either "thou" should be "you," or else "touched" should be "touchedst, didst touch." Pope has committed the same error in this speech to the Queen of Spleen; for that "thou," and not "you," is, or ought to be, the pronoun understood follows from the expression "thy power" at ver. 65. Hence "who rule" should be "who rulest," or "who dost rule," and so with the other verbs in the second person.
[475] The disease was probably named from the atmospheric vapours which were reputed to be a principal cause of English melancholy. Cowper says of England in his Task, Bk. v. ver. 462,
Thy clime is rude,
Replete with vapours, and disposes much
All hearts to sadness, and none more than mine.
[476] Citron-water was a cordial distilled from a mixture of spirit of wine with the rind of citrons and lemons. There are numerous allusions in the literature of Pope's day to the fondness of women of fashion for this drink, as in Swift's Journal of a Modern Lady, where he says that "to cool her heated brains" when she wakes at noon she
Takes a large dram of citron-water.
[477] The curl papers of ladies' hair used to be fastened with strips of pliant lead.—Croker.
[478] That is, at whose shrine all our sex resign ease, pleasure, and virtue. "Honour" means female reputation.
[479] A parody of Virgil, Ecl. i. 60.—Wakefield.
Garth, Dispensary, Canto iii.:
The tow'ring Alps shall sooner sink to vales,
And leeches in our glasses swell to whales;
Or Norwich trade in instruments of steel,
And Bromingham in stuffs and druggets deal.