The orc, who sees the moving shadow sail
Of those huge pinions on the sea below.
Stanza cii. lines 3 and 4.
Et in æquore summo
Umbra viri visa est; visam fera sævit in umbram.
As eagle, that amid her downward flight,
Beholds amid the grass a snake unrolled,
Or where she smoothes upon a sunny height
Her ruffled plumage, and her scales of gold,
Assails it not inhere prompt with poisonous bite
To hiss and creep, but with securer hold
Gripes it behind, and either pinion clangs,
Lest it should turn and wound her with its fangs.
Stanza ciii.
Utque Jovis præpes vacuo cum vidit in arvo
Præbentem Phœbo liventia terga draconem,
Occupat aversum, et neu sæva retorqueat ora
Squamigeris avidos figit cervicibus ungues.
With suchlike warfare is the mastiff vext
By the bold fly.
Stanza cv. lines 1 and 2.
Notwithstanding the example of Pope, who has changed a fly into a hornet, for the more ‘dignifying of the matter,’ as Master Matthew phrases it, I have ventured to call a fly a fly. In a note, which shows how much Pope was influenced by the taste of his times, he apologises for the change, and it is to be regretted that so many such sacrifices were ex-
