[386.] most affects: has the greatest liking for. It now generally denotes rather a feigned than a real liking: comp. pretend. Lines [386-392] may be compared with Il Pens. 167-174.
[393.] Hesperian tree. An allusion to the tree on which grew the golden apples of Juno, which were guarded by the Hesperides and the sleepless dragon Ladon. Hence the reference to the ‘dragon watch’: comp. Tennyson’s Dream of Fair Women, 255, “Those dragon eyes of anger’d Eleanor Do hunt me, day and night.” See also ll. [981-983].
[395.] unenchanted, superior to all the powers of enchantment, not to be enchanted. Similarly Milton has ‘unreproved’ for ‘not reprovable,’ ‘unvalued’ for ‘invaluable,’ etc.; and Shakespeare has ‘unavoided’ for ‘inevitable,’ ‘imagined’ for ‘imaginable,’ etc. Abbott (§ 375) says: The passive participle is often used to signify, not that which was and is, but that which was and therefore can be hereafter; in other words -ed is used for -able.
[396.] Compare Chaucer, Doctor’s Tale, 44, “She flowered in virginity, With all humility and abstinence.”
[398.] unsunned, hidden. Comp. Cym. ii. 5. 13, “As chaste as unsunned snow”; F. Q. ii. 7, “Mammon ... Sunning his treasure hoar.”
[400.] as bid me hope, etc. The construction is, ‘as (you may) bid me (to) hope (that) Danger will wink on Opportunity and (that Danger will) let a single helpless maiden pass uninjured.’
[401.] Danger will wink on, etc., i.e. danger will shut its eyes to an opportunity. To wink on or wink at is to connive, to refuse to see something: comp. Macbeth, i. 4. 52, “The eye wink at the hand”; Acts, xvii. 30. Warton notes a similar argument by Rosalind in As You Like It, i. 3. 113: “Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold.”
[403.] surrounding. Milton is said to be the first author of any note who uses this word in its current sense of ‘encompassing,’ which it has acquired through a supposed connection with round. Shakespeare does not use it. Its original sense is ‘to overflow’ (Lat. superundare).
[404.] it recks me not, i.e. I do not heed: an impersonal use of the old verb reck (A.S. récan, to care). Comp. Lyc. 122, “What recks it them.”
[405.] dog them both, i.e. follow closely upon night and loneliness. Comp. All’s Well, iii. 4. 15, “death and danger dogs the heels of worth.”