IV. Le Malade.

Ll. 151, 152. Some writers have printed si j'étais plus sage..., as if the sentence were unfinished, and explain that 'I should not take them' is understood. But the thought rather seems to be expressed elliptically: Were I wiser, these gifts forebode no good to me (and I should listen to these misgivings).

L. 156. j'aurai pu. The future expressing what is likely to have taken place. See Ayer, § 203.

IV. LE MALADE.

M. Dezeimeris (Leçons nouvelles et remarques sur le texte de divers auteurs, Bordeaux, 1879) has shown how much this poem owed to a Greek versified romance by Theodoras Prodromus, entitled The Adventures of Rhodanthe and Dosicles. To this very indifferent and cold production he has traced both the scheme and most characteristic details of Chénier's Malade. We have deemed it unadvisable to crowd our notes with the numerous passages of the Byzantine writer which have inspired our poet.

Ll. 1-3. This invocation, a litany in form, may have been suggested by the Orphic hymn to Apollo.

L. 6. qui meurt abandonnée, i.e. qui meurt si elle est abandonnée.

L. 7. Qui n'a pas dû rester..., 'who surely has not been spared by death that she might see her own son die.'

Ll. 8, 9. Assoupis, assoupis... Frequent repetitions occur throughout this piece, all with a most natural and pathetic effect. M. Dezeimeris that Chénier took the hint from Prodromus, in whose poem, however, the repetitions, for the most part irrelevant, are mere mannerism.

L. 15. un jeune taureau blanc. 'Iuvencum candentem,' Aen. ix. 627.

L. 22. Aen. x. 557.

Ll. 24, 25. Il. i. 362. Thetis says to Achilles; 'Why weeps my son? what grieves thee? Speak, conceal not what hath laid such hard hand on thee, let both know.'—CHAPMAN.

L. 34. See tapes in A. Rich's Dict. of Roman and Greek Antiq.

L. 36. ô douleurs! The s is required by the rhyme rather than by the sense.

L. 43. Euripides, Hipp. 135.

L. 44. Sans connaître Cérès. 'Non Cereris placuere dapes, non pocula Bacchi' is Gaulmin's paraphrase of Prodromus (Paris, 1625). For a similar use of 'Ceres,' see Ovid, Met. iii. 437. Milton has: 'A field Of Ceres ripe for harvest waving bends' (Paradise Lost, iv. 980, 981); and Byron: 'Beneath his ears of Ceres groan the roads' (Don Juan, XII. ix).

L. 46. ta vieille inconsolable mère, not ton inconsolable vieille mère, which would be the more usual, but less forcible, order.

L. 48. T'asseyait sur son sein. Sein (bosom) here stands for giron (lap). This is the Latin phrase in sinu. The English Bible reads (Luke xvi. 23): 'He (the rich man) seeth Abraham... and Lazarus in his bosom,' whereas Langland, more explicit and accurate, says, 'Ich sauh hym [Lazarus] sitte... in Abraham's lappe' (P. Pl., C. ix, 283).

L. 53. presse de ta lèvre. She says this holding out the cup to him, so that there is no need for her to express the word 'cup,' which is therefore understood. Yet it appears that Chénier did not mean ll. 53, 54 to stand thus, as they are struck out in the MS. (Dezeimeris, p. 69).

Ll. 59, 60. sur leur jeune sein... leur robe. He says leur, as if everybody ought to understand him, because his own thought is full of them—those dancing fair ones mentioned in the following line. This, as well as the preceding 'presse' and 'la mienne' higher up, is of those true touches that carry us into the atmosphere of life.

L. 65. Reminiscences of Virgil, Ecl. v. 58; Georg. ii. 151.

L. 70. cette vierge dansante. The first editor had altered this into 'cette vierge charmante,' either because the epithet recurs at ll. 61, 89, or because he objected to this declension, or rather adjectival use, of the past participle. For this syntactical feature see Darmesteter et Hatzfeld, Le seizième siècle en France, §210; Haase, §91. See also note to p. 62, l. 19.

L. 71. Pallas (Od. i. 58) represents Ulysses as longing to see 'His country's smoke leap from her chimney tops.'—CHAPMAN.

L. 74. enchante ta vieillesse. An easy correction would be enchantent, which would not spoil the metre, but, as a rule, Chénier makes the verb agree with the last subject. See Ayer, §217.

Ll. 76, 77. Tibullus, i. 3. 8.

L. 80. Viendras-tu point...? The omission of ne in direct interrogation, very frequent in the seventeenth century, is still to be met with in modern poetry, e.g.: 'Viendras-tu pas voir mes ondines?'—V. Hugo, Ballades, 4. (Haase, §101 A.)

L. 84. Racine, Phèdre, I. iii: 'Ariane, ma soeur, de quel amour blessée...'

L. 93. Virgil, Ecl. vi. 21 'Aegle naiadum pulcherrima...'

L. 95. ne sera-ce point. A future of doubt.

L. 103. Ovid, Met. i. 481.

L. 105. garde que jamais elle soit... Ne was generally omitted in the seventeenth century after expressions of fear and after garde, gardez, prenez garde (Haase, §104 B).

L. 109. va la trouver. Cf. the first scene of the third act of Racine's Phèdre. The entire poem is to some extent the counterpart of Racine's play.