L. 44. _Que visite Phoebus le soir ou le matin._ A poetic translation of
_Orient_ and _Occident_.
L. 47. _l'une et l'autre Téthys._ Catullus, 'Uterque Neptunus,' xxxi. 3.
Cf. notes to Nérée, p. 90, l. 95, and Cybèle, p. 91, l. 133.
L. 50. _Trudaine._ The grandfather of Chénier's friend, who was Director
of Public Works under Louis XV, and laid out the fine roads of France.
L. 54. _impie._ Not, of course, irreligious, but sacrilegious, as
invading the (to a Frenchman) sacred territory of France--in the course
of what Charles Lamb ironically calls 'the long, steady, deep-rooted,
_rational_ antipathies of the great French and English nations.'--_Mrs.
Battle's Opinions on Whist._ See another use of _impie_, p. 112, l. 107.
L. 83. _Le sel._ An allusion to the gabelle or salt-tax imposed before
the Revolution. This was written before 1789.
L. 85. _Mille brigands_, the _partisans_ or men who constituted _partis_
or societies for the levy of certain taxes.
L. 97. _Malesherbes, Turgot._ These Ministers retired in 1776, but
Malesherbes resumed office, only for a few months, in 1787.