Few ask, if fraud or force attain'd his ends.
For this, ere Phœbus rose, he had implor'd
Propitious heav'n, and ev'ry pow'r ador'd,
But chiefly Love-to Love an altar built
Of twelve vast French romances, neatly gilt.
There lay three garters, half a pair of gloves;
And all the trophies of his former loves;
With tender billet-doux he lights the pyre,

185

And breathes three am'rous sighs to raise the fire.
Then prostrate falls, and begs with ardent eyes

190

Soon to obtain, and long possess the prize :

The pow'rs gave ear, and granted half his pray'r;
The rest the winds dispers'd in empty air.
But now secure the painted vessel glides,
The sun-beams trembling on the floating tides,
While melting music steals upon the sky,
And soften'd sounds along the waters die.
Smooth flow the waves, the zephyrs gently play,
Belinda smil'd, and all the world was gay,

All but the sylph; with careful thoughts oppresst,
Th' impending woe sat heavy on his breast.
He summons strait his denizens of air;
The lucid squadrons round the sails repair:
Soft o'er the shrouds aërial whispers breathe,
That seem'd but zephyrs to the train beneath.
Some to the sun their insect-wings unfold,
Waft on the breeze, or sink in clouds of gold;

195

200

201

186. Twelve vast French romances = Cleopatra, Le Grand Cyrus, Clelie, Zayde, etc., etc. Pope may well call them "vast;" e. g. Clelie appeared in ten volumes of 800 pages each. The English translations were published in huge folios.

196. [What is meant by floating ?]

197. Melting music. Comp. Il Penseroso, 165.

203. Denizens. Means properly who dwell within, i. e. within the city, or who enjoy its franchise; then generally inhabitants, then especially a naturalized citizen. Here his Denizens-his fellow inhabitants.

205. [What are the shrouds of a ship?] For other meanings of shrouds see note to Hymn Nativity, 218.

207. [What is the force of insect here?]

208. Waft: here in a middle sense, waft themselves. In clouds of gold. This use of cloud is common enough: For gold see Paradise Lost, I. 483. Comp. "gilded butterfly."

210

Transparent forms, too fine for mortal sight,
Their fluid bodies half dissolv'd in light,
Loose to the wind their airy garments flew,
Thin glitt'ring textures of the filmy dew,
Dipped in the richest tincture of the skies,
Where light disports in ever-mingling dyes,
While ev'ry beam new transient colors flings,
Colors that change whene'er they wave their wings.
Amid the circle, on the gilded mast,

Superior by the head, was Ariel plac'd;

His purple pinions opening to the sun,

He raised his azure wand, and thus begun :

"Ye Sylphs and Sylphids, to your chief give ear!
Fays, Fairies, Genii, Elves, and Demons, hear!
Ye know the spheres and various tasks assigned
By laws eternal to th' aërial kind.

Some in the fields of purest ether play,

And bask and whiten in the blaze of day.

210. [What part of speech is half here?]

211. To the wind. See Lycidas, 13.

215

220

225

212. Filmy. Properly film means a thin skin or pellicle. Here filmy dew seems to mean the film-like moisture that covers leaves, etc. Glitt'ring textures. Milton's "glittering tissues." Tissue and texture are radically identical.

218. Superior by the head. We should now rather say "a head." 221. Sylphs and Sylphids. The feminine form sylphid is formed after the analogy of Achæid or Achæad (Iliad, v. 424), Troad, etc. This id or ad is also the Greek feminine patronymic sign. Comp. Nereus and Nereid, etc. This same termination is also specially used to denote a poem or work o some subject specified in the first part of the word: thus Thebaid-poem on Thebes; Eneid=poem on Æneas; Iliad=poem on Ilium. (Iliad-a Trojan woman in En. i. 480, etc.)

This is a parody of Paradise Lost, v. 600:

"Hear, all ye angels, progeny of light,

Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers.,'

222. Fayes, Fairies, Genii, are names of Latin origin. Fays and fairies are romance from the same root, the Latin fatum. Elf is of Teutonic origin; dæmon of Greek.

223. Spheres. Sphere-properly a ball, globe, and then specially a planet (see Hymn Nativity)-seems to be used also for a planet's path, or orbit, or circuit, and so for the area or region of its motion; then generally for any tract or district or province in which any body moves. Comp. Shakespeare, I. Henry IV. V. iv. 65:

"Two stars keep not their motion in one sphere."

226. [Whiten. Mention other verbs with this termination. What other force has it?]

Some guide the course of wandring orbs on high,
Or roll the planets thro' the boundless sky;
Some, less refin'd, beneath the moon's pale light
Pursue the stars that shoot athwart the night,
Or suck the mists in grosser air below,
Or dip their pinions in the painted bow,
Or brew fierce tempests on the wintry main,
Or o'er the glebe distill the kindly rain.
Others on earth o'er human race preside,
Watch all their ways, and all their actions guide;
Of these the chief the care of nations own,
And guard with arms divine the British throne.
Our humbler province is to tend the fair,
Not a less pleasing, tho' less glorious care,

To save the powder from too rude a gale,
Nor let th' imprison'd essences exhale,

To draw fresh colors from the vernal flow'rs,

230

235

240

To steal from rainbows, ere they drop in show'rs
A brighter wash, to curl their waving hairs,
Assist their blushes, and inspire their airs,
Nay, oft', in dreams invention we bestow,
To change a flounce, or add a furbelow.

