oes she any longer endure
to utter words below {the majesty of} a Goddess; and raising her hands
to heaven, she says, 'For ever may you live in that pool.' The wish of
the Goddess comes to pass. They delight to go beneath the water, and
sometimes to plunge the whole of their limbs in the deep pool; now to
raise their heads, and now to swim on the top of the water; oft to sit
on the bank of the pool, {and} often to leap back again into the cold
stream. And even now do they exercise their offensive tongues in strife:
and banishing {all} shame, although they are beneath the water, {still}
beneath the water,[47] do they try to keep up their abuse. Their voice,
too, is now hoarse, and their bloated necks swell out; and their very
abuse dilates their extended jaws. Their backs are united to their
heads: their necks seem as though cut off; their backbone is green;
their belly, the greatest part of their body, is white; and {as}
new-made frogs, they leap about in the muddy stream."

[Footnote 45: _The Chimaera._--Ver. 339. The Chimaera, according to
the poets, was a monster having the head of a lion, the body of a
goat, and the tail of a dragon. It seems, however, that it was
nothing more than a volcanic mountain of Lycia, in Asia Minor,
whence there were occasional eruptions of flame. The top of it was
frequented by lions; the middle afforded plentiful pasture for
goats; and towards the bottom, being rocky, and full of caverns,
it was infested by vast numbers of serpents, that harbored there.]

[Footnote 46: _Beheld a lake._--Ver. 343. Probus, in his
Commentary on the Second Book of the Georgics, says that the name
of the spring was Mela, and that of the shepherd who so churlishly
repulsed Latona, was Neocles. Antoninus Liberalis says, that the
name of the stream was Melites, and that Latona required the water
for the purpose of bathing her children. He further tells us, that
on being repulsed, she carried her children to the river Xanthus,
and returning thence, hurled stones at the peasants, and changed
them into frogs.]

[Footnote 47: _Beneath the water._--Ver. 376. Some commentators
are so fanciful as to say, that the repetition of the words 'sub
aqua,' in the line 'Quamvis sint sub aqua, sub aqua, maledicere
tentant,' not inelegantly [non ineleganter] expresses the croaking
noise of the frogs. A man's fancy must, indeed, be exuberant