Scène III
11 29— De ce soupir: Louis Racine remarks hère that
this speech of Ulysses is in keeping with his character, crafty and éloquent. He also points oui that in Euripides, Menelaus, the brother of Agamemnon, plays the part assigned by J. Racine to Ulysses, and claims (at first) the sacrifice of hia own nièce !
12 7, 8 — Que ses plaintes ... : The meaning of lines 7
and 8 is, *' Do y ou think that in his lamentations, which you will try in vain to appease, he will allow the goda' word to be doubted, and not accuse you of being the cause of the evil?"
12 14 — Xante : The same as Scamander, the celebrated
river of the Troad. As a mythological personage, the river-god was called Xanthus by the gods.
12 \b— Et qui de ville en ville ... : This line repre-
sents Agamemnon as rousing the Greek chiefs to action against Troy by reminding them of their oath, mentioned below.
12 18 — Tyndare : Tyndareus made the suitors of his
daughter Helen take an oath that they would uphold by force of arms the honour of any one of those who would be chosen as Helen 's husband.
12 23 — Sans vous : Without you, if it were not for you
— i.e., if you haa Qot urged us to do it.
12 2^— Flammes : Love.
12 27 — De toutes parts assemblés en ces lieux : And now
that we are assembled hère from ail parts of Greece.
12 ZO — Ce fameux ouvrage— i.e., the oalling to arms of
the Greek chiefs.
12 82 — Frets de: The French Academy gives à alone
us the préposition governed by prêt. Racine, Corneille, Voltaire. &c., however sometimes use de.
Nami. 71
Pa^* 18 lim 7 — Bt comrir vous jeter entre Calehcu et lui: Menelaus has probably not forgotten the following occurrence. To escape the obligation of going to Troy, Ulysses pretended to be mad. He yoked an ass and an oz to a plough, and began to 80W sait. To try him, his infant son, Telemachus, was placed before the plough. The father stopped the plough, and having thus betrayed himself, was obliged to ioin the other suitors of Helen in fulfilment of the oath he had swom.
SOBKB IV.
Il 24 — A P^ne nom avons, for nous avons avec peine :
With trouble. In Modem French à peine means hardly.
13 29— Et qui de son destin : Remark îfeafter interroger.
\Ve say now interroger %ur. Littré saya tiiat interroger de is used only in poetry.
14 l-— Abord : For arrivée, arrivai j used also in thi;
sensé by Corneille —
.... Mon abord en oes lieux Me fit Toir Polyeucte, et je plus à ses yeux. — "Folyeucte," acte i., scène 3.
14 9 — Secrètes : Probably used hère in the sensé of
particulières, particular, apecially reseryed for you.
SCBN» V.
14 14 — Ressorts : Literally springs, hence power,
means, inventions. You undo ail that my vain prudence has done.
14 16 — Encor si je pouvais : If at least 1 could. Encore
is not unfrequently used in this sensé ; in poetry thia word may be spelt with or without an e, according to the requirements of the mètre ; in prose it always takes an t.
14 21 — Je suis père, seigneur. Et fotble comme un amtre :
Notice this punctuation.
14 22— En la place: In the place. VVe shoold now
prefer d.
14 b2— Rejaillir : To be reflected, is so spelt in ail
éditions published during Racine's lifetime.
16 1 — ^oyez tout rUellespont blanchissant sous nos
rames : See the whole of the Uellespont foaming under onr oart. Hellespont, the long
narrow strait counecting the Propontis with the JSgean Sea. Hellespont means the sea of Helle, for Helle, riding away through the air on the ram with the golden âeece, fell into the sea, which was called after her.
^agê 15 Une Z^ Priam : The famous King of Troy, father of Hector and Paris. When the Greeks landed on the Trojan coast he was already advanced in years, and took no active part in the war. n f 16 \^— Écarter : Keep away from.
