The two lines in the reply of Æneas are 360-1 of the same Book"Fair queen oppose not what the gods command; Forced by my fate, I leave your happy land." P. 193 b. Traitress too kenn'd, and cursed sorceress. In the old edition the word is keend. Kenned is the participle of the verb "to ken¿.e., see from a distance”—and means here glaringly manifest. P. 194 a. Save, save Eneas; Dido's liefest love. Lief, or lieve, is dear; from leof, Saxon, Shakspeare has→→ P. 194. My liefest liege to be mine enemy."-2 Henry VI., iii. R. Here lie the sword that in the darksome cave, Here lie the garment which I clothed him in. Mr. Dyce weakens these verses very much by changing lie in both instances to lies. It is quite evident that Dido is addressing herself first to the sword, "thou shalt burn first," and then to the garment, "perish thou too." P. 194. And from mine ashes let a conqueror rise That may revenge this treason to a queen This prophecy about Hannibal is direct from Virgil "Exoriare aliquis nostris ex ossibus ultor, Qui face Dardanios ferroque sequare colonos."-Æn,, iv. 625. These lines are followed by those which are given in the original Latin, so that it would appear that Marlowe had intended to translate them also when he revised his work. The Sic, sic juvat ire sub umbras is from line 660 of the same Book. P. 195 a. The grief that tires upon thine inward soul, " To tire was, says Nares, a term in falconry; from tirer, French, to drag or pull. The hawk was said to tire on her prey, when it was thrown to her, and she began to pull at it and tear it."-See Note 12 a. "Ye dregs of baseness, vultures among men, P. 195 6. Beaumont and Fletcher. What can my tears or cries prevail me now, Prevail was often thus used for avail; so Beaumont and Fletcher Hero and Leander. Or this fine poem the old editions are very numerous. 1. Hero and Leander. By Christopher Marloe. London. Printed by Adam Islip, for Edward Blunt. 1598. 4to.-This edition has only the first two Sestiads. 2. [Another edition printed in the same year. Marlowe's portion is split into three Sestiads, and Chapman's continuation follows. Sir Charles Isham has twothe only two-copies. It will soon be reprinted by Mr. Collier, see his letter in the Athenæum, September 4, 1869. Previously to the date of this letter it was not known that Chapman's continuation had been published before 1600.] 3. Hero and Leander: Begunne by Christopher Marloe: Wherunto is added the first booke of Lucan translated line for line by the same Author. Ut Nectar, Ingenium. At London Printed for John Flasket, and are to be solde in Paules Church-yard, at the signe of the Blacke-beare. 1600. 4to. [This title-page has the peculiarity of making no mention of Chapman's continuation, which occupies the larger portion of the volume, and of particularly specifying the translation, a separate publication, which has not hitherto been discovered bound up with it.] 4. Hero and Leander: Begunne by Christopher Marloe, and finished by George Chapman. Ut Nectar, Ingenium. At London. Imprinted for John Flasket, and are to be sold in Paules Church-Yard, at the signe of the blacke Beare. 1606. 4to. 5. Hero and Leander: Begunne by Christopher Marloe, and finished by George Chapman. Ut Nectar, Ingenium. At London. Imprinted for Ed. Blunt and W. Barret, and are to be sold in Paul's Church-yard, at the signe of the blacke Beare. 1609. 4to. 6. Hero and Leander: Begunne by Christopher Marloe, and finished by George Chapman. Ut Nectar, Ingenium. London. Printed by W. Stansby for Ed. Blunt and W. Barret, and are to be sold in Pauls Church-yard, at the signe of the Blacke Beare. 1613, 4to. 7. Hero and Leander: Begun by Christopher Marloe, and finished by George Chapman. Ut Nectar, Ingenium. London. Printed by A. M. for Richard Hawkins and are to bee sold at his Shop in Chancerie-Lane, neere Serieants Inne. 1629. 4to. 8. Hero and Leander: Begun by Christopher Marloe, and finished by George Chapman. Ut Nectar, Ingenium. London. Printed by N. Okes for William Leake, and are to be sold at his shop in Chancery-lane neere the Roules. 1637. 4to. P. 197 a. FIRST SESTIAD. Those with sweet water oft her handmaid fills, An idea taken from the well-known toy, by which the song of birds may be so closely imitated. P. 197 a. And with still panting rock there took his rest. Some of the editions read rockt, which I am inclined to think must be the right word. It would mean that Cupid was rocked to rest by the gentle heaving of her bosom. P. 197 a. Fair Cynthia wished his arms might be her sphere; This bold idea will remind the reader of Tamburlaine the Great. P. 197 b. So was his neck in touching, and surpast Pelops was said to have been boiled by his father, Tantalus, and offered as a feast to the gods. His shoulder alone was consumed, and replaced by an imitation one of ivory. The earliest mythic Musæus is represented as presiding at Eleusis over the mystic rites of Demeter, the eater of the shoulder. P. 197 b. That my slack muse sings of Leander's eyes. Slack here stands for feeble, and in a way which I imagine to be very unusual. It does mean feeble certainly, but it is the feebleness of relaxation or looseness. P. 198 a. All his joints relaxed; From his slack hands the garland wreathed for Eve When yawning dragons draw her thirling car. The old editions read thirling, and Mr. Dyce very properly removed the whirling of the modern editors in its favour. He has, however, been severely taken to task for defining it as "tremulously moving," by Mr. Robert Bell, who prefers the other reading. But thirling really means penetrating by revolving, and thus may be fairly poetically applied to the motion of a chariot through the "gloomy sky" of midnight. The word is preserved to us in the drill of a carpenter's workshop. The old Mussulman historian Al 'Utbi describes Mahmoud of Ghuzni forcing his way through an army "like a gimlet into wood." P. 198. Incensed with savage heat, gallop amain. Mr. Robert Bell thinks this line was in Shakspeare's head when he wrote- But unluckily Shakspeare's phrase is "gallop apace." P. 198 a. The walls were of discoloured jasper stone. Discoloured is diverse-coloured. So Chapman "Menesthius was one That ever wore discoloured arms."