The original manuscript title of this ode was "Noontide." It was
first printed in Dodsley's _Collection_, vol. ii. p. 271, under the
title of "Ode."
1. _The rosy-bosom'd Hours_. Cf. Milton, _Comus_, 984: "The Graces
and the rosy-bosom'd Hours;" and Thomson, _Spring_, 1007:
"The rosy-bosom'd Spring
To weeping Fancy pines."
The _Horæ_, or hours, according to the Homeric idea, were the
goddesses of the seasons, the course of which was symbolically
represented by "the dance of the Hours." They were often described,
in connection with the Graces, Hebe, and Aphrodite, as accompanying
with their dancing the songs of the Muses and the lyre of Apollo.
Long after the time of Homer they continued to be regarded as the
givers of the seasons, especially spring and autumn, or "Nature in
her bloom and her maturity." At first there were only two Horæ,
Thallo (or Spring) and Karpo (or Autumn); but later the number was
three, like that of the Graces. In art they are represented as
blooming maidens, bearing the products of the seasons.
2. _Fair Venus' train_. The Hours adorned Aphrodite (Venus) as she
rose from the sea, and are often associated with her by Homer,
Hesiod, and other classical writers. Wakefield remarks: "Venus is
here employed, in conformity to the mythology of the Greeks, as the
source of creation and beauty."
3. _Long-expecting_. Waiting long for the spring. Sometimes
incorrectly printed "long-expected." Cf. Dryden, _Astræa Redux_, 132:
"To flowers that in its womb expecting lie."
4. _The purple year_. Cf. the _Pervigilium Veneris_, 13: "Ipsa gemmis
purpurantem pingit annum floribus;" Pope, _Pastorals_, i. 28: "And
lavish Nature paints the purple year;" and Mallet, _Zephyr_: "Gales
that wake the purple year."
5. _The Attic warbler_. The nightingale, called "the Attic bird,"
either because it was so common in Attica, or from the old legend
that Philomela (or, as some say, Procne), the daughter of a king of
Attica, was changed into a nightingale. Cf. Milton's description of
Athens (_P. R._ iv. 245):
"where the Attic bird
Trills her thick-warbled notes the summer long."
Cf. Ovid, _Hal._ 110: "Attica avis verna sub tempestate queratus;"
and Propertius, ii. 16, 6: "Attica volucris."
_Pours her throat_ is a metonymy. H. p. 85. Cf. Pope, _Essay on Man_,
iii. 33: "Is it for thee the linnet pours her throat?"
6, 7. Cf. Thomson, _Spring_, 577:
"From the first note the hollow cuckoo sings,
The symphony of spring."
9, 10. Cf. Milton, _Comus_, 989:
"And west winds with musky wing
About the cedarn alleys fling
Nard and cassia's balmy smells."
12. Cf. Milton, _P. L._ iv. 245: "Where the unpierc'd shade Imbrown'd
the noontide bowers;" Pope, _Eloisa_, 170: "And breathes a browner
horror on the woods;" Thomson, _Castle of Indolence_, i. 38: "Or
Autumn's varied shades imbrown the walls."
According to Ruskin (_Modern Painters_, vol. iii. p. 241, Amer. ed.)
there is no brown in nature. After remarking that Dante "does not
acknowledge the existence of the colour of _brown_ at all," he goes
on to say: "But one day, just when I was puzzling myself about this,
I happened to be sitting by one of our best living modern colourists,
watching him at his work, when he said, suddenly and by mere
accident, after we had been talking about other things, 'Do you know
I have found that there is no _brown_ in nature? What we call brown
is always a variety either of orange or purple. It never can be
represented by umber, unless altered by contrast.' It is curious how
far the significance of this remark extends, how exquisitely it
illustrates and confirms the mediæval sense of hue," etc.
14. _O'ercanopies the glade_. Gray himself quotes Shakes. _M. N. D._
ii. 1: "A bank o'ercanopied with luscious woodbine."[1] Cf. Fletcher,
_Purple Island_, i. 5, 30: "The beech shall yield a cool, safe
canopy;" and Milton, _Comus_, 543: "a bank, With ivy canopied."
[Footnote 1: The reading of the folio of 1623 is:
"I know a banke where the wilde time blowes,
Where Oxslips and the nodding Violet growes,
Quite ouer-cannoped with luscious woodbine."
Dyce and some other modern editors read,
"Quite overcanopied with lush woodbine."]