P. 27, l. 26. flies which win battles. Montaigne relates that the Portuguese besieging the town of Tamly were obliged to raise the siege on account of the clouds of flies. Essais, l. ii. ch. xii.
P. 28, l. 12. Memoria hospitis unius diei prætereuntis. Lib. Sap. v. 14.
P. 30, l. 4. Plerumque gratæ, altered from Hor. Carm. iii. 29, v. 13. plerumque gratæ divitibus vices.
P. 30, l. 13. Epaminondas. The example is taken from Montaigne, Essais, l. ii. ch. xxxvi.
P. 31, l. 22. Sneezing absorbs all the faculties. A paraphrase of a passage in Montaigne, Essais, l. iii. ch. v.
P. 31, l. 28. Scaramouch. One of the traditional parts in Italian Comedy, at that time played by the well-known actor Tiberio Fiorelli, whom Pascal had probably seen.
P. 31, l. 29. The doctor, also a common character in Italian forces. Molière has borrowed from the Italian stage his doctor, so often a pedant and a fool, of whom le docteur Pancrace, in Le Marriage Forcé, is perhaps the most notable example, though that comedy was produced after the death of Pascal.
P. 32, l. 11. the Condrieu, the Desargues. Gerard Desargues was a mathematician at Condrieu on the Rhone, who had been Pascal's teacher. Among the Muscat grapes grown at Condrieu, Pascal distinguishes a special variety of Desargues, and among these a particular vine.
P. 32, l. 28. the Passion of Cleobuline. In Artamène, on le Grand Cyrus, the celebrated romance of Mademoiselle de Scudery, Cleobuline, princess, afterwards queen of Corinth, is one of the principal characters. She is represented as in love with Myrinthe, one of her subjects, but "she loved him without thinking of love; and remained so long in her error, that when she became aware of it, her affection was no longer in a condition to be overcome."