The Iliad

      devoted to the worship of Apollo. See Muller, "Dorians," vol. i. p.
      248.

  107 --_Barbarous tongues._ "Various as were the dialects of the
      Greeks--and these differences existed not only between the several
      tribes, but even between neighbouring cities--they yet acknowledged
      in their language that they formed but one nation were but branches
      of the same family. Homer has 'men of other tongues:' and yet Homer
      had no general name for the Greek nation."--Heeren, "Ancient Greece,"
      Section vii. p. 107, sq.

        _  108 The cranes._
        "Marking the tracts of air, the clamorous cranes
        Wheel their due flight in varied ranks descried:
        And each with outstretch'd neck his rank maintains,
        In marshall'd order through th' ethereal void."

                            Lorenzo de Medici, in Roscoe's Life, Appendix.

      See Cary's Dante: "Hell," canto v.

        _  109 Silent, breathing rage._
          "Thus they,
        Breathing united force with fixed thought,
        Moved on in silence."

                                             "Paradise Lost," book i. 559.

          110 "As when some peasant in a bushy brake
        Has with unwary footing press'd a snake;
        He starts aside, astonish'd, when he spies
        His rising crest, blue neck, and rolling eyes"

                                                 Dryden's Virgil, ii. 510.

  111 Dysparis, i.e. unlucky, ill fated, Paris. This alludes to the evils
      which resulted from his having been brought up, despite the omens
      which attended his birth.

  112 The following scene, in which Homer has contrived to introduce so
      brilliant a sketch of the Grecian warriors, has been imitated by
      Euripides, who in his "Phoenissae" represents Antigone surveying the
      opposing champions from a high tower, while the paedagogus describes
      their insignia and details their histories.

  113 --_No wonder,_ &c. Zeuxis, the celebrated artist, is said to have
      appended these lines to his picture of Helen, as a motto. Valer Max.
      iii. 7.

  114 The early epic was largely occupied with the exploits and sufferings
      of women, or heroines, the wives and daughters of the Grecian
      heroes. A nation of courageous, hardy, indefatigable women, dwelling
      apart from men, permitting only a short temporary intercourse, for
      the purpose of renovating their numbers, burning out their right
      breast with a view of enabling themselves to draw the bow freely;
      this was at once a general type, stimulating to the fancy of the
      poet, and a theme eminently popular with his hearers. We find these
      warlike females constantly reappearing in the ancient poems, and
      universally accepted as past realities in the Iliad. When Priam
      wishes to illustrate emphatically the most numerous host in which he
      ever found himself included, he tells us that it was assembled in
      Phrygia, on the banks of the Sangarius, for the purpose of resisting
      the formidable Amazons. When Bellerophon is to be employed in a
      deadly and perilous undertaking, by those who prudently wished to
      procure his death, he is despatched against the Amazons.--Grote, vol.
      i p. 289.

  115 --_Antenor,_ like AEneas, had always been favourable to the
      restoration of Helen. Liv 1. 2.

          116 "His lab'ring heart with sudden rapture seized
        He paus'd, and on the ground in silence gazed.
        Unskill'd and uninspired he seems to stand,
        Nor lifts the eye, nor graceful moves the hand:
        Then, while the chiefs in still attention hung,
        Pours the full tide of eloquence along;
        While from his lips the melting torrent flows,
        Soft as the fleeces of descending snows.
        Now stronger notes engage the listening crowd,
        Louder the accents rise, and yet more loud,
        Like thunders rolling from a distant cloud."

                                        Merrick's "Tryphiodorus," 148, 99.

  117 Duport, "Gnomol. Homer," p. 20, well observes that this comparison
      may also be sarcastically applied to the _frigid_ style of oratory.
      It, of course, here merely denotes the ready fluency of Ulysses.

  118 --_Her brothers' doom._ They perished in combat with Lynceus and
      Idas, whilst besieging Sparta. See Hygin. Poet Astr. 32, 22. Virgil
      and others, however, make them share immortality by turns.

  119 Idreus was the arm-bearer and charioteer of king Priam, slain during
      this war. Cf. AEn, vi. 487.

  120 --_Scaea's gates,_ rather _Scaean gates,_ _i.e._ the left-hand gates.

  121 This was customary in all sacrifices. Hence we find Iras descending
      to cut off the hair of Dido, before which she could not expire.