We drove afield, and both together heard
What time the gray-fly winds her fultry horn,
Batt'ning our flocks with the fresh dews of night.

Again, A. ii. S. iii.

The GREY-EYED morn smiles on the frowning night.

27. "We continued together till noon, and from thence, &c." The Gray-fly is called by the naturalifts, The Gray-fy or Trum pet-fly. Here we have Milton's born, and fultry horn is the fharp hum of this infect at noon, or the hottest part of the day. But by fome this has been thought the chaffer, which begins its flight in the evening.

27. We drove afield.-] That is, " we drove our flocks afield.” I mention this, that Gray's echo of the paffage in the CHURCHYARD Elegy, yet with another meaning, may not mislead many careless readers.

How joyous did they drive the team afield.

From the regularity of his purfuits, the purity of his pleafures, his temperance, and general fimplicity of life, Milton habitually became an early rifer. Hence he gained an acquaintance with the beauties of the morning, which he fo frequently contemplated with delight, and has therefore fo repeatedly defcribed, in all their various appearances: and this is a fubject which he delineates with the lively pencil of a lover. In the APOLOGY FOR SMECTYMNUUs he declares," Those morning haunts are where

they should be, at home: not fleeping or concocting the furfeits. "of an irregular feast, but up and stirring, in winter often be"fore the found of any bell awakens men to labour or devotion; "in fummer, as oft as the bird that firft rouses, or not much tar"dyer, to read good authors, &c." PROSE-WORKS, i. 109. In L'ALLEGRO, one of the first delights of his chearful man, is to hear the "lark begin her flight." His lovely landscape of Eden always wears its most attractive charms at fun-rifing, and feems most delicious to our first parents" at that season prime for sweetest "fents and airs." In the prefent inftance, he more particularly alludes to the stated early hours of a collegiate life, which he shared, on the felf-fame hill, with his friend Lycidas at Cambridge.

29. Batt'ning our flocks with the fresh dews of night.] To BATTEN is both neutral and active, to grow or to make fat. The neutral is most common. Shakespeare, HAML. A. ii. S. iv, Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed,

And BATTEN on this moor?

Oft

30

Oft till the ftar that rofe, at evening, bright, Toward heav'n's defcent had flop'd his weft'ring wheel. Mean while the rural ditties were not mute, Temper'd to th' oaten flute;

Rough Satyrs danc'd, and Fauns with cloven heel From the glad found would not be abfent long; And old Damoetas lov'd to hear our fong.

And Drayton, ECL. ix. vol. iv. ut fupr. p. 1431.

36

Their BATTENING FLOCKS on graffie leas to hold. Milton had this line in his eye. BATFULL, that is plentiful, is a frequent epithet in Drayton, especially in his POLYOLBION.

30. Oft till the ftar that rofe, at evening, bright.] Thus the edition 1645. In the edition of 1638, and Cambridge manufcript,

Oft till the evn-starre bright..

And in the next line, BURNISHT was altered to WESTERING.

31. -Had flop'd his weft'ring wheel.] Befide to WESTER in Chaucer, of the fun, we have to WEST in Spenfer, F. Q. v. INTROD. 8.

32.

And twice hath rifen where he now doth WEST,
And WESTED twice where he ought rise aright.

The rural ditties were not mute,

Temper'd to th' oaten flute.] So Phineas Fletcher, a popular author in Milton's days, PURPL. ISL. C. ix. ft. iii.

TEMPERING their sweetest notes unto thy lay.

And the fame writer, in POETICALL MISCELLANIES, Cambr. 1633. P. 55. 4to.

And all in course their voice ATTEMPERING.

And Spenfer, in JUNE.

-Where birds of every kind

To th' waters fall their tunes ATTEMPER right.

It is the fame phrafeology in PARAD. L. B. vii. 598. Of va rious inftruments of mufic.

TEMPER'D foft tunings.

36. See Note on EL. i. 15. And the last NOTE on this piece.

But,

But, O the heavy change, now thou art gone, Now thou art gone, and never must return! Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods, and defert caves With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown, And all their echoes mourn:

The willows, and the hazel copfes green,

Shall now no more be feen

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.

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39. Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods, and defert caves, &c.] It is thus in the first edition, 1638.

Thee fhepherds, thee the woods, and defert caves, &c.

That is, "thee the shepherds, thee the woods, and thee the caves, "lament." Without the addrefs to Lycidas. Gray has hence adopted each defert cave.

40. With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown.] Doctor Warburton supposes, that the vine is here called GADDING, because, being married to the elm, like other wives fhe is fond of GADDING ABROAD, and feeking a new affociate. I have met with a peculiar ufe of the word GADDING, which also fhews its antient and original spelling. From the Register of a Chantry at Godderfton in Norfolk, under the year 1534. 66 Receyvid at the "GADYNG with Saynte Marye Songe at Crifmas." Blomf. NORF. iii. 404. That is, " AT GOING ABOUT from house to house,at "christmass with a Carol of the Holy Virgin, &c." It seems as if there was fuch an old verb as GADE, a frequentative from GO. Chaucer, Roм. R. 938.