245

227. Wandring orbs-meteors. Strictly the term planets (see following line) means "wanderers;" but it is applied to stars that move along regular and calculated courses.

230. See Paradise Lost, iv. 555-60, especially 556-7:

"Swift as a shooting star

In autumn thwarts the night."

Athwart. Comp. across, etc. For the simple word, see Troilus and Cressida, I. iii. 15:

"Trial did draw, Bias and thwart."

232. See Paradise Lost, xi. 244: "Iris had dipt the woof."

233. Main. The full phrase is the "main sea;" so "main flood" (Merchant of Venice, IV. i. 72);

234. [What is the meaning of kindly here? Comp. "gentle rain.] 239. Fair was commonly used as a substantive in the latter part of the seventeenth and in the eighteenth centuries, after the French; thus Spectator: "Gentlemen who do not design to marry yet pay their devoirs to one particular fair;" but it does not seem to have been adopted so far as to have a plural inflection.

246. [What is meant by airs here? What other various meanings has the word?]

248. Comp. Spectator: "She was flounced and furbelowed from head to foot, every ribbon was crinkled, and every part of her garment in curl." Furbelow-strictly a kind of flounce; commonly, the fringed border of a gown or petticoat.

This day black omens threat the brightest Fair
That e'er deserv'd a watchful spirit's care;
Some dire disaster, or by force, or slight;

But what, or where, the fates have wrapt in night.
Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law,

Or some frail China jar receive a flaw,

250

Or stain her honor, or her new brocade,

Forget her pray'rs, or miss a masquerade,

Or lose her heart, or necklace, at a ball,

Haste, then, ye spirits! to your charge repair:

255

Or whether Heav'n has doom'd that Shock must fall.

The flutt'ring fan be Zephyretta's care;

The drops to thee, Brillante, we consign;
And, Momentilla, let the watch be thine;
Do thou, Crispissa, tend her fav'rite lock;
Ariel himself shall be the guard of Shock.
To fifty chosen sylphs, of special note,
We trust the important charge, the petticoat
Form a strong line about the silver bound,
And guard the wide circumference around.
Whatever spirit, careless of his charge,
His post neglects, or leaves the fair at large,
Shall feel sharp vengeance soon o'ertake his sins,—
Be stopped in vials, or transfix'd with pins,

або

265

270

251. Slight. So sleight was variously spelt. We retain the word in the phrase "sleight of hand."

254. China jar. China-ware or porcelain "was first introduced into Europe in the beginning of the sixteenth century. . . . For a long time it was erroneously believed that China alone furnished the proper kind of clay necessary for its manufacture, and this circumstance, along with the then extremely rude state of the potter's art in Europe, prevented, for nearly two hundred years subsequent to its first introduction, any attempt towards the fabrication of this article in the west."

255. Brocade. "A stuff of gold, silver, or silk, raised and enriched with flowers, foliage, and other ornaments. Formerly it signified only a stuff woven all of gold or silver, in which silk was mixed. At present all stuffs .... are so called if they are worked with flowers or other figures."

256. Masquerade. From the Restoration onwards masquerades were extremely popular.

260. Fans were a notable part of a lady's equipment at this time. In a skillful hand they did much execution on manly bosoms. 261. Drops the pendants of 1. 286. Earrings of brilliants. 272. [Stopped. Stopper and stopple are the substantives.]

Or plung'd in lakes of bitter washes lie,
Or wedg'd whole ages in a bodkin's eye;
Gums and pomatums shall his flight restrain,
While clog'd he beats his silken wings in vain ;
Or alum stypticks with contracting pow'r
Shrink his thin essence like a rivel'd flower;
Or, as Ixion fix'd, the wretch shall feel
The giddy motion of the whirling mill,
In fumes of burning chocolate shall glow,
And tremble at the sea that froths below!"
He spoke; the spirits from the sails descend.
Some, orb in orb, around the nymph extend;
Some thrid the mazy ringlets of her hair;
Some hang upon the pendants of her ear.
With beating hearts the dire event they wait,
Anxious, and trembling for the birth of Fate.

275

280

285

CANTO III.

CLOSE by those meads, for ever crown'd with flow'rs
Where Thames with pride surveys his rising tow'rs, 296
There stands a structure of a majestic frame,

Which from the neighb'ring Hampton takes its name
Here Britain's statesmen oft' the fall foredoom

Of foreign tyrants, and of nymphs at home;

Here thou, great ANNA! whom three realms obey, 295
Dost sometimes counsel take-and sometimes tea.

274. Bodkin-originally a small dagger, as in Hamlet. Here, as in our modern usage, a large blunt needle.

278. Shrink. See Hymn Nativity, 203.

279. Ixion. See Class. Dict.

280. Mill-chocolate mill. "Chocolate was introduced into Europe (from Mexico and the Brazils) about A.D. 1520. Mill would seem to have been pronounced meel.

284. Orb in orb-circle in circle See note on sphere.

285. Thrid: a various form of thread.

288. [What is the force of birth here?]

290. What is the force of rising ?]

291. A structure, etc.-Hampton Court.

292. In the time of William III. and Queen Anne, Hampton Court was frequently the scene of Cabinet meetings.

294. Foreign Tyrants-Louis XIV.

296. Tea was pronounced tay till towards the middle of the eighteenth century, a pronunciation surviving still amongst our lower