[99] Yet from bland Venus’ mystic rites aloof.] Hesiod introduces the privacy and retiredness of a virgin’s apartment in the house of her mother, as conveying the idea of more complete shelter.
[100] With shining ointment.] Ointment always accompanied the bath. Thus Homer describes the bathing of Nausicaa and her maids in the sixth book of the Odyssey:
And laving next and smoothing o’er with oil
Their limbs, all seated on the river bank
They took repast.
And afterwards of Ulysses:
At his side they spread
Mantle and vest; and next the limpid oil
Presenting to him in a golden cruse,
Exhorted him to bathe.