[84.] Acrisius.]—Ver. 559. He was a king of Argos, the son of Abas, and the father of Danaë. He refused, and probably with justice, to admit Bacchus or his rites within the gates of his city.
[85.] His grandfather.]—Ver. 563. Athamas was the son of Æolus, and being the husband of Ino, was the son-in-law of Cadmus; who being the father of Agave, the mother of Pentheus, is the grandfather mentioned in the present line.
[86.] Mæonia.]—Ver. 583. Colonists were said to have proceeded from Lydia, or Mæonia, to the coasts of Etruria. Bacchus assumes the name of Acœtes, as corresponding to the Greek epithet ἀκοίτης, ‘watchful,’ or ‘sleepless;’ which ought to be the characteristic of the careful ‘pilot,’ or ‘helmsman.’
[87.] Olenian she-goat.]—Ver. 594. Amalthea, the goat that suckled Jupiter, is called Olenian, either because she was reared in Olenus, a city of Bœotia, or because she was placed as a Constellation between the arms, ὠλέναι, of the Constellation Auriga, or the Charioteer. The rising and setting of this Constellation were supposed to produce showers.
[88.] Taygete.]—Ver. 594. She was one of the Pleiades, the daughters of Atlas, who were placed among the Constellations.
[89.] Hyades.]—Ver. 594. These were the Dodonides, or nurses of Bacchus, whom Jupiter, as a mark of his favor, placed in the number of the Constellations. Their name is derived from ὕειν, ‘to rain.’
[90.] Dia.]—Ver. 596. This was another name of the Isle of Naxos. Gierig thinks that the reading here is neither ‘Diæ’ nor ‘Chiæ,’ which are the two common readings; as the situation of neither the Isle of Naxos nor that of Chios, would suit the course of the ship, as stated in the text. He thinks that the Isle of Ceos, or Cea, is meant, which Ptolemy calls Κια, and which he thinks ought here to be written ‘Ciæ.’
[91.] Epopeus.]—Ver. 619. He was the κελεύστης, ‘pausarius,’ or keeper of time for the rowers.
[92.] A dreadful murder.]—Ver. 626. They seem to have been composed of much the same kind of lawless materials that formed the daring crews of the buccanier Morgan and Captain Kydd in more recent times.
[93.] Naxos.]—Ver. 636. This was the most famous island of the group of the Cyclades.