fixed to Virgil's /Eneidf * Ille ego
... at nunc horrentia Martis.*

* Strides ' is the future of strido^ a
form which occuis in Virg. y^n. iv.
689 ; viii. 420 ; Ovid, Met. ix.
171, &c.

172] Virg. E. vii. 23, *non
omnia possumus omnes.'

173 in SBTTun] 'for all time,'
Hor. Od. IV. xiv. 3.

1 75 TTea] the Ouse ; but whether
the Bucks or the Yorkshire river is

here intended is uncertain. The
former supposition is slightly sup-
ported by the fact of Milton's resi-
dence in Buckinghamshire ; while
on the other hand the names of the
rivers immediately following seem
to point to a northern locality.
Keightley, who adopts the latter
view, refers to the Vacation Exer-
cise^ I. 92, where the Ouse is men-
tioned in company with the Tweed,
Don, and Trent. The epithet

* flava comas,' which applies gene-
rally to the Saxon race, does not
help towards deciding the question.
The other rivers are the Alan in
Northumberland, the Humber (pro-
perly * Abus *), Trent, Thames,
and Tamar in Cornwall, hence

* fusca metallis.* With * potor
Alauni' cf. Hor. Od. ii. xx. 20,

* Rhodanique potor,' also I v. xv.
21, *qui Tanain bibunt.*

1 76] * Treanta ' seems to be
formed from the modem name of
the river ; the Romans called it
Trivona.

177 Thamesis mens] Keightley
compares Spenser, F. Q. iv. xi.
41, 'And MuUa wm^^ whose waves
I whilom taught to weep.' •

122

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Haec tibi servabam lenta sub cortice lauri,
Haec et plura simul ; turn quae mihi pocula Mansus,
Mansus Chalcidicae non ultima gloria ripge,
Bina dedit, mirum artis opus, mirandus et ipse,

I So

1 80 hsBO] probably refers to
the British poem, which when com-
pleted he intend^l to submit to his
friend for criticism. Thus in the
6th Elegy (//. 79 foil.) he tells Dio-
dati that he has been writing a hymn
upon the Nativity, upon which he
will ask his opinion —

'Te quoque pressa manent patriis

meditata cicutis ;
Tu mihi cui recitem judicis instar
eris.'

Sec also his letter of Sept. 23,
1637, containing an account of the
studies in which he was then en-
gaged.

181-197] On the strength of this
passage, Prof. Masson (adopting a
suggestion of Warton's) asserts that
Manso had actually given Milton a
pair of chased goblets. Keightley
on the other hand considers it to be
merely a poetical description after
Theocritus (Id, i. 27 foil.) and
Vii^il (E. iii. 36 foil.) of some other
tokens of Manso's esteem. All we
know for certain is that he had sent
Milton a complimentary elegiac
couplet —

* Ut mens forma decor facies mos,
si pietas sic,
Non Anglus, verum hercle An-
gelus ipse fores,'

Also in the account of his travels,
to which we have before referred,
Milton says that Manso * gave him
singular proofs of his regard,'
which may reasonably be supposed
to have taken some tangible form ;
the more so, because it is further
stated that Manso had excused him-
self for not paying him greater per-
sonal attention, on account of his

free speaking on religiou| matters.
With all due deference to Mr.
, Keightley's opinion, as to the in-
herent improbability of the matter,
we should be disposed to say that a
pair of silver cups would be a very
likely present from a wealthy Nea-
politan virtuoso to his English
friend ; nor is this likelihood really
diminished by the mere fact of simi-
lar representations in Theocritus
and Virgil, especially when we bear
in mind that no part of the details
of Milton's description is in any
way borrowed from theirs. And
when we proceed to examine these
details further, both the singularity
of the subjects chosen and the mi-
nuteness of each point in the picture
render it almost impossible to sup-
pose that we have here a mere in-
vention of the poet, and not an
actual thing described. It is of
course barely possible that such may
have been the case, but the proba-
bility seems to lie very strongly the
other way.

182] Naples (Neapolis) was
founded by the Cumaeans, who were
originally colonists from Chalcis in
Eubcea. Cf. Livy, viii. 22, *Cu-
mani ab Chalcide Euboica originem
trahunt.' Hence the rock of Cumae
is called * Chalcidica arx * in Virg.
^n. vi. 17. Milton may have
purposely used the older name in
recognition of the antiquity of Man-
so's family. Cf. *Lydorum san-
guinis ambo,' /. i"}^ supra. Warton
curiously quotes 'Chalcidico versu,'
Virg. E. X. 50, which alludes to
Euphorion, a poet of Chalcis, but
has nothing to do either with Cumae
or with Naples.

