SCENE IL
Page 17 hne I — A moi, comte, deux mots: Here, count, a wc rd with you.
17 7 — La même vertu: The very virtue. Notice. —
Before the noun or pronoun, mêmemeans same or even ; after it, self, itself. La même vertu, the same virtue ; même la vertu, even virtue ; elle-même, herself ; même elle, even she. In Corneille’s time this rule did not exist.
17 14 — Jeune présomptueux : Presumptuous youth.
17 16 — Aux âmes bien nées: In high-born soûls valour
does not wait for âge. A for dans is often used with a good effect by Corneille.
In high-born soûls,
Valour’s not meted by the years they’ve told.
— W. F. Nokes.
ï7 20 — Mes pareils à deux fois ne se font pas connaître :
The like of me need no second trial to show their worth.
j 7 21 — Et pour leur coup d’essai veulent des coups de
maître : And will hâve a masterly stroke as a first essay. Notice. — Coup d’étourdi, a rash action. Coup de désespoir, a desperate attempt. Coup d’état, violent measures, or, a piece of great policy.
iS 2 — Au seul bruit de ton nom : At the mere sound of
your name.
1 S 4 — Le destin de ma perte : My doom, my inévitable
death.
18 5 — En téméraire : Rashly. Notice. — Vous parlez en
soldat, je dois agir en roi, you speak like a soldier, I must act like a king ; Il me traite en ami, he treats me as a friend.
18 8 — Invaincu : Some hâve blamed Corneille, others
hâve praised him, for having invented this word, which he has used several times in his plays ; but it is found in Ronsard (1524- 1584), Robert Garnier (1545-1601), Agrippa d’Aubigné (1524-1585).
18 10— Par tes yeux : By the bright lire in your eyes.
18 14— Mouvements : Impulses, transports.
Page iZ line 21 — Un coup d’essai fatal: Seek not to make thy maiden-stroke thy last. Essai, Provençal, assag ; Ital. assaggio ; Lat. exagium, aweighingmachine ; there is not far from the sense of weighing to that of trying ; for other examples of Lat. x becoming ss in French see note, p. 9, 1. 13. Notice. — The Lat. médial consonant g has been dropped, as in gigantem , géant ; magister , maître ; regina, reine ; fagina , faîne, beech-nut ; negare , nier, to deny, etc., etc.
?8 24 — A vaincre sans péril, on triomphe sans gloire. Cf
“ Ignominiam judicat gladiator cum inferiore componi, et scit eum sine gloria vinci qui sine periculo vincitur .” (Seneca de Providentia,
cap. iü.)
18 25 — Abattu.: Overcome ; lit. beaten down. Notice.
— Abattre une maison, to pull down a house ; Abattre un arbre, to fell a tree ; La pluie abat la poussière, the rain lays the dust.
18 27 — Indigne pitié : Base pity ; unmerited, offensive.
19 2 — Qui survit .... Notice that qui here isseparated
from its antécédent fils by dégénère ; there is no ambiguity whatever, and other instances are to be found in Corneille, Racine, La Fontaine, Boileau ; but it is to be imitated only with great reserve in verse, and avoided in prose.
