No More Learning

'16'

It was an old convention that lovers were so troubled by their passion
that they could not sleep. In the 'Prologue to the Canterbury Tales'
(ll. 97-98), Chaucer says of the young squire:

So hote he lovede, that by nightertale
He sleep namore than dooth a nightingale.

Pope, of course, is laughing at the easy-going lovers of his day who in
spite of their troubles sleep very comfortably till noon.


'17'

The lady on awaking rang a little hand-bell that stood on a table by her
bed to call her maid. Then as the maid did not appear at once she tapped
impatiently on the floor with the heel of her slipper. The watch in the
next line was a repeater.


'19'

All the rest of this canto was added in the second edition of the poem.
See pp. 84-86. Pope did not notice that he describes Belinda as waking
in I. 14 and still asleep and dreaming in ll. 19-116.


'20 guardian Sylph':

compare ll. 67-78.
'23 a Birth-night Beau':

a fine gentleman in his best clothes, such as he would wear at a ball on
the occasion of a royal birthday.


'30'

The nurse would have told Belinda the old tales of fairies who danced by
moonlight on rings in the greensward, and dropped silver coins into the
shoes of tidy little maids. The priest, on the other hand, would have
repeated to her the legend of St. Cecilia and her guardian angel who
once appeared in bodily form to her husband holding two rose garlands
gathered in Paradise, or of St. Dorothea, who sent an angel messenger
with a basket of heavenly fruits and flowers to convert the pagan
Theophilus.


'42 militia':

used here in the general sense of "soldiery. "


'44 the box':

in the theater.


'the ring':

the drive in Hyde Park, where the ladies of society took the air.


'46 a chair':

a sedan chair in which ladies used to be carried about. Why is Belinda
told to scorn it?


'50'

What is the meaning of "vehicles" in this line?


'56 Ombre':

the fashionable game of cards in Pope's day. See his account of a game
in Canto III and the notes on that passage.


'57-67'

See 'Introduction', p. 85.


'69-70'

Compare 'Paradise Lost', I, 423-431.