[731] Od. ix. 391.
[732] This is a fair instance of ‘elegant translation.’ What Homer says is:
E’en as a blacksmith-wight some weighty hatchet or war-axe
Dippeth in water cold with a mighty hissing and sputt’ring,
Quenching to temper, for such is the strength and steeling of iron.
The reply will be that Homer does not say it in this way; and to this reply I have no rejoinder.
[733] Hes. Opera, 174, sq.
[734] Ibid. ix. 366.
[735] xi. 34, 35, &c.
[736] Dr. Schliemann is assuredly singular when translating the Homeric Cyanus by ‘bronze’ (Preface to Mycenæ, p. x.). Millin (Minéralogie Homérique) holds it to be tin. The ‘Cyanus’ of Pliny (xxxvii. 38) is lapis lazuli.