Part 61

----stained with blood of many a band Of Scots and English.]

While thus she rested on her arm reclined, The hoary willows waving with the wind.]

The winds their breath restrain, And the hushed waves lie flatted on the main.--WAKEFIELD.

Pope's lines are compiled from the passage quoted by Wakefield and a couplet in the Court Prospect of Hopkins:

Unrolling waves steal softly to the shore, They know their sovereign and they fear to roar.]

As when old Nilus, who with bounteous flows Waters a hundred nations as he goes, Scattering rich harvests, keeps his sacred head Amidst the clouds still undiscovered.

Homer denominates the Nile, whose sources were unknown, a river that falls from Jupiter or heaven. And our countryman calls it sevenfold, as Ovid before him septemfluus, and Catullus still earlier septemgeminus, from the seven mouths by which its waters are discharged into the Mediterranean.--WAKEFIELD.]

Let Venice boast her tow'rs amidst the main, Where the rough Adrian swells and roars in vain; Here not a town, but spacious realms shall have A sure foundation on the rolling wave.--WARBURTON.

This he altered with his usual discernment, on account of the mean conceit in the equivocal use of the word "foundation."--WAKEFIELD.]

In saying that British blood should no more dye foreign lands, Pope meant to furnish an argument for the Peace by intimating that the war was kept up, at the sacrifice of English life, for the benefit of other nations.]

O'er all the Forests shall appear no trace.

And all his malice, all his craft is shown In innocent wars, on beasts and birds alone.

His commentator, Dr. Hurd, remarks in a spirit that endears him to the reader, "Innocent, he means, in comparison with wars on his own kind."--WAKEFIELD.]

As far as fair Augusta's buildings reach, Bent, like a bow, along a peaceful beach.--WAKEFIELD.

Cowley's Somerset House:

And here, behold, in a long bending row, How two joint cities make one glorious bow.

Whitehall is just above that circular sweep of the Thames in the midst of which the cities of London and Westminster unite. Pope wrote in the belief that the magnificent design of Inigo Jones for the palace at Whitehall would one day be executed.]

Thither the kingdoms and the nations come, In supplicating crowds to learn their doom. To Delphi less th' inquiring worlds repair.]

After holding out a prospect of perpetual peace, Pope conjures up a future vision of "sueing kings," and "suppliant states," which are the consequences of war and victory.]

Now shall our fleets the bloody cross display To the rich regions of the rising day, Or those green isles, where headlong Titan steeps His hissing axle in th' Atlantic deeps: Tempt icy seas, &c.--POPE.

The original lines were rejected, probably as too nearly resembling a passage in Comus:

And the gilded car of day His glowing axle doth allay In the steep Atlantic stream.--BOWLES.]

To the fair region where the sun does rise.]

What now remains But that once more we tempt the wat'ry plains.--WAKEFIELD.]

The word is certainly not "prosaic," for no one in prose would talk of exalting a sail, but it is "inefficient," just because it is one of those deviations from common speech, which sound affected.]

uncontroll'd The British navy, through the ocean vast, Shall wave her double cross t' extremest climes Terrific, and return with od'rous spoils Of Araby well fraught, or Indus' wealth, Pearl and barbaric gold.--WAKEFIELD.

Pope also drew upon Addison's lines to William III.:

Where'er the waves in restless errors roll, The sea lies open now to either pole: Now may we safely use the northern gales, And in the polar circle spread our sails: Or deep in southern climes, secure from wars, New lands explore, and sail by other stars; Fetch uncontrolled each labour of the sun, And make the product of the world our own.