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

"3

Et circum gemino caelaverat argumento :

In medio rubri maris unda et odoriferum ver, 185

Littora longa Arabum et sudantes balsama silvae ;

Has inter Phoenix, divina avis, unica terns,

Caeruleum fulgens diversicoloribus alis,

Auroram vitreis surgentem respicit undis ;

Parte alia polus omnipatens et magnus Olympus : 190

Quis putet ? hie quoque Amor pictaeque in nube pharetrae,

Arma conisca faces, et spicula tincta pyropo ;

Nee tenues animas pectusque ignobile vulgi,

Hinc ferit ; at circum flammantia lumina torquens

Semper in erectum spargit sua tela per orbes 195

Impiger, et pronos nunquam collimat ad ictus :

184 csBlaverat argumento]
Ovid, Met. xiii. 685.

187] For the fable of the Phcenix
see Ovid, Met. xv. 391 foil. ;
Amor. II. vi. 54 ; Pliny, Nat.
Hist. X. ii. 2.

unioa terns] Cf. P. L. v. 272,

* that Wifbird.'

188] ' Diversicolor ' is post-clas-
sical ; the regular word is versi-
color'y Virg. ^n. x. 181 ; Livy,
XXXIV. i. 3, &c.

190 omnipatenB] seems to be
a word of Milton's own coining.

191 Quis putet 1] expressing ad-
miration ; something like the Greek
ir«s 8o«c€t5 ; as in Aristoph. Nubes^
881, Ik t&v ffiilay fiarpdxovs ivoUij

192] If *arma corusca faces' is
the right reading, it can only mean

* arms gleaming with [the light of]
his torches.* But this is a very bold
use of the so-called Greek accusa-
tive, and one which no existing ex-
pression in any Latin writer seems
to justify. Perhaps the nearest ap-
proach to it is to be found in Hor.
£p. I. vi. 74, * Pueri suspensi locu-
los tabulamque ;' but this may be

explained as a mere variety of the
ordinary phrases ^ indutus vestem,'
&c., which will hardly include the
instance before us. The insertion
of a comma after * corusca,' thus
making * faces ' the nominative,
would remove the difficulty ; but I
have not ventured to introduce this
change of punctuation into the text,
pyropo] a kind of bronze, of a
fiery red colour, named from irvp-
anosy which is an epithet of the
lightning-bolt in iEsch. Prom. 667.
Cf. Ovid, Met. ii. 2, * flammas
imitante pyropo.' In Met. \. 469
Cupid is described with two darts,
one tipped with gold, the other with
lead —

* fugat hoc, facit illud amorem.
Quod facit auratum est, et cuspide

fiilget acuta ;
Quod fugat obtusum est, et habet

sub arundine plumbum.'

195 in erectam] the neuter adj.
used substantively, * into an elevated
region.' Cf. *per arduum,' Hor.
Od. II. xix. 21.

per orbes] 'among the stars'
(Warton).

i24

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Hinc mentes ardere sacrse formaeque deorum.

Tu quoque in his, nee me fallit spes lubrica, Damon,
Tu quoque in his certe es, nam quo tua dulcis abiret
Sanctaque simplicitas, nam quo tua Candida virtus ?
Nee te Lethaeo fas quaesivisse sub orco,
Nee tibi eonveniunt laerymae, nee flebimus ultra :
Ite proeul, laerymae ; purum eolit sethera Damon,
-^thera purus habet, pluvium pede reppulit areum ;
Heroumque animas inter divosque perennes
-^thereos haurit latiees, et gaudia potat
Ore saero. Quin tu, eoeli post jura reeepta,
Dexter ades plaeidusque fave quieunque voearis,
Seu tu noster eris Damon, sive aequior audis

200

205

196 oollimat] ' takes aim.' The
woid collimare is now understood
not to exist : it was formerly found
in editions of Cicero, Gellius, &c.,
the supposed meaning being * to
\oo\i sidelong sX2Lnyi\i\Tig' (as if from
the adj. /imus), but it has been
expunged everywhere as a mistake
for collimare^ *to aim in a straight
line.'

197] Keightley remarks that 'di-
vine, not sensual love is here spoken
of.' See P. L. viiL 592; Comus^
1004 ; Quarles, Emblems^ ii. 8.
Milton was doubtless familiar with
the magnificent description of Celes-
tial Love in Plato's Symposium (c. 8)
and Phadrus (c. 30 foil.).

198-219] The mention of * sacred
minds and forms divine ' leads the
poet to describe that state of hea-
venly bliss which he is assured that
the soul of his friend is now enjoy-
ing. This passage will bear a close
comparison with that in Lycidas, 165
foil., both as regards the general
sentiment and some particular ex-
pressions ; there is the same juxta-
position of classical and Scriptural
imagery, only here the former
largely predominates, as might be

expected from the form of the poem
and the language in which it is
written. The apotheosis of Daphnis
in Virgil's 5th Eclogue seems to
have been chiefly before Milton's
mind on both occasions.

200 sancta simplicitas] Cf.
/. 33.

201 qnsesivisse] The perfect tense
has great force here. The first im-
pulse of grief was to mourn the
departed one as lost and gone, but
it is presently rejected for an ex-
pression of belief in his immortality.
See Lycidas, 165, 166, 204 ; Vii^.
E, V. 56, 5 7. The fine idea of spring-
ing upwards from the arc of the
rainbow is partly due to Virgil, G.
iv. 233, where the rising Pleiad is
said to * spurn with her foot the
Ocean stream' (* Oceani spretos
pede reppulit amnes ').

