Note 28 — HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION.
Reading edition
This superstitious practice is repeatedly alluded to by the poets: thus Sir Walter Scott, in the Lay of the Last Minstrel—
“But she has ta’en the broken lance,
And wash’d it from the clotted gore,
And salved the splinter o’er and o’er.
William of Deloraine, in trance,
Whene’er she turn’d it round and round,
Twisted, as if she gall’d his wound,
Then to her maidens she did say,
That he should be whole man and sound.”—Canto iii. St. xxiii.
Dryden has also introduced the same superstition in his Enchanted Island. Act. v. Scene ii.
Ariel.
Anoint the sword which pierced him with this
Weapon salve, and wrap it close from air
Till I have time to visit it again.
Again, in Scene 4th, Miranda enters with Hippolito’s sword, wrapt up:—
Hip.
O my wounds pain me,
[She unwraps the sword.]
Mir.
I am come to ease you.
Hip.
Alas I feel the cold air come to me; My wound shoots worse than ever.
Mir.
Does it still grieve you?
[She wipes and anoints the sword.]
Hip.
Now, methinks, there’s something laid just upon it:
Mir.
Do you find no ease?
Hip.
Yes, Yes; upon the sudden all this pain
Is leaving me—Sweet heaven, how am I eased!