L. 139. _nourrit un long amour_: a very happy phrase, recalling La
Fontaine's 'quittez le _long espoir_ et les vastes pensées,' _Fables_,
XL viii. In Shakespeare's '_A long farewell_ to all my greatness.'
_Henry VIII_, iii. 2. 351, we have a similar use of 'long'. Such
epithets stand in lieu of a whole phrase.
L. 143. _Od._ vii. 174, 175: 'And there was spread A table, which the
butler set with bread,'--CHAPMAN.
L. 144. _Sieds-toi._ _Se seoir_, for instances of which we must go to
the seventeenth century, its uses being confined to the present of the
indicative, the imperative, and the infinitive, is an archaism. Such
archaisms, like _que puissent_ above, give more solemnity to the tone,
make the scene recede, as it were, into the past.
L. 150. _l'éponge._ _Od._ i. 111: 'Some... With porous _sponges_
cleansing tables.'--CHAPMAN.
L. 151. _S'approche_, i.e. 'is brought by the servants.' The stranger
does not sit at the common table, but, as when Ulysses is entertained by
Alcinous, a table is spread for him.
L. 152. _le disque_: _discus_, platter for meat, whence O.E. 'disc,' E.
'dish,' and German _Tisch_, a table. _d'airain_; cf. _Il._ xi. 630: 'a
brass fruit-dish.'--CHAPMAN.
L. 153. _l'amphore vineuse._ An epithet of nature. Chénier, it will be
noticed, used them freely, as the ancients did.
L. 155. _leur lendemain..._ A thought akin to that in Homer, _Od._ xv.
400: 'Betwixt his sorrows every humane joys.'--CHAPMAN.
Ll. 156-159. _Od._ vii. 178: '... command That instantly your heralds
fill in wine, That to the god that doth in lightnings shine We may
do sacrifice: for he is there Where these his reverend suppliants
appear.'--CHAPMAN.
L. 158. _Pour boire._ An unexpected passage from indirect to direct
speech, as in Homer, _Il._ xv. 348. The abrupt break in construction
is more telling in French than in English, where it is a more common
device.