205] Keightley comp. Hor. Od.
III. iii. II, 'Quos inter Augustus
recumbe'ns Purpureo bibit ore nec-
tar.'

208] See note and reff.on Lycidas^
184.

209 aadis] as in Hor. Sat 11.
vi. 20, * seu lane libentius audis.'
Different names of a god implied

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Diodatus, quo te divino nomine cuncti
Coelicolae norint, silvisque vocabere Damon.
Quod tibi purpureus pudor et sine labe juventus
Grata fuit, quod nulla tori libata voluptas,
En etiam tibi virginei servantur honores ;
Ipse caput nitidum cinctus rutilante corona,
Laetaque frondentis gestans umbracula palmae,
iEtemum perages immortales hymenaeos ;
Cantus ubi choreisque furit lyra mista beatis,
Festa Sionaeo bacchantur et Orgia thyrso.

125
210

215

different attributes (Exodus vi. 3) ;
whence arose the idea that one
name would on certain occasions be
more acceptable than another. Thus
the Chorus in iEsch. Agam. 155
exclaims : Zciiy, tfr-ni itot' Itrtiv^ el
T<$8' ahr^ (pl\ov KfK\rifi4vtff ro\n6
vi¥ irpo<revv4irta.

210 Diodatus] * God -given/
*hence * divino nomine.' One of
Diodati's letters begins with the
words SeoffSdros MlXrotyi x^P*^^
(see Introduction, p. 31).

211 silvis] i.e. by us shepherds.
212] Richardson comp. Ovid,

Amor. I. iii. 14, * Nudaque simpli-
citas purpureusque pudor.' The
latter is the rosy blush of modesty ;
cf. Virg. Mn. i. 591, 'lumenque
juventae Purpureum* (see note on
LycidaSf 141).

214] Warton observes that Dio-
dati was unmarried, and quotes Rev.
xiv. 3, 4. Cf. also Bp. Taylor,
Holy Lrving, xi. 3 (quoted by Keble
in 5ie Christian Year^ Wednesday
before Easter), *that little coronet
or special reward, which God hath
prepared for those "who have not
defiled themselves with women,
but follow the Lamb for ever." *

216 palmsB] Rev. vii. 9.

217 hyxnenaBOs] See Lycidas, 176
and note.

219 thyrso] the instrumental ab-
lative, * under the inspiration of the
thyrsus,' the instrument which ex-
cited the Bacchantes to phrensy.
We have here perhaps the most
startling instance to be found in
Milton's poetry of that blending of
sacred with pagan imagery, to
which reference has so often been
made. Such a conception as is here
presented to us can only be account-
ed for (and even then not wholly
excused) on the hypothesis that
partly from the custom of the period,
partly from his own literary associa-
tions, the images derived from clas-
sical mythology had become so
familiar to Milton's mind that their
precise original import was for the
time forgotten. To suppose that he
would seriously have admitted any
real comparison between the orgies
of Dionysus and the joys of the
saints in glory would be to contra-
dict all that we know, from other
sources, of his genuine piety and the
intense sincerity of his devotion.

TRANSLATION OF THE EPITAPHIUM

DAMONIS.

By Charles Symmons, D.D. Jesus Coll. Oxon., 1806.

Damon, an Epitaphial Elegy.

Ye nymphs of Himera (whose stream along

The notes have floated of your mournful song,

As Daphnis or as Hylas you deplored,

Or Bion, once the shepherds' tuneful lord ;)

Lend your Sicilian softness to proclaim 5

The woes of Thyrsis on the banks of Thame;

What plaints he murmured to the springs and floods,

How waked the sorrowing echoes of the woods.

As frantic for his Damon lost, alone

He roamed, and taught the sleepless night to groan. 10

Twice the green blade had bristled on the plain,

And twice the golden ear enriched the swain,

Since Damon by a doom too strict expired,

And his pale eye his absent friend required.

For Thyrsis still his wished return delayed; 15

The Muses held him in the Tuscan shade.

But when with satiate taste and careful thought

His long-forgotten home and flock he sought.

