“. . . their ships dark-fronted.”
(κυανώπιδες.) The reader will call to mind the νῆες μέλαιναι, the black ships in Homer.—See Dict. Antiq. voce Ships.
“A strong-limbed race with noon-day sweats well hardened.”
This sentiment must have awakened a hearty response in the minds of the Greeks, who were superior to the moderns in nothing so much as in the prominency which they gave to gymnastic exercises, and their contempt for all sorts of σκιοτροφία—rearing in the shade—which our modern bookish system tends to foster.
“No Mars is in her.”
ὄυκ ἔνεστ Ἄρης, a proverbial expression for pithless, nerveless. The same expression is used in the initiatory anapæsts of the Agamemnon. Ἄρης δ ὄυκ ἔνι χώρᾳ.
“Good Greek corn is better than papyrus.”