636. ~more med'cinal~, of greater virtue. The line may be scanned thus: And yet | more med | 'cinal is | it than | that Mo | ly. ~Moly~. When Ulysses was approaching the abode of Circe he was met by Hermes, who said: "Come then, I will redeem thee from thy distress, and bring deliverance. Lo, take this herb of virtue, and go to the dwelling of Circe, that it may keep from thy head the evil day. And I will tell thee all the magic sleight of Circe. She will mix thee a potion and cast drugs into the mess; but not even so shall she be able to enchant thee; so helpful is this charmed herb that I shall give thee ... Therewith the slayer of Argos gave me the plant that he had plucked from the ground, and he showed me the growth thereof. It was black at the root, but the flower was like to milk. _Moly_ the gods call it, but it is hard for mortal men to dig; howbeit with the gods all things are possible" (_Odyssey_, x. 280, etc., _Butcher and Lang's translation_). In his first Elegy Milton alludes to Mōly as the counter-charm to the spells of Circe: see also Tennyson's _Lotos-Eaters_, "beds of amaranth and _moly_." 638. ~He called it Hæmony~. _He_ is the shepherd lad of line 619. _Haemony_: Milton invents the plant, both name and thing. But the adjective _Haemonian_ is used, in Latin poetry as = _Thessalian_, Haemonia being the old name of Thessaly. And as Thessaly was regarded as a land of magic, 'Haemonian' acquired the sense of 'magical' (see Ovid, _Met._ vii 264, "_Haemonia_ radices valle resectas," etc.), and Milton's Haemony is simply "the magical plant." Coleridge supposes that by the prickles and gold flower of the plant Milton signified the sorrows and triumph of the Christian life. 639. ~sovran use~: see note, l. 41. The use of this adjective with charms, medicines, or remedies of any kind was so very common that the word came to imply 'all-healing,' 'supremely efficacious'; see _Cor._ ii. 1. 125, "The most _sovereign_ prescription in Galen." 640. ~mildew blast~: comp. _Arc._ 48-53, _Ham._ iii. 4. 64, "Here is your husband; Like a _mildew'd_ ear _Blasting_ his wholesome brother." A mildew blast is one giving rise to that kind of blight called mildew (A.S. meledeáw, honey-dew), it being supposed that the prevalence of dry east winds was favourable to its formation. 642. ~pursed it up~, etc., _i.e._ put it in my wallet, though I did not attach much importance to it. ~little reckoning~: comp. _Lyc._ 116, where the very same phrase occurs. 643. ~Till now that~. Here _that_ = when, the clause introduced by it being explanatory of _now_ (see Abbott, § 284).