[r] He spoke; and all was silence, all was night!
These scattered fragments may be compared to shreds of old arras, or reflections from a river broken and confused by the oar; and now and then perhaps the imagination of the reader may supply more than is lost. Si qua latent, meliora putat.
Illud vero perquam rarum ac memoria dignum, etiam suprema opera artificum imperfectasque tabulas, sicut Irin Aristidis, Tyndaridas Nicomachi, Medeam Timomachi, et quam diximus Venerem Apellis, in majori admiratione esse, quam perfecta.
[] The soldier, &c.
So Fortune smil In the Lusiad, to beguile the heavy hours at sea, Veloso relates to his companions of the second watch the story of the Twelve Knights. L. vi.
[t] So Fortune smil’d, careless of sea or land!
Among those, who went with Columbus, were many adventurers, and gentlemen of the court. Primero was the game then in fashion. See Vega, p. 2, lib. iii. c. 9.
[] Yet who but He undaunted could explore
Many sighed and wept; and every hour seemed a year, says Herrera.
I. i. 9 and 10.
[v] While his dear boys—ah, on his neck they hung,
‘But I was most afflicted, when I thought of my two sons, whom I had left behind me in a strange country….before I had done, or at least could be known to have done, any thing which might incline your highnesses to remember them. And though I comforted myself with the reflection that our Lord would not suffer so earnest an endeavour for the exaltation of his church to come to nothing, yet I considered that, on account of my unworthiness,’ &c.—F. Columbus, c. 37.
[w] Roc of the West! to him all empire giv’n!
Le Condor est le même oiseau que le Roc des Orientaux. Buffon. ‘By the Peruvians,’ says Vega, ‘he was antiently worshipped; and there were those who claimed their descent from him.’ In these degenerate days he still ranks above the Eagle.
[x] High-hung in forests to the casing snows.
A custom not peculiar to the Western Hemisphere. The Tunguses of Siberia hang their dead on trees; ‘parceque la terre ne se laisse point ouvrir.’ Recherches Philos. sur les Americ. I. 140.
[y] ——and, thro’ that dismal night,
‘Aquella noche triste.’ The night, on which Cortes made his famous retreat from Mexico through the street of Tlacopan, still goes by the name of LA NOCHE TRISTE.
HUMBOLDT.
[z] By his white plume reveal’d and buskins white,
It is said that Pizarro used to dress in this fashion; after Gonzalo, whom he had served under in Italy.
[a] ’Twas MERION’S self, covering with dreadful shade.
Now one,
Now other, as their shape serv’d best his end.