. 34. 9, "_bruta tellus_."

800. ~She fables not~: she speaks truly. This line is alliterative.

801. ~set off~: comp. _Lyc._ 80, "_set off_ to the world."

802. ~though not mortal~: _sc._ 'I am.' ~shuddering dew~. The epithet
is, by hypallage, transferred from the person to the dew or cold sweat
which 'dips' or moistens his body.

804. ~Speaks thunder and the chains of Erebus~, etc.; in allusion to the
_Titanomachia_ or contest between Zeus and the Titans. Zeus, having been
provided with thunder and lightning by the Cyclops, cast the Titans into
Tartarus or Erebus, a region as far below Hell as Heaven is above the
Earth. The leader of the Titans was Cronos (Saturn). There is a zeugma
in _speaks_ as applied to 'thunder' and 'chains,' unless it be taken as
in both cases equivalent to _denounces_.

806. ~Come, no more!~ Comus now addresses the lady.

808. ~canon laws of our foundation~, _i.e._ the established rules of our
society. "A humorous application of the language of universities and
other foundations" (Keightley).

809. ~'tis but the lees~, etc. _Lees_ and _settlings_ are synonymous =
dregs. The allusion is to the old physiological system of the four
primary humours of the body, viz. blood, phlegm, choler, and melancholy
(see Burton's _Anat. of Mel._ i. 1, Sec. ii. 2): "Melancholy, cold and dry,
thick, black, and sour, begotten of the more feculent part of
nourishment, and purged from the spleen"; Gk. +melancholia+, black bile.
See _Sams. Agon._ 600, "_humours black_ That mingle with thy fancy";
and Nash's _Terrors of the Night_ (1594): "(Melancholy) sinketh down to
the bottom like the lees of the wine, corrupteth the blood, and is the
cause of lunacy."

811. ~straight~, immediately. The adverb _straight_ is now chiefly used of
direction; to indicate time _straightway_ (= in a straight way) is more
usual: comp. _L'Alleg._ 69: "Straight mine eye hath caught new
pleasures."

814. ~scape~, a mutilated form of 'escape,' occurs both as a noun and a
verb in Shakespeare and Milton: see _Par. Lost_, x. 5, "what can _scape_
the eye of God?"; _Par. Reg._ ii. 189, "then lay'st thy _scapes_ on
names adored."

816. ~without his rod reversed~. This use of the participle is a Latinism:
see note, l. 48. At the same time it is to be noted that a phrase of
this kind introduced by 'without' is in Latin frequently rendered by the
ablative absolute: such construction is here inadmissible because
'without' also governs 'mutt