The accursed Plague, arrayed in surcoat, comes
Above her arms, in colour like the sand;
That, saving in its dye, was of the sort
Which bishops and which prelates wear at court.
Stanza iv. lines 5, 6, 7, 8.
We have here one of those half sneers in which Ariosto occasionally indulges. Was it justifiable? I have never heard the Italian prelacy accused of avarice, nor does it seem a vice very likely at any time to have been inherent in such a body. As men well-born, and usually educated in gentlemanlike habits, they are at least now what such circumstances would seem to have at all times promised. But Ariosto was perhaps out of humour with his patron.
A lance he takes, and threats her and defies.
Stanza v. line 8.
Some of the commentators are indignant at a supposed oversight in this place. They observe that Rogero came away upon the hippogryph apparently without a lance. Where then did he find the one which he takes? The cavil seems to me somewhat hypercritical, though it might have been better if Ariosto had been a little more explicit. A knight full armed was usually attended by a squire or valet bearing his lance. Now we know that a valet followed Rogero, charged with the hippogryph, and it is not to be supposed that the two damsels, who had furnished him with a courser, should have neglected to provide him with what was yet more necessary in the duel for which they had engaged him. We may therefore, with the critic’s leave, suppose that he snatches the lance from an attendant.
“Sheathe, courteous cavalier, thy sword anew:
“Pass we the river, and our way pursue.”
Stanza vii. lines 7 and 8.
Harrington, translating from the Italian commentators, tells