Ah ! then, beneath the accustomed elm reclined,

All — all his loss came rushing to his mind. 20

Undone and desolate, for transient ease

He poured his swelling heart in strains like these :

Return unfed, my lambs ; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost!
What powers shall I of earth or heaven invoke, 25

Since Damon fell by their relentless stroke } •

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. 127

And shalt thou leave us thus ? and shall thy worth
Sleep in a nameless grave with common earth ?
But he whose wand the realms of death controls
Forbids thy shade to blend with common souls. 30

While these o'erawed disperse at his command,
He leads thee to thy own distinguished band.
Return unfedy my lambs; by fortune crost
Your hapless master now to you is lost!
And sure, unless beneath some evil eye, 35

That blights me with its glance, my powers should die,
Thou shalt not slumber on thy timeless bier
* Without the meed of one melodious tear.'
Long shall thy name, thy virtues long remain
In fond memorial with the shepherd train ; 40

Their festive honours and their votive lay
To thee, as to their Daphnis, they shall pay, —
Their Daphnis thou, as long as Pales loves
The springing meads, or Faunus haunts the groves;
If aught of power or faith and truth attend, 45

Palladian science and a Muse thy friend.
Return unfed y my lambs j by fortune crost
Your hapless master now to you is lost!
Yes, Damon, thee such recompenses wait. —
But ah ! what ills hang gloomy o'er my fate ? 50

Who now, still faithful to my side, will bear
Keen frosts or suns that parch the sickening air,
When boldly, to protect the distant fold.
We seek the growling savage in his hold ?
Who now, as we retrace the long rough way, 55

With tale or song will soothe the weary day ?
Return unfed, my lambs ; by fortune crost
Your hapless master now to you is lost!
To whom my bosom shall I now confide ?
At whose soft voice will now my cares subside ? 60

Who now will cheat the night with harmless mirth.
As the nut crackles on the glowing hearth.
Or the pear hisses, — ^while without the storm
Roars through the wood and ruffles nature's form ?

Return unfed, my lambs; by fortune crost 65

Your hapless master now to you is lost!
In sunmier too, at noontide's sultry hour.

128 EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

When Pan lies sleeping in his beechen bower ;

When diving from the day^s oppressive heat

The panting Naiad seeks her crystal seat ; 70

When every shepherd leaves the silent plain,

And the green hedge protects the snoring swain ;

Whose playful fancy then shall light the smile ?

Whose Attic tongue relieve my languid toil ?

Return unfed^ my lambs; by fortune crost 75

Your hapless master now to you is lost!
Ah ! now through meads and vales alone I stray,
Or linger sad where woods embrown the day ;
As drives the storm, and Eurus o'er my head
Breaks the loose twilight of the billowy shade. 80

Return unfed, my lambs ; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost!
My late trim fields their laboured culture scorn.
And idle weeds insult my drooping com ;
My widowed vine in prone dishonour sees 85

Her clusters wither ; — not a shrub can please.
E'en my sheep tire me ; they with upward eyes
Gaze at my grief, and seem to feel my sighs.

Return unfed, my lambs ; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost! 90

My shepherd friends, by various tastes inclined,
Direct my steps the sweetest spot to find.
This likes the hazel, that the beechen grove ;
One bids me here, one there for pleasure rove.
Aegon the willow's pensile shade delights, 95

And gay Amyntas to the streams invites.

* Here are cool fountains ; here is mossy grass ;

* Here zephyrs softly whisper as they pass.

* From this light spring yon arbute draws her green,

* The pride and beauty of the sylvan scene.' . 100
Deaf is my woe, and while they speak in vain,

I plunge into the copse and hide my pain.

Return unfed, my lambs; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost!
Mopsus surprised me in my sullen mood, 105

(Mopsus who knew the language of the wood ;
Knew all the stars, could all their junctions spell,)
And thus ; — * What passions in your bosom swell ?

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. 129

* Speak ! flows the poison from disastrous love ?

' Or falls the mischief star-sent from above ? no

* For leaden Saturn, with his chill control,

* Oft has shot blights into the shepherd's soul/

Return unfed^ my lambs; by fortune crost
Your hapless master now to you is lost!
The wandering nymphs exclaim — ' What, Thyrsis, now ? 1 1 5

* Those heavy eyelids and that cloudy brow

* Become not youth ; to youth the jocund song,

* Frolic and dance and wanton wiles belong.

* With these he courts the joys that suit his state ;

* Ah ! twice unhappy he who loves too late !' 120

Return unfed, my lambs j by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost/
With Dryope and Hyas, ^Egle came,
A lovely lyrist, but a scornful dame.

From Chelmer's banks fair Chloris joined the train ; 125
But vain their blandishments, their solace vain.
Dead is my hope, and pointless beauty's dart
To waken torpid pleasure in my heart.

Return unfed, my lambs j by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost! 130

How blest where, none repulsed and none preferred.
One common friendship blends the lowing herd !
Touched by no subtle magnet in the mind.
Each meets a comrade when he meets his kind.
Conspiring wolves enjoy this equal love, 135

And this the zebra's parti-coloured drove ;
This too the tribes of ocean, and the flock
Which Proteus feeds beneath his vaulted rock.
The sparrowj fearless of a lonely state.
Has ever for his social wing a mate ; 14a

Whom should the falcon or the marksman strike,
He soon repairs his loss and finds a like.
But we, by Fate's severer frown oppressed.
With war and sharp repulsion in the breast,
Can scarcely meet amid the human throng 145

One kindred soul, or met preserve him long.
>yhen fortune, now determined to be kind.
Yields the ^ch gift, and mind is linked to mind.

ijo EPITAPHIUM DAMON IS.

