III. LA LIBERTÉ.
L. 1. _qui t'agite?_ _Qui_ here is a neuter and means 'what.' See Darmesteter, § 416.
L. 8. _parmi l'herbe._ Delicately archaic. Thus Corneille has '_parmi_ l'air,' _Mel._ IV. vi. and La Fontaine '_Parmi_ la plaine,' _Fables_, XI. i. 4. See Haase, § 131 A.
Ll. 12, 13. Notice the fine effect of imitative harmony in these lines. They are as rough as the landscape they describe. Much of their harshness is due to the predominance of the sound of _r_.
Ll. 36, 37. Euripides, _Hec._ 332.
L. 38. _rien à soi._ _Soi_, which is now more especially used when the subject of the sentence is _on_, was formerly indiscriminately used with _lui_ put for _lui-même_. See note to p. 29, VII, l. 10.
L. 49. _Aen._ iv. 487.
L. 54. _les maux qu'on me fait._ The plural of _mal_ is not common with the verb _faire_. There is an instance of it in Régnier: 'sa barbe... où certains animaux... luy faisoient mille _maux_,' _Satire_ x, 171-4.
L. 66. _De qui les blés._ This use of _de qui_, when the antecedent is an inanimate thing, was condemned by Vaugelas, whose rule has prevailed. Yet there is a tendency with many modern writers to return to the older practice.
L. 72. The horn of plenty, or cornucopia, or Amalthaea's horn.
L. 73. _Sans doute que._ How are we to account for this _que_? The phrase is the result of an ellipsis, and stands for 'il est sans doute que.'
L. 75. _Je n'y vois._ _Y_ refers to _la terre_, l. 55.
L. 80. _Elle est pour moi marâtre._ _Marâtre_ is an adjective here=inexorable.
L. 87. _Je m'occupe à leurs jeux._ For a distinction between _s'occuper à_ and _s'occuper de_ see Littré, _Dict._, s.v. 'occuper,' Remarque. The meaning here is: I occupy my mind in seeing them play.
L. 88. _sur la rosée et sur l'herbe brillante_, a hendiadys for _sur l'herbe brillante de rosée_.
L. 93. _Deux fois... promenés._ An ablative absolute. _Promener_, of course, is not the proper word for 'driving' a flock, but an expression of angry contempt for the tedious and, as it were, unprofitable work.
L. 101. _injure_, in the singular, for the sake of the metre.
L. 107. _Du chaume._ Calpurnius, _Aegl._ viii. 66.
L. 117. _la mienne._ This syntactical incorrectness--for _la mienne_ cannot mean _ma vierge_--is in fact an elegance. The shepherd is full of the idea of his love, and most naturally says _la mienne_, meaning _ma bien-aimée_. This neglect of strict logic is most natural.
Ll. 151, 152. Some writers have printed _si j'étais plus sage...,_ as if the sentence were unfinished, and explain that 'I should not take them' is understood. But the thought rather seems to be expressed elliptically: Were I wiser, these gifts forebode no good to me (and I should listen to these misgivings).
L. 156. _j'aurai pu._ The future expressing what is likely to have taken place. See Ayer, § 203.