The Works of Alexander Pope Part 48

[Footnote 36: Virgil, Ecl. iii. 86:

Pascite taurum, Qui cornu petat, et pedibus jam spargat arenam.--POPE.

Dryden, aen. ix. 859:

A snow-white steer before thy altar led: And dares the fight, and spurns the yellow sands.--WAKEFIELD.

The second line of the couplet in the text ran thus in the original ma.n.u.script:

With b.u.t.ting horns, and heels that spurn the sand.

This also was from Dryden, Ecl. iii. 135:

With spurning heels, and with a b.u.t.ting head.]

[Footnote 37: Originally thus in the ma.n.u.script:

Pan, let my numbers equal Strephon's lays, Of Parian stone thy statue will I raise; But if I conquer and augment my fold, Thy Parian statue shall be changed to gold.--WARBURTON.

This he formed on Dryden's Vir. Ecl. vii. 45:

Thy statue then of Parian stone shall stand; But if the falling lambs increase my fold, Thy marble statue shall be turned to gold.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 38: Pope had at first written,

The lovely Chloris beckons from the plain, Then hides in shades from her deluded swain.

"Objection," he says, in the paper he submitted to Walsh, "that _hides_ without the accusative _herself_ is not good English, and that _from her deluded swain_ is needless. Alteration:

The wanton Chloris beckons from the plain, Then, hid in shades, eludes her eager swain.

Quaere. If _wanton_ be more significant than _lovely_; if _eludes_ be properer in this case than _deluded_; if _eager_ be an expressive epithet to the swain who searches for his mistress?"

Walsh. "_Wanton_ applied to a woman is equivocal, and therefore not proper. _Eludes_ is properer than _deluded_. _Eager_ is very well."]

[Footnote 39: He owes this thought to Horace, Ode i. 9, 21.--WAKEFIELD.

Or rather to the version of Dryden, since the lines of Pope have a closer resemblance to the translation than to the original:

The laugh that guides thee to the mark, When the kind nymph would coyness feign, And hides but to be found again.]

[Footnote 40: Imitation of Virgil, Ecl. iii. 64:

Malo me Galatea pet.i.t, lasciva puella, Et fugit ad salices, et se cupit ante videri.--POPE.

He probably consulted Creech's translation of the pa.s.sage in Virgil:

Sly Galatea drives me o'er the green, And apples throws, then hides, yet would be seen.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 41: Dryden's Don Sebastian;

A brisk Arabian girl came tripping by; Pa.s.sing, she cast at him a sidelong glance, And looked behind, in hopes to be pursued.--STEEVENS.]

[Footnote 42: A very trifling and false conceit.--WARTON.]

[Footnote 43: In place of the next speech of Strephon, and the reply of Daphnis, the dialogue continued thus in the original ma.n.u.script:

STREPHON.

Go, flow'ry wreath, and let my Silvia know, Compared to thine how bright her beauties show; Then die; and dying, teach the lovely maid How soon the brightest beauties are decayed.

DAPHNIS.

Go, tuneful bird, that pleased the woods so long, Of Amaryllis learn a sweeter song; To heav'n arising then her notes convey, For heav'n alone is worthy such a lay.

The speech of Strephon is an echo of Waller's well-known song:

Go, lovely rose, Tell her that wastes her time and me, That now she knows When I resemble her to thee, How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Then die, that she The common fate of all things rare May read in thee; How small a part of time they share, That are so wondrous sweet and fair.

The speech of Daphnis is from Dryden's Virgil, Ecl. iii. 113:

Winds, on your wings to heav'n her accents bear, Such words as heav'n alone is fit to hear.]

[Footnote 44: It stood thus at first:

Let rich Iberia golden fleeces boast, Her purple wool the proud a.s.syrian coast, Blest Thames's sh.o.r.es, &c.--POPE.]

[Footnote 45: It is evident from the mention of the "golden sands" of Pactolus, and the "amber" of the poplars in connection with the Thames, that he had in view Denham's description in Cooper's Hill:

Though with those streams he no resemblance hold, Whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold.--WAKEFIELD.

The sisters of Phaeton, according to the cla.s.sical fable, were, upon the death of their brother, turned into poplars on the banks of the Po, and the tears which dropt from these trees were said to be converted into amber.]

[Footnote 46: This couplet is a palpable imitation of Virgil, Ecl. vii.

67:

Saepius at si me, Lycida formose, revisas, Fraxinus in silvis cedet tibi, pinus in hortis.--WAKEFIELD.

The entire speech is a parody of the lines quoted by Wakefield, and of the lines which immediately precede them in Virgil's Eclogue. The pa.s.sage omitted by Wakefield is thus translated in vol. i. of Tonson's Miscellany:

Bacchus the vine, the laurel Phoebus loves; Fair Venus cherishes the myrtle groves; Phyllis the hazel loves, while Phyllis loves that tree, Myrtles and laurels of less fame shall be.]

[Footnote 47: Virg. Ecl. vii. 57:

Aret ager, vitio moriens sit.i.t aeris herba [&c.]

Phyllidis adventu nostrae nemus omne virebit.--POPE.]