Notes on Mi/ioii's Nativity Ode. 365 



which Chapman translates {Am. Zod.) : 



And from ApoUos bed the vaile doth twine. 



231. Pillows. The tirst recorded use of the verb in English, 

 according- to the Neiv Eng. Diet. Cf. Fletcher, Clirist's Victory: 



He, earth'.^ great prophet, ];e whom rest doth fly. 

 That on salt billows, doth, as pillows, sleeping lie. 



282. flocking shadows pale. For the nomi between two ad- 

 jectives cf. Com. 470, 'gloom}' shadows damp ' ; and see note on 187. 



flocking-. Conveys a different notion from Troop, 233. Cf. 

 Homer, Od. 11. 42, 632-3. 



shadows pale. .Virgil's ' pallentis umbras Erebi ' {jEn. 4. 26) ; 

 ' animas . . . joallentis ' (4. 242—3) ; ' simulacra modis pallentia miris ' 

 {G. 1. 477, from Lucr. 1. 123). Cf. Seneca, (Ed. 583-4. A similar 

 conception of shades or ghosts is found in Hebrew, in the word 

 rephaim: Job 26. 5; Ps. 88. 10; Prov. 2. 18; 9. 18; 21. 16; Isa. 

 14. 9; 26. 4, 19. Cf. 1 Sam. 28. 7 ff.; Mk. 6. 49. 



233. Troop to the infernal jail. Cf. Lucan 1. 454-6: 



Umbrae 

 Non tacitas Ere])i sedes, Ditisque profundi 

 Pallida regna petunt. 



Troop. Cf. Com. 603; Shakespeare, M.N.D. 3. 2. 382. 



infernal jail. Homer's Tartarus has a gate of iron (//. 8. 15). 

 In Hesiod, Tlieog. 726, Tartarus is surrounded by a brazen wall. 

 In Virgil (^w. 6. 549 ff.), it has a triple wall, and a huge gate 

 with posts of adamant, besides a tower of iron. Ovid, Met. 4. 453, 

 speaks of it as a prison closed with gates of adamant. Seneca 

 has inferorum career {Here. Fur. 1222): cf. Thy. 16, 803—5; Here. 

 Fur. 57, 737; Here. (Et. 1008, 1142-3; Hipp. 836; Lucan 6. 747-8. 

 Milton ma}^ perhaps also have remembered Shakespeare, Haml. 1. 

 5. 13-14: 



But that I am forbid 

 To tell the secrets of my prison-house. 



He was, of course, familiar with 1 Pet. 3. 19, with its reference to 

 'spirits in prison' (cf. P.L. 11. 725). Milton often refers to hell as 

 a prison: P.L. 1. 71; 2. 59, 434; 4. 824, 906; 1. 364. Cf. P. 

 Fletcher, Purple Island 7. 75 : 



Breaks ope the jayl, and brings the prisoners thence. 



