The above portrait of the Cyclops (or at least a fimilar one in HOMER'S Odyff.) is evidently copied by the writer of the Arabian Nights Entertainments. See vol. iii. LINE 57. For thee, ten does, all mark'd with moons, I rear. CASAUBON and HEINSIUS would read Mavopoęws, wearing collars, according to the Vatican MS. The ancients, it is true, were fond of ornamenting, in this manner, the animals they had brought up tame. But the common reading hath more fimplicity-Anoopws-all of them pregnant. The translator, however, hath preferred REISKE'S conjecture both to the Vulgate and Vatican-Mnvo@opws, marked with little moons. A paffage in HOMER'S Iliad, B. 23, may not unappofitely illuftrate this emendation: HOMER is fpeaking of a horse, On whofe broad front a blaze of shining white LINE 58. And four fine cubs, I plunder'd from a bear. OVID hath foftened the ferocity of these favage bears-pre fents that aptly characterize the monster POLYPHEME. Inveni geminos, qui tecum ludere poffint, LINE 63. There, ivy round my bays and cypress twines; The repetition of T. in the original, is particularly beautiful. LINE 71. On the red hearth unquench'd my embers live; The The Cyclops here alludes, perhaps, to TELEPHUS's prediction, that his eye should be burnt out by ULYSSES. If we take this with us, the sense is obvious and eafy. I could even fuffer this • eye, which I value fo much, to be burnt by thee, GALATEA, And, as he had been talking of his fire before, it seems a natural tranfition.' WARTON. • &c. C HEINSIUS hath given a very different however, is far-fetched and improbable. hath been abfolutely a Crux Criticorum. not followed WARTON, whose construction, he thinks, is neither obvious nor eafy.' interpretation, which, This paffage, indeed, The tranflator hath LINE 81. But yet, at once, my flowers I could not bring; The distinctness and fimple beauty of this paffage (in the original) cannot escape the admirers of THEOCR.TUS. LINE 105. Full many a pretty maid, at dusky eve, My fmiles and jokes with frolic laugh receive. Lenefque fub noctem fufurri HORACE. CORNELIUS GALLUS hath defcribed a frolicfome nymph in a pleasing and natural manner— Erubuit vultus ipfa puella meos; We We meet with fome curious lines in Mr. WILLIAM BROWNE'S Paftoral Poems, correfponding with the above As that her fonne, fince day grew old and weake, IDYLLIUM the TWELFTH. THI HIS is one of the Idyllia that (for obvious reasons to the learned reader) would not admit of a very close translation. The Greek and Latin poets (it is well known) published, without the flightest consciousness of impropriety, fuch paffages as, among us, would meet with univerfal reprobation: But, melancholy reflection! they were read and admired in the literary ages of Greece and Rome. Is not this circumftance too ftriking an evidence, that the connection above alluded to, was countenanced, at least, among the ancients? From too passionate an expreffion in the poet's painting-a warmth of coloring too vivid -we may often fufpect fomething more than pure attachments founded on a rational esteem. IDYLLIUM IDYLLIUM the THIRTEENTH. LINE 15. R the hen fhook her wing, by twilight's gleam, O Gathering her chicken to the smoky beam. This picture of a hen and chicken is drawn exactly from nature. Nothing can be more pictorefque than the Coaμevos πλερα ματρος. LINE 25. And HYLAS, with a filial friendship fraught. HYLAS is introduced, in a fimilar manner, in the Argon. of ORPHEUS. See line 225. LINE 33. The flower of heroes. Thefe Argonauts, the flower of heroes, (or of failors, as PINDAR calls them) were fifty-two in number. LINE 41. Sharp oxtongue's flowery plant, and rushes broad. The oxtongue (Beтoμov ov) was probably the Carex acuta of VIRGIL. The leaves of this plant are so sharp, that it wounds the tongues of oxen, as the word Cerouos expreffes. See Butumus in MILLER. For Cyperus, or the three-cornered Rush, fee note on the firft Idyllium, line 131ft in tranflation. 1 LINE 56. And fweet NYCHEA, like the blooming fpring. < Literally he looked the spring.' LINE 65. Meantime, ALCIDES, clouded o'er by grief. VALERIUS FLACCUs admirably well paints the sudden and vehement emotion of HERCULES, on the lofs of HYLAS. Arg. B. 3. 1. 570. Sed neque apud focios, ftru&tafque in littore menfas Yet we obferve his ufual pomp of words. All his descriptions, indeed, are inflated. We are delighted by his ardent imagination; but his turgid expreffions intervene, and the pleasure is-momentary. WARTON. LINE 71. From the deep water HYLAS thrice replied Ut littus, Hyla, Hyla, omne fonaret. And every wood, and every valley wide He fill'd with Hylas' name, the nymphs eke Hylas cride. FAIRY QUEEN. LINE 72. Tho' near, each feeble murmur, as at diftance, died! This line is meant to exprefs the found iffuing from the water, with an undulatory motion, and dying gradually away. L IN E 87. In vain his HYLAS number'd with the bleft, The |