206
NOTES ON THE TEXT OF SHELLEY.
construed. Shelley has not distinguished the drinking-can or cup (σκύφος) wrought of ivy-wood, or carved round with ivy-leaves, from the ninety-gallon bowl (κρατὴρ) into which the Cyclops had just milked his cows. Read:—
"Then he milked the cows,
And, pouring in the white milk, filled a bowl
That might have held ten amphoræ; and by it
He set himself an ivy-carven cup—
Three cubits wide and four in depth it seemed—
[And set a brass pot on the fire to boil][1]
And spits made out of blackthorn shoots, with tips
Burnt hard in fire, and planed in the other parts
Smooth with a pruning-hook; and huge blood-bowls
Ætnæan, set for the axe's edge to fill."
Or if σφαγεῑα can mean the axes themselves, and γνάθους be read for υνάθοις;
"And the under-jaws
Of axes, huge Ætnæan slaughtering-tools."
I do not see the meaning of those asterisks marking omission where omission is none, between the opening speech of Silenus and the parode. Of this Shelley has only translated the strophe and the latter part of the epode. Why the intervening verses were omitted it is impossible to say. In default of the better version he has begrudged us I offer this by way of makeshift, following the exact order and cadence of rhymes observed by Shelley. After the call to the she-goat[2] (which he
- ↑ This line seems misplaced here, and has been marked as such by later editors.
- ↑ Shelley seems to have overlooked the sex of the goat whom the satyrs are calling back to give suck to her young. In his text the words "he of race divine," and "father of the flocks," should be altered to "she" and "mother."