646-7. ~Entered ... came off~. 'I entered into the very midst of his treacherous enchantments, and yet escaped.' _Lime-twigs_ = snares; in allusion to the practice of catching birds by means of twigs smeared with a viscous substance (called on that account 'birdlime'). Shakespeare makes repeated allusion to this practice: see _Macbeth_, iv. 2. 34; _Two Gent._ ii. 2. 68; ii. _Hen. VI._ i. 3. 91; etc. 649. ~necromancer's hall~. Warton supposes that Milton here thought of a magician's castle which has an enchanted hall invaded by Christian knights, as we read of in the romances of chivalry. _Necromancer_, lit. one who by magical power can commune with the dead (Gk. νεκρός, a corpse); hence a sorcerer. From confusion of the first syllable with that of the Lat. _niger_, black, the art of necromancy came to be called "the black art." 650. ~Where if he be~, Lat. _ubi si sit_: in English the relative adverb in such cases is best rendered by a conjunction + a demonstrative adverb; thus, '_and_ if he be _there_.' 651. ~brandished blade~. Comp. Hermes' advice to Ulysses: "When it shall be that Circe smites thee with her long wand, even then draw thy sharp sword from thy thigh, and spring on her, as one eager to slay her," _Odyssey_, x. ~break his glass~. An imitation of Spenser, who makes Sir Guyon break the golden cup of the enchantress Excess, _F. Q._ i. 12, stanza 56. 652. ~luscious~, delicious. The word is a corruption of _lustious_ from O.E. _lust_ = pleasure: see note, l. 49. 653. ~But seize his wand~. The force of this injunction is shown by lines 815-819. 654. ~menace high~, violent threat. _High_ is thus used in a number of figurative senses, _e.g._ a high wind, a high hand, high passions (_Par. Lost_, ix. 123), high descent, high design, etc. 655. ~Sons of Vulcan~. In the _Aeneid_ (Bk. viii. 252) we are told that Cacus, son of Vulcan (the Roman God of Fire), "vomited from his throat huge volumes of smoke" when pursued by Hercules, "_Faucibus ingentem fumum_," etc. 657. ~apace~; quickly, at a great pace. This word has changed its meaning: in Chaucer it means 'at a foot pace,' _i.e._ slowly. The first syllable is the indefinite article '_a_' = one (Skeat). 658. ~bear~: the subjunctive used optatively (Abbott, § 365). (_Stage Direction_) ~puts by~: puts on one side, refuses. ~goes about to rise~, _i.e._ endeavours to rise. This idiomatic use of _go about_ still lingers in the phrase 'to _go about_ one's business'; comp. 'to _set about_' anything. 659. ~but~, merely: comp. l. 656. After the conditional clause we have here a verb in the present tense ('are chained'), a construction which well expresses the certainty and immediate action of the sorcerer's spell (see Abbott, § 371).