RESTORATION OF A VERSE IN SOPHOCLES. 507 



fcholi all: found it in his manufcript as two words ais* 

 vttvov; for he bids us make one word of it, fince it 

 characterizes Death as an infernal deity. A curious 

 god, that is always alleep ! And yet Stephens, in his 

 Thefaurus, founds his explication of the word awum^ 

 which he has adorned with parallels, on this paflage 

 alone. The anonymous completer of the Johnfonian 

 edition, fays, that Johnfon and the interpreter in the 

 London edition of 1722. who figns himfelf A. B. 

 tranflated it, fernper infornnem, but that this explica- 

 tion cannot at all be admitted, fince awnvov implies 

 directly the reverie. The learned gentleman gave him- 

 felf as little concern about the fenfe as about the rhyth- 

 mus. By making the antiftrophe tcv aXtvocAJwvpvg anfwer 

 to dwccws octroi, we have a very fuitable appellative for the 

 porter of hell. And thus it is in the Bruhach edition, 

 as fomebody has wrote in the margin of my copy. 

 This cc before wcv was probably obliterated in the 

 manufcript of the fcholiafts or in that of their predecef- 

 fors ; hence the chafm, and the cavils and difputes 

 about the new compound. 



The faulty interpunctuation of the editions I altered 

 as I copied the paffage. 



Prancklin has thus tranflated the chorus which makes 

 the fubjedfc of the foregoing difquifition : 



Goddefs invifible, on thee we call, 

 If thee we may invoke, Proferpina ; and thee, 

 Great Pluto, king of Ihades ; o grant, 

 That not opprefs'd by tortring pain 

 Beneath the ftroke of death he linger long, 

 But fwift with eafy fieps defcend 



