In sage and solemn tunes have sung,
Of turneys and of trophies hung,
Of forests and inchantments drear,
Where more is meant than meets the ear.
Thus night oft see me in thy pale career,
Till civil-suited morn appear,

120

rant, but that the intelligent 120. Where more is meant than have more penetration, Orl. Inam. meets the ear.) Mr. Bowle refers 1. i. c. xxvi.

to Seneca, Epist. 114. “In quiMa voi, ch' avete gl' intelletti sani,

“ bus plus intelligendum est Mirate la dottrina che's' asconde, quam audiendum." T. War

Sotte queste coperte alte e profonde. ton. Milton says in his Apology for 121. Thus night oft see me in Smeelymnuus, “I may tell you thy pale career.] Hitherto we “ whither my younger

feet wan

have seen the night of the me“ dered: I betook me among lancholy man. Here his day “those lofty fables and romances, commences. Accordingly, this “ which recount in solemn cantos second part or division of the “ the deeds of knighthood, &c." poem is ushered in with a long Prose Works, i. 11. T. Warlon. verse. T. Warton.

118. --of trophies hung.) So 122. Till civil-suited morn apin Sams. Agon. 1738.

pear,] Paradise Regained, iv.

426. With all his trophics hung, and acts enroll'd, &c.

till morning fair T. Warton. Came forth with pilgrim steps in 119. Of forests and inchant

Richardson ments drear.) Mr. Bowle here cites the title of a chapter in Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Perceforest, “ Comment le rois act iii. sc. 4. “ d'Angleterre entra en la forest,

-Come civil night, « et des enchantements quil y

Thou sober-suited matron, all in black. “ trouua." vol. i. c. xxiv. f. 27. He adds other notices of in- 122. In this and in other places chanted forests, from Comedias of Shakespeare, civil is grave, de de Cervantes, t. i. 121. And cent, solemn. B. Jonson applies Batalla de Roncesvalles, c. xxxi. it to the colour of dress, Woman's st. ult. There are fine strokes Prize, act iii. s. 3. of imagination in Lucan's inchanted grove. In Boyardo's

I do not like the colour, 'tis too civil.

T. Warton. Orlando, the forest of Arden is the scene of many of Merlin's See also Mr. Dunster's note inchantments. T. Warton. on P. R. iv. 427. E.

amice gray.

125

Not trick'd and frounc'd as she was wont
With the Attic boy to hunt,
But kerchef'd in a comely cloud,
While rocking winds are piping loud,
Or usher'd with a shower still,
When the gust hath blown his fill,
Ending on the rustling leaves,
With minute drops from off the eaves.

130

123. Not trick'd and frounc'd “gloomy with rain and wind, he as she was wont

- walks into the dark trackless With the Attic boy to hunt,] “ woods, falls asleep by some Shakespeare calls dress tricking. “murmuring water, and with Mrs. Page, in the Merry Wives “ melancholy enthusiasm, exof Windsor, “ Go get us proper:

“pects some dream of prognosti“ ties and tricking for our fairies." « cation, or some music played Frounc'd is another word to the "by aerial performers." Never same purpose, signifying much were fine imagery and fine imathe same as frizzled, crisped, gination so marred, mutilated, curled. The Attic boy is ces and impoverished, by a cold, unphalus, with whom Aurora fell feeling, and imperfect representin love as he was hunting. See ation! To say nothing, that he Peck, and Ovid. Met. vii. 701. confounds two descriptions. T. 125. But kerchef d in a comely

Warton. cloud,] Kerchef is a bead dress 130. Wilh minute drops.). A from the French couvre chef ; a natural little circumstance calcu. word used by Chaucer and lated to impress a pleasing meShakespeare. Julius Cæsar, act lancholy; and which reminds ii. sc. 3.

one of a similar image in a poet 126. While rocking winds are that abounds in natural little piping loud,] So Shakespeare, circumstances. Speaking of a Mids. N. Dr. a. i. s. 1.

gentle Spring-Shower,« "Tis

scarce to patter heard,” says Therefore the winds piping to us in Thomson, Seas. Spring, ver. 176.

Dr. J. Warton. The still, that is, gentle shower, He means, by minute drops in the next line is opposed to from off the eaves, not small drops, the “ winds piping loud. See but minute drops, such as drop note on The Passion, 28. T. at intervals, by minutes, for the Warton.

shower was now over : 127. Doctor Johnson, from this say, minute-guns, and minuteto the hundred and fifty-fourth bells. In L'Allegro, the lark verse inclusively, thus abridges bade good-morrow at the poet's our author's ideas. “When the window, through sweet-briars, “morning comes, a morning honeysuckles, and vines, spread

vain.

And when the sun begins to fling
His flaring beams, me Goddess bring
To arched walks of twilight groves,
And shadows brown that Sylvan loves
Of pine, or monumental oak,

185
Where the rude axe with heaved stroke
Was never heard the Nymphs to daunt,
Or fright them from their hallow'd haunt.
There in close covert by some brook,
Where no profaner eye may look,

140 Hide me from day's garish eye, While the bee with honied thigh, ing, as we have seen, over In Comus, in the manuscript, v. the walls of the house. Now, 181. their leaves are dropping wet In the blind alleys of this arched wood. with a morning-shower. T. War- See P. R. č. 293. and P. L. i. 304, ton.