Death mocks the fond possession, bursts the chain.

And plants the bosom with perennial pain. 150

Return unfedy my lambs; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost J
Alas ! what madness tempted me to stray
Where other suns on distant regions play?
To tread aerial paths and Alpine snows, 155

Scared by stem Nature's terrible repose ?
Ah ! could the sepulchre of buried Rome
Thus urge my frantic foot to spurn my home ?
Though Rome were now, as once in pomp arrayed
She drew the Mantuan from his flock and shade ; 160

Ah ! could she lure me from thy faithful side,
Lead me where rocks would part us, floods divide,
Forests and lofty motmtains intervene,
Whole realms extend and oceans roar between ?
Ah, wretch ! denied to press thy fainting hand, 165

Close thy dim eyes and catch thy last command ;
To say—' My friend, O think of all our love,
' And bear it glowing to the realms above !'

Return unfed^ my lambs; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost / 170

Yet must I not deplore the hours that flew.
Ye Tuscan swains, with science and with you ; —
' Each Grace and Muse is yours,' — ^and yours my Damon too,
From ancient Lucca's Tuscan walls he came^
With you in country, talents, arts the same. 175

How happy, lulled by Amo's warbling stream.
Hid by his poplars from day's flaring beam.
When stretched along the fragrant moss I lay.
And culled the violet or plucked the bay ;
Or heard, contending for the rural prize, 180

Famed Lycid's and Menalcas' melodies.
I too essayed to sing, nor vainly sung ;
This flute, these baskets speak my victor tongue —
And Datis and Francinus, swains who trace
Their Tuscan lineage to the Lydian race, 185

Dear to the Muses both, with friendly care
Taught their carved trees my favoured name to bear.

Return unfedy my lambs; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost I

}

EPITAPHIUM DAMONI& 131

Then, as the moonbeam slumbered on the plain, 190

I penned my fold, and sung in cheerful strain ;

And oft exclaimed, unconscious of my doom,

As your pale ashes mouldered in the tomb—

' Now he is singing ; now my friend prepares

' His twisted osiers or his wiry snares ! ' 195

Then would rash fancy on the future seize.

And hail you present in such words as these —

* What ? loitering here ? unless some cause dissuade,

* Haste and enjoy with me the whispering shade ;

' Or where his course the lucid Colnus bends, 200

* Or where Cassibelan's domain extends.

* There shew what herbs in vale or upland gfrow,
'The harebell's ringlet and the saffron's glow ;

* There teach me all the physic of the plains,

* What healing virtues swell the floref s veins.' 205
Ah ! perish all the healing plants, confest

Too weak to save the swain who knew them best !

As late a new- compacted pipe I found.

It gave beneath my lips a loftier sound ;

Too high indeed the notes ; for as it spoke 210

The waxen junctures in the labour broke.

Smile as you may, I will not hide from you

The ambitious sb*ain ; — ^ye woods, awhile adieu !
Return unfed, my lambs; by fortune crost
Your hapless master now to you is lost / 215

High on Rutupium's cliffs my muse shall hail

The first white gleamings of the Dardan sail ; .

Shall sing the realms by Imogen controlled,

And Brennus, Arvirage, and Belin old ;

Shall sing Armorica at length subdued 220

By British steel in Gallic blood imbrued ;

And Uther in the form of Gorlois led

By Merlin's fraud to logeme's bed,

Whence Arthur sprang. If length of days be mine,

My shepherd's pipe shall hang on yon old pine 225

In long neglect ; or tuned to British strains

With British airs shall please my native swains.

But wherefore so ? alas ! no human mind

Can hope for audience all the human kind

K 2

132 EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Enough for me ; I ask no more renown 230

(Lost to the world, to Britain only known).

If yellow-tressed Usa read my lays,

Alain and gulphy Humber sound my praise,

Trent's sylvan echoes answer to my song,

My own dear Thames my warbled notes prolong ; 235

Ore-tinctured Tamar own me for her bard,

And Thule mid her utmost flood regard.

Return unfed^ my lambs; by fortune crost

Your hapless master now to you is lost !
These lays, and more like these, for thee designed 240

I wrote, and folded in the laurePs rind.
For thee I also kept, of antique mould.
Two spacious goblets, rough with laboured gold.
(Rare was the gift, but yet the giver more^
Mansus the pride of the Chalcidian shore). 245

In bold existence, from the workman's hand.
Two subjects on their fretted surface stand.
Here by the Red Sea coast, in length displayed,
Arabia pants beneath her odorous shade ;
And here the Phoenix from his spicy throne, 250

In heavenly plumage radiant and alone,
Himself a kind, beholds with flamy sight
The wave first kindle with the morning light
There on another side the heavens unfold.
And great Olympus shines in brighter gold. 255

Strange though it seems, conspicuous on the scene
The god of love displays his infant mien ;
Dazzling his arms, his quiver, torch and bow,
His brilliant shafts with points of topaz glow.
With these he meditates no common wound, 360

But proudly throws a fiery glance around ;
And scorning vulgar aims, directs on high
His war against the people of the sky ;
Thence struck with sacred flame the ethereal race
Rush to new joys, and heavenly minds embrace. 265

With these is Damon now, my hope is sure ;
Yes ! with the just, the holy and the pure.
My Damon dwells ; — ^'twere impious to surmise
Virtues like his could rest below the skies.

