6

PROLOGUE.

IN

[N Troy, there lies the fcene: from Ifles of Greece
The princes orgillous, their high blood chaf'd,
Have to the port of Athens fent their ships,
Fraught with the minifters and inftruments
Of cruel war. Sixty and nine, that wore
Their Crownets regal, from th' Athenian bay
Put forth toward Phrygia, and their vow is made
To ranfack Troy; within whofe ftrong immures,
The ravifh'd Helen, Menelaus' Queen,

With wanton Paris fleeps; and that's the quarrel.
To Tenedos they come.

And the deeep drawing barks do there difgorge
Their warlike fraughtage. Now on Dardan plains,
The fresh, and yet unbruifed, Greeks do pitch
Their brave pavillions. Priam's fix gates i' th' city, (1)
(Dardan, and Thymbria, Ilia, Scæa, Troian,
And Antenorides,) with may ftaples

( 1 ) ———Priam's fix-gated city

Dardan, Timbria, Helias, Chetas, Trojan,
And Antenoridan, with may faples

And correfponfive and fulfilling bols

And

Stirre up the fons of Troy ] This has been a most miferably mangled paffage, thro' all the editions: corrupted at once into falte concord, and false reasoning. Priam's fix-gated city firre up the fons of Troy?—Here's a verb plural govern'd of a nominative fingular. But that is eafily remedied. The next question to be asked, is, in what fense a city having fix ftrong gates, and thofe well barr'd and bolted, can be faid to flir up its inhabitants? unle's they may be fuppos'd to derive fome spirit from the strength of their fortifications But this could not be the Poet's thought. He must mean, I take it, that the Greeks had pitch'd their tents upon the plains before Troy; and that the Trojans were fecurely barricaded within the walls and gates of their city. This fenfe my correction reftores.

-Priam's fix gates i'th' city,

Sperre up the fons of Troy.

P 4

Why

And correfponfive and fulfilling bolts
Sperre up the fons of Troy.

Now expectation tickling kittish fpirits,
On one and other fide, Trojan and Greek,
Sets all on hazard. And hither am I come
A Prologue arm'd, (but not in confidence
Of Author's pen, or A&tor's voice; but fuited
In like conditions as our argument ;)

Why they might be call'd Priam's fix gates, will be seen in the sequelof this note. To fperre, or spar, (from the old Teutonic word, sperren) fignifies, to fhut up, defend by barrs, &c. And in this very fenfe has CHAUCER ufed the term in the 5th book of his Troilus and Creseide. For when he saw her doorés fperred all,

Well nigh for forrow' adown he 'gan to fall.

But now for the fix gates, the very names of which our editors have barbaroufly demolish'd; and which Mr. Pope, tho' the translator of Homer, had not the skill to re-edify, till I chalk'd out the materials for him. We find them enumerated by La Cerda, (from Dares Phry gius, as he informs us) in his note upon this paffage of Virgil: -Hic Juno Scaas fæviffima portas

Prima tenet. Æneid. ii. v. 612. Trojanæ urbis portas fex enumerat Dares; Antenoridem, Dardanien, Iliam, Sceam, Catumbriam, Trojanam. This lift is again given us by Tiraquellus in a note upon Alexander ab Alexandro, (lib. iv. cap.23.) and from these two copied by Sir Edward Sherburne in his Commen. tary upon the Troades of Seneca tranflated by him. But even in these three paffages we have to deal with error: Catumbria is a very odd word; and, I am well satisfied, a depraved one. I'll endeavour to account for the blunder, and give the true reading. We are to remember, there was near old Troy a plain call'd Thymbra; a river, that run thro' it, call'd Thymbrius; and a temple to Apollo Thym braus. The gate, that we are fpeaking of, was probably defcrib'd in the Greek author (fuppos'd to be Dares Phrygius, and now long fince loft) to be xalà @piov: the gate that fac'd, or was in the neigh. bourhood of, the aforefaid plain and river. And from thence, as I fufpect, by the negligence or ignorance of the tranflator, the two Greek words were join'd, and corrupted into Catumbria. The correcter editions of Dares Phrygius (I mean the Latin verfion, which goes under that name) neither read as Cerda, Tiraquellus, or Sir Edward Sherburne have given us this paffage; but thus :- -Ilio portas fecit (feil. Priamus) quarum nomina bæc funt, Antenorida, Dardania, Ilia, See, Thymbrææ, Trojana. This exactly fquares with my emen. dation, as well as affigns the caufe why our Poet might call the fix gates Priam's, who was the builder of them,

To tell you, (fair beholders) that our Play
Leaps o'er the vaunt and firftlings of those broils,
'Ginning i'th middle: ftarting thence away, (2)
To what may be digefted in a Play.

Like, or find fault,

do, as your pleasures are; Now good, or bad, 'tis but the chance of war.

(2) Beginning in the middle, farting thence away,] Thus all the editions, before Mr. Pope's. He, in the purity of his ear, has ca. fhier'd the last word, because the verfe was longer than its fellows, I have chose to retain it; (because, I am perfuaded, the Poet intended a rhyme) and reduce the line to measure by an apocope fo frequent in his writings.

Helen, Wife to Menelaus, in love with Paris.
Andromache, Wife to Hector.

Caffandra Daughter to Priam, a Prophetess.
Crefida, Daughter to Calchas, in love with Troilus.

Alexander, Creffida's Man.

Boy, Page to Troilus.

Trojan and Greek Soldiers, with other Attendants.

SCENE, Troy; and the Grecian Camp, before it.