Ibid. b. ix. 1107. 131. And when the sun begins

-A pillar'd shade, to fling

High overarchu. His flaring beams,]

Here, by the way, is accidentally So Drayton, Nymphid. vol. i. p. Bishop 'Warburton's ingenious 1449.

but false idea of the Saracen arWhen Phæbus with a face of mirth chitecture. Compare also b. iv.

Had flong abroad his beumes. 705. T. Warton. Our author, in his book of Re

134. shadows brown] See the formation, of gospel truth. “In notes, P. L. iv. 246. and P. R. ii.

a flaring tire bespeckled her." 292. E. Pr. W. vol. i. 9. T. Warton.

141.-day'sgarish eye,] Garish, 133. To arched walks of twić splendid, gaudy. A word in

Shakespeare, Richard III. act iv. And shadows brown that Sylvan

SC. 4. loves.)

a garish flag. Thus in Browne's Britannia's Romeo and Juliet, act iii. sc. 4. Pastorals, now in high reputa- all the world shall be in love with tion, b. ii. s. iv. p. 104.

night,

And pay no worship to the garish sun. Now wanders Pan the arched groves and hills,

141. The eye of day for the Where fayeries often danc'd. sun, was a common image in

Spenser, Sylvester, Drayton, Ph. Again, ibid. s. ii. p. 44.

light groves,

145

That at her flow'ry work doth sing,
And the waters murmuring
With such consort as they keep,
Entice the dewy-feather'd sleep;
And let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings in airy stream
Of lively portraiture display'd,
Softly on my eye-lids laid.

150

thigh, &c.] Compare P. R. iv. “ lively displayed,” with this 247. where see the note. Com- sense, “ Wave his wings, in an pare also Drayton's Owle, vol. iv. “airy stream of rich pictures so p. 1492.

“strongly displayed in vision as See the small brookes as through the

“ to resemble real life.” Or, groves they travel,

if lively remain as an adjective, With the smooth cadence of their much in the same sense, dis

murmuring; Each bee with honie on her laden thye. itself. On the whole, we must

played will signify displaying T. Warton.

not here seek for precise mean148. Wave at his wings] Wave ings of parts, but acquiesce in a is used here as a verb neuter. general idea resulting from the

148. I do not exactly under. whole, which I think is suffi. stand the whole of the context. ciently seen.

T. Warton. Is the Dream to wave at Sleep's 150. Softly on my eye-lids laid.] wings? Doctor Newton will have In the same strain, Fletcher in wave to be a verb neuter: and the Faithful Shepherdess, act ii. very justly, as the passage now s. 1. vol. iii. p. 126. stands. But let us strike out at,

-Sweetest slumbers and make wave active.

And soft silence, fall in numbers -Let some strange mysterious dream

On your eye-lids. Ware his wings, in airy stream, &c. And in the Tragedy of Valenti" Let some fantastic Dream put nian, in an address to Sleep, act “ the wings of Sleep in motion, v. 8. 2. vol. iv. p. 353. “ which shall be displayed, or

On this afflicted prince fall like a

cloud “ expanded, in an airy or soft “ stream of visionary imagery,

In gentle showers. “ gently falling or settling on Nor must I forget an exquisite

my eye-lids.” Or, his may passage in Par. L. b. iv. 614. refer to Dream, and not to Sleep, -The timely dew of sleep with much the same sense. In , Now falling with soft slumbrous the mean time, supposing lively

weight inclines adverbial, as was now common,

Our eye-lids. displayed will connect with pour. But for wildness, and perhaps traiture, that is, “pourtraiture force, of imagery, in expressing

And as I wake, sweet music breathe
Above, about, or underneath,

doth crecp

the approach of sleep, Shake- 8. 3. The soldiers are watching speare exceeds all. Mids. N. Dr. before the palace. “ Musick of act iii. 8. 2.

" hautboys under the stage.-9

" Sold. Peace, what noise ? Till o'er their brows death-counter

" i Sold. List, list! Musick i'th' feiting sleep With leaden legs and batty wings

“ uir. S Sold. Under the earth,

“ &c." Sandys, in the Notes to T. Warlor. his English Ovid, says, that “ In

“the garden of the Tuilleries at 151. - sweet music breathe &c.) Paris, by an artificial device This thought is taken from

underground invented for muShakespeare's Tempest. Jortin. “ sicke, I have known an echo 151. And as I wake, sweet music

repeat a verse." Edit. Oxon. breathe

1632. p. 103. Psyche in Apuleius, Above, about, and underneath.) sleeping on a green and flowery Probably suggested to Milton's bank near a romantic grove, is imagination by some of the ma- awakened by invisible singers chineries of the Masks under the and unseen harps. Aur. Asin. I. contrivance of Inigo Jones. Hol- v. p. 87. b. edit. Beroald. By linshead, describing a very cu- the way, the whole of this ficrious device or spectacle pre- tion in Apuleius, where Pysche sented before Queen Elizabeth, wafted by the zephyrs into a deinsists particularly on the secret licious valley, sees a forest of or mysterious music of some fic. huge trees, containing a superb titious nymphs, “which," he palace richly constructed of ivory, adds,“ surely had been a noble gold, and precious stones, in “ hearing, and the more melo- which a sumptuous banquet ac

dious for the varietie (novelty] companied with music is most “thereof, because it should come luxuriously displayed, no person “secretlie and strangelie out of in the mean time appearing, has “the earth." Hist. iii. f. 1297. been adopted by the Gothic roJonson, in a Masque called a