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. 133

Then cease our tears ! from his superior seat 270

He sees the showery arch beneath his feet ;

And mixed with heroes and with gods above

Quaffs endless draughts of life, and joy and love*

But thou, when fixed on thy empyreal throne,

When heaven's eternal rights are all thy own, 275

O still attend us from thy starry sphere,

Still as we call thee by thy name most dear,

Diodatus above — but yet our Damon here !

As thine was roseate purity, that fled

In youth abstemious from the nuptial bed, 280

Thy virgin triumphs heavenly spousals wait ; —

Lo ! where it leads along its festal state ;

A crown of living lustre binds thy brow.

Thy hand sustains the palm's immortal bough ;

While the full song, the dance, the frantic lyre, ] 285

And Sion's thyrsus wildly waved conspire [

To solemnise the rites, and boundless joys inspire, j

THE SAME

By Professor Masson, 1873. — Reprinted from his 'Life

OF Milton/ Vol. II. p. 85.

On the Death of Damon.

The Argument

Thyrsis and Damon, shepherds of the same neighbourhood, following
the same pursuits, were friends from their boyhood, in the highest
degree of mutual attachment. Thyrsis, having set out to travel for
mental improvement, received news when abroad of Damon's death.
Afterwards at length returning, and finding the matter to be so, he
deplores himself and his solitary condition in the following poem.
Under the guise of Damon, however, is here imderstood Charles
Diodati, tracing his descent on the father's side from the Tuscan city of
Lucca, but otherwise English — a youth remarkable, while he lived,
for his genius, his learning, and other most shining virtues.

Nymphs of old Himera's stream (for ye it was that remembered
Daphnis and Hylas when dead, and grieved for the sad fate of Bion),
Tell through the hamlets of Thames this later Sicilian story —
What were the cries and murmurs that burst from Thyrsis the

wretched,
What lamentations continued he wrung from the caves and the

rivers,
Wrung from the wandering brooks and the grovels most secret

recesses,
Mourning his Damon lost, and compelling even the midnight
Into the sound of his woe, as he wandered in desolate places.
Twice had the ears in the wheat-fields shot through the green of

their sheathing,
As many crops of pale gold were the reapers counting as garnered,
Since the last day that had taken Damon down from the living,

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. 135

Thyrsis not being by ; for then that shepherd was absent,
Kept by the Muse's sweet love in the far-famed town of the Tuscan.
But, when his satiate mind, and the care of his flock recollected,
Brought him back to his home, and he sat, as of old, 'neath the

elm-tree,
Then at last, O then, as the sense of his loss comes upon him.
Thus he begins to disburthen all his measureless sorrow : —

Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Ah me ! what deities now shall I call on in earth or in heaven,
After the pitiless death by which they have reft thee, my Damon ?
Thus dost thou leave us ? thus without name is thy virtue departed
Down to the world below, to take rank with the shadows unnoted ?
No ! May He that disparteth souls with his glittering baton
Will it not so, but lead thee into some band of the worthies,
Driving far from thy side all the mere herd of the voiceless !

Go unpastured, my lambs: your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Hap as it may, unless the wolf's black glance shall first cross me,
Not in a tearless tomb shall thy loved mortality moulder ;
Stand shall thine honour for thee, and long henceforth shall it

flourish
Mid our shepherd lads ; and thee they shall joy to remember
Next after Daphnis chief, next after Daphnis to praise thee,
Sj long as Pales and Faunus shall love our fields and our

meadows,
If it avails to have cherished the faith of the old and the loyal,
Pallas's arts of peace, and have had a tuneful companion !

Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Kept are these honours for thee, and thine they shall be, my

Damon !
But for myself what remains ? For me what faithful companion
Now will cling to my side, in the place of the one so familiar.
All through the season harsh when the grounds are crisp with the

snow-crust.
Or 'neath the blazing sun when the herbage is dying for moisture ?
Were it the task to go forth in the track of the ravaging lions.
Or to drive back from the folds the wolf-packs boldened by hunger,
Who would now lighten the day with the sound of his talk or his

singing ?

136 EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Go unpasturedy my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Whom shall I trust with my thoughts ; or who will teach me to

deaden
Heart-hid pains ; or who will cheat away the long evening
Sweetly with chat by the fire, where hissing hot on the ashes
Roasts the ripe pear, and the chestnuts crackle beneath, while the

South-wind
Hurls confusion without, and thunders down on the elm-tops ?
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Then, in the summer, when day spins round on his middlemost axle,
What time Pan takes his sleep concealed in the shade of the

Deecnes,
And when the n)'mphs have repaired to their well-known grots in

the rivers,
Shepherds are not to be seen and under the hedge snores the rustic.
Who will bring me again thy blandishing ways and thy laughter,
All thy Athenian jests, and all the fine wit of thy fancies ?

Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Now all lonely I wander over the fields and the pastures.
Or where the branchy shades are densest down in the valleys ;
There I wait till late, while the shower and the storm-blast above me
Moan at their will, and sighings shake through the breaks of the

woodlands.
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Ah ! how my fields, once neat, are now overgrown and unsightly,
Forward only in weeds, and the tall com sickens with mildew !
Mateless, my vines droop down the shrivelled weight of their

clusters ;
Neither please me my myrtles; and even the sheep are a trouble ;
They seem sad, and they turn their faces, poor things, to their master !
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Tityrus calls to the hazels ; to the ash-trees Alphesibceus ;
^gon suggests the willows : * The streams,' says lovely Amyntas ;

* Here are the cool springs, here the moss-broidered grass and the

hillocks ;

* Here are the zephyrs, and here the arbutus whispers the rq>ple.'

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. 137

These things they sing to the deaf; so I took to the thickets and

left them.
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not youi*

bleating.
Mopsus addressed me next, for he had espied me returning
(Wise in the language of birds, and wise in the stars too, is

Mopsus) :

* Thyrsis/ he said, * what is this ? what bilious humour afflicts thee ?

* Either love is the cause, or the blast of some star inauspicious ;

* Saturn's star is of all the' oftenest deadly to shepherds,

* Fixing deep in the breast his slant leaden shaft of sickness.'

Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your
bleating.
Round me fair maids wonder ; * What will come of thee, Thyrsis ?

* What wouldst thou have?* they say : *not commonly see we the

young men

* Wearing that cloud on the brow, the eyes thus stem and the

visage :
' Youth seeks the dance and sports, and in all will tend to be
wooing :

* Rightfully so : twice wretched is he who is late in his loving.'

Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Dryope came, and Hyas, and JEgle, the daughter of Baucis
(Learned is she in the song and the lute, but O what a proud

one !) ;
Came to me Chloris also, the maid from the banks of the Chelmer.
Nothing their blandishings move me, nothing their prattle of

comfort ;
Nothing the present can move me, nor any hope of the future.
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Ah me ! how like one another the herds frisk over the meadows.
All by the law of their kind, companions equally common ;
No one selecting for friendship this one rather than that one
Out of the flock ! So come in droves to their feeding the jackals ;
So in their turns pair also the rough untameable zebras.
Such too the law of the deep, where Proteus down on the shingle
Numbers his troops of sea-calves. Nay, that meanest of wing'd

ones,
See how the sparrow has always near him a fellow^ when flying

138 EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Round by the bams he chirrups, but seeks his own thatch ere it

darkens ;
Whom should fate strike lifeless — whether the beak of the falcon
Pin him in air, or he lie transfixed by the reed of the ditcher —
Quick the survivor is off, and a moment finds him remated.
IVe are the hard race, we, the battered children of fortune.
We of the breed of men, strange-minded and different-moulded !
Scarcely does any discover his one true mate among thousands ;
Or, if kindlier chance shall have given the singular blessing,
Comes a dark day on the creep, and comes the hour unexpected,
Snatching away the gift, and leaving the anguish etemaL

Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Ah ! what roaming whimsy drew my steps to a distance.
Over the rocks hung in air and the Alpine passes and glaciers !
Was it so needful for me to have seen old Rome in her ruins —
Even though Rome had been such as, erst in the days of her

g^atness,^
Tityrus, only to visit, forsook both his flocks and his country —
That but for this I consented to lack the use of thy presence.
Placing so many seas and so many mountains between us.
So many woods and rocks and so many murmuring rivers ?
Ah ! at the end at least to have touched his hand had been given.,

me,
Closed his beautiful eyes in the placid hour of his dying.
Said to my friend, ' Farewell ! in the world of the stars think of me\*
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your
bleating.
Albeit also oiyou my memory never shall weary.
Swains of the Tuscan land, well-practised youths in the Muses,
Here there was grace and lightness ; Tuscan thou too, my Damon,
Tracing the line of thy race from the ancient city of Lucca ! .
O, how mighty was I, when, stretched by the stream of the Amo
Murmuring cool, and where the poplar-grove softens the herbage,
Violets now I would pluck, and now the sprigs of the myrtle.
Hearing Menalcas and Lycidas vying the while in their ditties !
/ also dared the challenge ; nor, as I reckon, the hearers
Greatly disliked my trials — ^for yet the tokens are with me.
Rush-plaits, osier nets, and reed-stops of wax, which they gave me.
Ay more : two of the group have taught our name to their beech-
woods —

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. 139

Dati and also Francini, both of them notable shepherds,
As well in lore as in voice, and both of the blood of the Lydian.
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your

bleating.
Then too the pleasant dreams which the dewy moon woke within

me,
Penning the young kids alone within their wattles at even !
Ah! how often I said, when already the black mould bewrapt

thee,
' Now my Damon is singing, or spreading his snares for the

leveret ;

* Now he is weaving his twig-net for some of his various uses.'
What with my easy mind I hoped as then in the future
Lightly I seized with the wish and fancied as present before me.
*Ho, my friend !' I would cry : 'art busy? If nothing prevent

thee,

* Shall we go rest somewhere in some talk-favouring covert,

* Or to the waters of Colne, or the fields of Cassibelaunus ?

