Note 392 — BOOK V.
William Julius Mickle translation
The Lotophagi, so named from the lotus, are thus described by Homer:—
"Not prone to ill, nor strange to foreign guest, They eat, they drink, and Nature gives the feast; The trees around them all their fruit produce; Lotos the name; divine, nectareous juice; (Thence call'd Lotophagi) which whoso tastes, Insatiate, riots in the sweet repasts, Nor other home, nor other care intends, But quits his home, his country, and his friends: The three we sent, from off th' enchanting ground We dragg'd reluctant, and by force we bound: The rest in haste forsook the pleasing shore, Or, the charm tasted, had return'd no more." Pope, Odyss. ix. 103.
The Libyan lotus is a shrub like a bramble, the berries like the myrtle, purple when ripe, and about the size of an olive. Mixed with bread-corn, it was used as food for slaves. They also made an agreeable wine of it, but which would not keep above ten days. See Pope's note in loco.