—Iliad, xvi. P. 198 b. Vailed-i.e., bowed. It is not often used as a neuter verb, except by the poets, and South, in doing so, spells it veils-"ignorantly," as Johnson says. Vailed to the ground, veiling her eyelids close. P. 198 b. What we behold is censured by our eyes. Censure meant judgment, opinion. Shakspeare has "Madam and you, my sister, will you go To give your censures in this weighty business?" P. 198 h. Whoever loved that loved not at first sight. Shakspeare introduces this line very gracefully in act iii. scene 5 of As You Like It, which he is believed to have produced in 1599, the year after Hero and Leander was published "Dead shepherd! now I find thy saw of might Who ever loved that loved not at first sight.' Shakspeare must have had the whole passage in his mind when writing this scene. P. 1994. Rare creature, let me speak without offence, Is of behaviour boisterous and rough. This is the shape in which these lines are put by Ben Jonson into the mouth of Mathew in Every Man in his Humour. Knowell remarks, "this is in Hero and Leander" and on Mathew's quoting another couplet further on And I in duty will excel all other, As you in beauty do excel Love's mother Knowell says "he utters nothing but stolen remnants! A filching rogue, hang him!-and from the dead! its worse than sacrilege." Gifford, who, when editing a book, hated everybody but his author and Dean Ireland, takes occasion to say of Marlowe, "he was a man of impious principles, and flagitious life, and perished in a drunken broil." Why did he not add that he was the son of a shoemaker? P. 200 a. So young, so gentle, and so debonair. Milton must have been thinking of this line when he wrote "So buxom, blithe and debonair." P. 200 a. As put thereby yet might he hope for me. I think this ought to be written " 'put then by." At 203 a post, we find P. 2008. Far from the town where all is whist and still. Whist is husht or hush.-See Note, ante, 187 a. P. 200 b. Her vows above the empty air he flings. Mr. Dyce has altered the above of the old editions to about. P. 201 a. Her mind pure, and her tongue untaught to glose. To glose or gloze is to flatter, to insinuate, to fawn. It was arrested for a time in its descent to the limbo of disused words by Lord Brougham's memorable taunt to Lord Melbourne. 'My tongue is not hung to courtly tunes; I can't gloze." P. 202 b. And fruitful wits that inaspiring are, Mr. Robert Bell claims the merit of the comma on each side of "discontent," and adds, "I have ventured upon the punctuation in the text under the impression that discontent here means discontented, and that the interpretation of the passage is that foolish wits who fail in their inspiration [? aspirations] shall, discontented, seek their portion in distant lands. It may possibly be intended to convey an allusion to the numerous adventurers, such as Raleigh, who went at that time flocking to the New World." Raleigh is a curious specimen to select as an inaspiring wit. P. 202. SECOND SESTIAD. Had spread the board, with roses strowed the room. Mr. Robert Bell devotes a long note to this piece of extravagance in decoration, justifying it by similar examples from Heliogabalus and Cleopatra "Not only were the tables and dishes covered with them, but by mechanical contrivance showers of roses were made to descend upon the guests!" He seems to think they cost the same everywhere as they do in Covent Garden. Attar of roses is by no means uncommon, or outrageously expensive, and a quarter of a million of fullgrown roses are consumed in making every half-crown's weight of it! At Ghazipur I have seen many hundred acres cultivated with nothing else. P. 202 b. Where fancy is in equal balance paised. Fancy is love, and paised is poised, Frenchified in its pronunciation to suit the rhyme. P. 203 a. Moved by love's force unto each other leap. Mr. Dyce follows the old copies in printing lep in order that it may rhyme to the eye. Step is one of the words always quoted as having no corresponding rhyme, and among the irregular sounds suggested has been this very one of lep for leaped, which like crep for crept, kep for kept is often enough heard among horsey individuals. Mr. Thackeray makes Captain Crawley invariably pronounce them in this way. Rushes were the ordinary coverings for the floors of mansions, as well as cottages, in the England of Marlowe's time. Sir Thomas More in his Pittifull Life of King Edward V. has drawn an affecting picture of Queen Elizabeth (Woodville) in the Sanctuary at Westminster sitting "alone below on the rushes all desolate and dismaid." Marlowe appears to mean the sun shining upon an object directly opposite to it. P. 204 a. Oh, none but gods have power their love to hide! Another reading of this line is P. 204 4. Oh, none have power, but gods, their love to hide! Spits forth the ringled bit, and with his hoves, &c. In ages and countries where mechanical ingenuity has but few outlets, It exhausts itself in the construction of bits each more peculiar in form, or more torturing in effect than that which has preceded it. I have seen collections of these instruments of torment, and among them some of which Marlowe's curious adjective would have been highly descriptive. It may be, however, that the word is ring-led, in which shape it would mean guided by the ring on each side like a snaffle. Hoves of course are hooves, as some people affectedly, but perhaps correctly, call hoofs. P. 205 a Relenting thoughts, remorse and pity rests, Mr. Dyce is liable to fits of virtuous indignation against tautology. In Queen Dido, p. 182 a, he complained of foul and favourless as "pleonastic;" and here remorse and pity are all but synonymes.' He might as well say that revenge and murder were identical. |