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weakened by the losses, of a hard-fought, well-won field,—to rush, at dis-
And gorgeous as the sun at midsummer,
*******
Hot. Let them come;
They come like sacrifices in their trim;
And to the fire-ey'd Maid of smoky war,
All hot, and bleeding, will we offer them:
The mailed Mars shall on his altar sit,
Up to his ears in blood."
K. Henry IV. Part I. Act iv. Sc. 1.
The Maid of war, thus by the impetuous Hotspur mated with Mars, totally removes the reproach conveyed in the commentator's misplaced apology for his author's ignorance:—
Further;—granting that our poet did believe Bellona to be the wife of Mars; this opinion, so far from being a sign of his want of acquaintance with ancient mythology, would show him much better skilled in it, than the Master who corrects him. Is it possible, Mr. Steevens could be, really, so illiterate as not to know, that the Grecian and Roman poets call Bellona, indifferently,
