25. _Step to a tune._ Here and in various other places, as lines 41, 73,
76, etc., are directions to the pallbearers.
34. _Lyric Apollo._ The god Apollo was the ideal of manly beauty. The
Grammarian was, it seems, endowed with rare charm of face and form.
35. _Long he lived nameless._ Youth had passed before the Grammarian
really entered upon his quest for knowledge. But he did not despair. His
vanishing of youth was but a signal to "leave play for work."
45. _Grappled with the world._ The world of knowledge, especially
ancient learning, which was recovered slowly and with difficulty.
49. _Theirs._ He wishes to study the "shaping" or writings of poets and
sages.