COMUS. The first Scene discovers a wild Wood. THE ATTENDANT SPIRIT descends or enters. BEFORE the starry threshold of Jove's court In regions mild of calm and serene air, Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot, 5 Which men call earth; and, with low-thoughted care 3. Insphered.] Within their assigned sphere. The portions of space occupied by departed souls were called spheres. 7. Pestered in this pinfold.] The word pestered originally means crowded, obstructed. Ital. pesta, a crowd.' Your coach whose rude postilion Must pester every narrow lane. Shirley's Lady of Pleasure, i. So all unhoused souls do thither creep, Nor are they pestered for want of room. Sandys' Ovid, iv. 441. A pinfold is a pen or pound for cattle. 10. After this mortal change.] The demonstrative meaning implied in the word this does not 10 1 Amongst the enthroned gods on sainted seats. To such my errand is; and, but for such, 20 15. But for such.] The adverbial phrase for such, and the adverb not, in the following line, are connected by the conjunction but, and both modify the verb soil. The construction is, I would not but for such soil these pure, &c.; and, in analysis, the whole phrase not but for such may be treated as an adverbial adjunct to soil. 16. Ambrosial weeds.] The word weeds, which was used to denote garments generally, is still applied to the mourning attire of the widow. Ambrosia signified the food of the gods, and also an unguent said to be used by them, and to be of immortalizing virtue. See lines 840-1. 17. Sin-worn mould.] Sin-corrupted earth. 20. Took in by lot.] On the dethronement of Saturn, his three sons, Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto, shared the empire of the universe. Pluto was called Stygian Jove 22. Like to rich and various 23. Unadorned.] Naked; not adorned as the land. 24. To grace, &c.] The infinitive thus used makes an adverbial clause that he may grace, &c. In the next line but one an infinitive phrase is used adjectively describing the noun leave. By course commits to several government, And gives them leave to wear their sapphire crowns, The greatest and the best of all the main, et that fr And all this tract that fronts the falling sun peer Has in his charge, with tempered awe to guide Lies through the perplexed paths of this drear wood, 25. By course.] In regular distribution commits to divided government; to each his own distinct government. 29. He quarters, &c.] He apportions to such water-nymphs as the Nereides. 30. All this tract, &c.] The tract fronting the falling sun, or west (sol occideus), is Wales, of which the Earl of Bridgewater was appointed Lord President. His family residence was Ashridge House, a few miles from Tring. 35. Their father's state.] The ceremony of his being instated at Ludlow Castle, his official residence. This is retrospective; as he was appointed to the Presidency of Wales by Charles I., in May 1633. The Lady Alice Egerton was only about 13 years of age, and the elder of her brothers about 12, when they performed in the mask at Ludlow Castle. 38. Horror.] Shagginess. See Note on l. 429. 41. But that, &c.] We have here the noun clause that I was despatched, &c., forming an object to the preposition but; and the 41st and 42nd lines constitute an adverbial clause to suffer. 43. Why.] That is, why I was despatched, &c., a noun clause objective. The direct object of the verb tell is the whole of the two succeeding lines. What never yet was heard in tale or song, 45. In hall or bower.] In banquet room or private apartment. So, in Spenser's Faërie Queene, VI. ix. 32, 'And this your cabin [shall be] both my bower and hall.' And in Chaucer's Nun Priest's Tale, Full sooty was her bower and eke her hall. 46. From out.] That is, out from; out being an adverb. Comp. from off the waters,' l. $96. Let them from forth a saw-pit rush at once. 49. The Tyrrhene shore.] The Tuscan shore, or shore of Etruria. See what Ovid says of Glaucus, Tyrrhena per æquora lapsus,' &c. (Met. xiv. 8). 50. Circe's island.] The small island æa, afterwards, by union with the mainland, forming the promontory of Circeii. Circe was the daughter of Apollo, her mother being one of the Oceanides, named Perse. Proxima Circææ raduntur litora terræ, Shakspeare's Merry Wives, iv. 4. Who knows not Circe, &c. Com transformed. The poet here imitates a Latin construction; comp. Horace, Od. I. iii. 29, 'Post ignem subductum;' so in Par. Lost, i. 573, 'Never since created man met such embodied force.' The god Bacchus punished the Tuscan pirates by transforming them into sea-monsters. The story is told in Ovid, Met. iii. 660. Sirenum voces et Circa pocula nosti, Sub domina meretrice fuisset turpis et excors, Vixisset canis immundns, vel amica luto sus. 52. Whoever tasted whose charmed cup, is a noun sentence nominative to lost, and also part of an adjective sentence describing Circe. Whom therefore she brought up, and Comus named: Roving the Celtic and Iberian fields, At last betakes him to this ominous wood; And, in thick shelter of black shades imbowered, Offering to every weary traveller To quench the drouth of Phoebus; which as they taste, 59. Frolic of his full-grown 65. Orient.] Bright. This 74. Not once perceive, &c.] 60 65 70 75 80 77. To roll, &c.] Adverbial use of the infinitive. See Note on l. 24. 79. Adventurous.] Hazardous, perilous. 80. Glancing star.] Shooting star. So in Par. Lost, iv. 555, Uriel is said to glide through the even 'swift as a shooting star in autumn thwarts the night.' To glance is to dart obliquely. Comp. Spenser, F. Q. VI., vii. 7. One did miss his mark, And being carried with his force forthright, Glanced swiftly by; like to that heavenly spark Which, gliding through the air, lights all the heaven's dark. * bie above all things doch gods stamp defare. G. Hibit. |