of their garden in some mysterious place in the far
west, where they guarded the tree that bore the golden apples, assisted
by the dragon Ladon, is one of the best known in the classic mythology.

984. Along the crisped shades and bowers. Milton applies _crisped_ to
brooks, Par. Lost IV 237. Herrick has,--"the crisped yew," and the
American Thoreau,--"A million crisped waves."

985. spruce. A very interesting account of the origin of this word is
given by Skeat in his Etymological Dictionary.

986. The Graces and the rosy-bosomed Hours. See note on L'Allegro 15.
"The _Graces_ were guardians of the vernal sweetness and beauty of
nature, friends and protectors of everything graceful and beautiful." The
_Hours_ were goddesses of the seasons, daughters of Zeus and Themis. They
were the door-keepers of Olympus, whose cloud-gate they open and shut:
thus they preside over the weather.

990. About the cedarn alleys: about the pathways through cedar groves.
Coleridge, in Kubla Khan, has the line, "Down the green hill athwart a
cedarn cover"; and Tennyson, Geraint and Enid, the line,--"And moving
toward a cedarn cabinet." So also William Barnes, in his Rural Poems,
uses the expression, "stonen jugs."

992. Iris is the messenger of the gods: her path is the rainbow.

993. Dr. Murray gives other instances of blow as a transitive verb.

999. Adonis was a young shepherd, the special favorite of Venus. His
death was caused by a wild boar. The story is told in various forms.
Observe that Milton makes him wax well of his deep wound.

1002. the Assyrian queen. The worship of Aphrodite (Venus) was brought
into Greece from Assyria.

1005. Holds his dear Psyche. Psyche--the personification of the human
soul--was a mortal maiden, beloved of Cupid. Venus, in her jealousy of
Psyche, compelled her to pass through a long series of hardships and
toils. Cupid at last succeeded in reconciling his mother and his beloved,
and in having _Psyche_ advanced to the dignity of an immortal.

1015. Where the bowed welkin slow doth bend: where the curvature of the
vault of the sky seems less than higher up toward the zenith.

1021. the sphery chime. See notes, Hymn on the Nativity 48 and 125.

LYCIDAS.

Lycidas is Milton's contribution to a volume of elegiac verses, in Greek,
Latin, and English, composed by many college friends of Edward King, who
was drowned in the wreck of the vessel in which he was cros