These bowis two held Swete-Loking,

That ne femid like no GADLING.

That is, "no gadder, idler, &c." And in the COKE'S TALE of Gamelyn, v. 203.

Stondeth ftill thou GADILING.

GADELYNG Occurs in Hearne's GL. to

ROBERT of GLOU-
Tully, in a beautiful

CESTER, fragling, renegade, &c. p. 651. defcription of the growth of the vine, fays, that it fpreads itself abroad,"multiplici lapfu et ERRATICO." De SENECTUT. §. xv. OPP. tom. iii. p. 311. edit. Oxon. 1783. 4to.

As

As killing as the canker to the rofe,

Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,

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45. As killing as the canker to the rofe.] Shakespeare is fond of this image, who, from frequent repetition, feems to have fug gefted it to Milton. SON N. lxx.

For CANKER vice the SWEETEST BUDS doth love.

Again, ibid. xxxv.

And loathfom CANKER lives in SWEETEST BUD. Again, ibid. xcv.

Which, like a CANKER in thy fragrant ROSE,

Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name.

And of a rofe again, which had feloniously stolen a favourite boy's complexion and breath, ibid. xcix.

But for his theft, in pride of all his growth,
A vengefull CANKER eat him up to death.

And in the Two GENTLEMEN OF VERONA, A. i. S. i.
As in the SWEETEST BUDS

The eating CANKER dwells, fo eating love, &c.

Again, TEMPEST, A. i. S. ii.

-Something ftain'd

With grief, that's beauty's CANKER.

And in the FIRST P. OF HENR. vi. A. ii. S. iv.
Hath not thy ROSE a CANKER, Somerset ?

And in HAMLET, A. i. S. iii.

The CANKER galls the INFANTS of the SPRING
Too oft before their buttons are disclos'd.

And in K. RICHARD . A. ii. S. iii.

But now will CANKER forrow eat my BUD.

And in the RAPE of LUCRECE, Malone's SUPPL. Shakesp. i. 52. Why should the WORM intrude the maiden BUD?

And in the MIDS. N. DR. A. ii. S. iii. The fairies are employed,
Some to kill CANKERS in the MUSK-ROSE buds.

Canker-Blooms are mentioned in Shakespeare's SON N. liv.
The CANKER-Blooms have full as deep a dye

As the perfumed tincture of the rofes.

But there the CANKER-Bloom is the dog-rofe. As in MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING, A. i. S. iii. "I had rather be a CANKER in "a hedge, than a rofe in his grace." Shakespeare affords other

inftances.

Or froft to flow'rs, that their gay wardrobe wear, When first the white-thorn blows;

Such, Lycidas, thy lofs to fhepherds ear.

51

Where were ye, Nymphs, when the remorfelefs deep Clos'd o'er the head of your lov'd Lycidas? For neither were ye playing on the steep, Where your old Bards, the famous Druids, lie, Nor on the fhaggy top of Mona high, Nor yet where Deva fpreads her wifard stream:

55

50. Theocritus and Virgil are obvious here. But fee Spenser's ASTROPHEL, ft. 22.

Ah, where were ye the while his fhepheard peares, &c.

53. Where your old Bards, the famous Druids, lie.] In the edition of 1638, The old Bards." With a very different meaning. The correction appeared in the author's edition of 1645.

54. Nor on the fhaggy top of Mona high.] In Drayton's POLYOLBION, Mona is introduced reciting her own hiftory; where fhe mentions her thick and dark groves as the favourite refidence of the Druids.

in

Sometimes within my fhades, in many an ancient wood, Whofe often-twined tops great Phebus fires withstood, The fearlesse British priests, under an aged oake, &c. Where, fays Selden, "The British Druids tooke this isle of Anglefey, then well-ftored with thicke woods and religious groves, "fo much that it was then called INIS DOWIL, The Dark ifle, "for their chiefe refidence, &c.". S. ix. vol. iii. p. 837. 839. Here are Milton's authorities. For the Druid-fepulchres, in the preceding line, at Kerig y Druidion, in the mountains of Denbighshire, he cansulted Camden's BRITANNIA.

ibid. Shaggy top-] So PARAD. L. vi. 645. The angels uplift the hills,

By theis SHAGGY TOPS.

55. Nor yet where Deva spreads her wifard fiream.] In Spenfer, the river Deee is the haunt of magicians. Merlin ufed to visit old Timon, in a green valley under the foot of the mountain Rauranvaur in Merionethshire, from which this river springs. QUEENE, i. ix. 4.

Under the foot of Rauran moffy hore,

From whence the river DEE, as filuer cleene,

His tombling billowes rolls with gentle rore.