* There thou shalt run me over the list of thy herbs and their juices,

* Foxglove, and crocuses lowly, and hyacinth-leaf with its blossom,

* Marsh-plants also that grow for use in the art of the healer.'
Perish the plants each one, and perish all arts of the healer
Gotten of herbs, since nothing served they even their master !

/ too— for strangely my pipe for some time past had been sounding
Strains of an unknown strength — ^'tis one day more than eleven

since
Thus it befell — and perchance the reeds I was trying were new

ones :
Bursting their fastenings, they flew apart when touched, and no

farther
Dared to endure the grave sounds : I am haply in this over-
boastful ;
Yet I will tell out the tale. Ye woods, yield your honours and
listen !
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your
bleating.
/ have a theme of the Trojans cruising our southern headlands
Shaping to song, and the realm of Imogen, daughter of Pandras,
Brennus and Arvirach, dukes, and Bren's bold brother, Belinus ;
Then the Armorican settlers under the laws of the Britons,
Ay, and the womb of Igraine fatally pregnant with Arthur,

I40 EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS.

Uther's son, whom he got disguised in Gorlois' likeness.
All by Merlin's craft. O then, if life shall be spared me,
Thou shalt be hung, my pipe, far off on some brown dying pine-
tree,
Much forgotten of me ; or else yon Latian music
Changed for the British war-screech ! What then ? For one to

do all things,
One to hope all things, fits not ! Prize sufficiently ample
Mine, and distinction gi^at (unheard of ever thereafter
Though I should be, and inglorious, all through the world of

the stranger),
If but yellow-haired Ouse shall read me, the drinker of Alan,
Humber, which whirls as it flows, and Trent's whole valley of

orchards,
Thames, my own Thames, above all, and Tamar's western waters.
Tawny with ores, and where the white waves swinge the far
Orkneys.
Go unpastured, my lambs : your master now heeds not your
bleating.
These I was keeping for thee, wrapt up in the rind of the laurel.
These and other things with them ; and mainly the two cups which

Manso —
Manso, not the last of Southern Italy's glories —
Gave me, a wonder of art, which himself, a wonder of nature,
Carved with a double design of his own well-skilled invention :
Here the Red Sea in the midst, and the odoriferous summer,
Araby's winding shores, and palm trees sweating their balsams.
Mid which the bird divine, earth's marvel, the singular Phoenix,
Blazing caerulean-bright with wings of different colours.
Turns to behold Aurora surmounting the glassy-green billows :
Obverse is Heaven's vast vault and the great Olympian mansion.
Who would suppose it ? Even here is Love and his cloud-painted

quiver.
Arms glittering torch-lit, and arrows tipped with the fire-gem.
Nor is it meagre souls and the base-bom breasts of the vulgar
Hence that he strikes ; but, whirling round him his luminous

splendours,
Always he scatters his darts right upwards sheer through the star-
depths
Restless, and never deigns to level the pain of them downwards ;
Whence the sacred minds and the forms of the gods ever- burning.

EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. 141

'Thou too art there — not vain is the hope that I cherish, my

Damon —
Thou too art certainly there ; for whither besides could have vanished
Holy-sweet fancies like thine, and purity stainless as thine was ?
No ; not down in Lethe's darkness ought we to seek thee !
Tears are not fitting for thee, nor for thee will we weep any longer ;
Flow no more, ye tear-drops ! Damon inhabits the ether ;
Pure, he possesses the sky ; he has spurned back the arc of the

rainbow.
Housed mid the souls of the heroes, housed mid the gods ever-
lasting,
Quaffs he the sacred chalices, drinks he the joys of the blessed,
Holy-mouthed himself. But O, Heaven's rights being now thine,
Be thou with me for my good, however I ought to invoke thee.
Whether still as our Damon, or whether of names thou wouldst

rather
That of Diodati now, by which deep-meaning divine name
All the celestials shall know thee, while shepherds shall still call

thee Damon.
For that the rosy blush and the unstained strength of young

manhood
Ever were dear to thee, and the marriage joy never was tasted,
Lo • there are kept for thee the honoiu*s of those that were virgin J
Thou, with thy fair head crowned with the golden, glittering

cincture,
Waving green branches of palm, and walking the gladsome pro-
cession,
Aye shall act and repeat the endless heavenly nuptials.
There where song never fails, and the lyre and the dance mix to

madness.
There where the revel rages and Sion's thyrsus beats time.'

LONDON : PRlNTfiD BY

ffOTTISWOODB AND CO., NEW-STRBBT SQUASS

AND PARLIAMBNT STRBBT

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