[570.] mine ear: see [note], l. 171.
[571.] wizard. Here used in contempt, like many other words with the suffix -ard, or -art, as braggart, sluggard, etc. Milton occasionally, however, uses the word merely in the sense of magician or magical, without implying contempt: see Lyc. 55, “Deva spreads her wizard stream.”
[572.] certain signs: see l. [644].
[574.] aidless: an obsolete word. See Trench’s English Past and Present for a list of about 150 words in -less, all now obsolete: comp. l. 92, [note]. wished: wished for. Comp. l. [950] for a similar transitive use of the verb.
[575.] such two: two persons of such and such description.
[577.] durst not stay. Durst is the old past tense of dare, and is used as an auxiliary: the form dared is much more modern, and may be used as an independent verb.
[578.] sprung: see [note], l. 256.
[579.] till I had found. The language is extremely condensed here, the meaning being, ‘I began my flight, and continued to run till I had found you’; the pluperfect tense is used because the speaker is looking back upon his meeting with the brothers after completing a long narration of the circumstances that led up to it. If, however, ‘had found’ be regarded as a subjunctive, the meaning is, ‘I began my flight, and determined to continue it until I had found (i.e. should have found) you.’ Comp. Abbott § 361.
[581.] triple knot, a three-fold alliance of Night, Shades, and Hell.
[584.] “This confidence of the elder brother in favour of the final efficacy of virtue, holds forth a very high strain of philosophy, delivered in as high strains of eloquence and poetry” (Warton). And Todd adds: “Religion here gave energy to the poet’s strains.”