[469] See Hom. Iliad, xviii., of Vulcan's walking tripods.—Pope.
Van Swieten, in his Commentaries on Boerhaave, relates that he knew a man who had studied till he fancied his legs to be of glass. His maid bringing wood to his fire threw it carelessly down. Our sage was terrified for his legs of glass. The girl, out of patience with his megrims, gave him a blow with a log on the parts affected. He started up in a rage, and from that moment recovered the use of his glass legs.—Warton.
[ [470] Alludes to a real fact; a lady of distinction imagined herself in this condition.—Pope.
[471] The fanciful person, here alluded to, was Dr. Edward Pelling, chaplain to several successive monarchs. Having studied himself into hypochondriasis between the age of forty and fifty, he imagined himself to be pregnant, and forbore all manner of exercise lest motion should prove injurious to his ideal burden.—Steevens.
[472] This is adopted from the Loyal Subject of Beaumont and Fletcher.—Steevens.
[473] In imitation of the golden branch which Æneas carried as a passport when he visited the infernal regions. Spleenwort is a species of fern. "Its virtues," says Cowley, "are told in its name." He makes it compare itself with "painted flowers," and exclaim,
They're fair, 'tis true, they're cheerful, and they're green,
But I, though sad, procure a gladsome mien.
The plant has lost the little credit it once possessed as a remedy for hypochondriacal affections.
[474] Bishop Lowth notices Pope's frequent violation of grammar in joining a pronoun in the singular to a verb in the plural. Thus when he says in the Messiah,
O thou my voice inspire
Who touched Isaiah's hallowed lips with fire,