15. =whist.= Hushed. This word, now used as a sort of interjection commanding silence, seems to have had in earlier English more of a verbal meaning, as Spenser in "The Faerie Queene," VII, vii, 59: "So was the Titaness put downe and whist." It also meant _to keep silent_, as in Surrey's "Virgil": "They whisted all, with fixed face intent." A game of cards in which the players are supposed to keep silent is called whist. =birds of calm.= Halcyons. See note 1, page 78. 16. =influence.= From Lat. _in_, into, and _fluo_, to flow. This word, until a comparatively modern date, was always used with respect to the supposed mysterious rays or aspects flowing from the stars to the earth, and thus having a strange power over the fortunes of men. "Canst thou bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades?"--_Job_ xxviii. 31. "Happy constellations on that hour Shed their selectest influences." --_Paradise Lost_, VIII, 512. 17. =For.= Notwithstanding. 18. =Lucifer.= The morning star. The idea of Lucifer appearing to warn the stars of the approach of the sun is a happy figure. See note 7, page 80. 19. =axle-tree.= Axis. _Tree_ in O. E. is used to signify beam. We still have _single-tree_, _double-tree_, _whiffle-tree_, etc. Compare "Comus," 95: "The gilded car of day His glowing axle doth allay." 20. =lawn.= Used in its original sense of a pasture, or open, grassy space. Formerly _laund_. Similarly we have _lane_, an open passage between houses or fields. 21. =Or ere.= _Or_ is here used in its old sense, meaning _before_, from A.-S. _ær_. _Ere_ = e'er, ever. Compare Ecclesiastes xii. 6: "Or ever the silver cord be loosed." Also "King Lear," Act ii, sc. 4: "But this heart Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws Or ere I'll weep." 22. =Pan.= See note, page 72. The application of the name _Pan_ to Christ is evidently derived from Spenser. See "Shepheards Calendar," July: "And such, I ween, the brethren were That came from Canaän, The brethren Twelve, that kept yfere The flocks of mightie Pan." In the Glosse to the Calendar for May it is said that "Great Pan is Christ, the very God of all shepheards, which calleth himselfe the great and good shepheard. The name is most rightly (methinks) applied to him; for Pan signifieth all, or omnipotent, which is only the Lord Iesus. And by that name (as I remember) he is called of Eusebius in his fifth booke, _De Preparat. Evange._" 23. =silly.= From A.-S. _saelig_, blessed, happy. Spenser uses the word in the sense of innocent, as in "Faerie Queene," III, viii, 27: "The silly virgin strove him to withstand." Chaucer, in the "Reves Tale," uses it in the more modern sense of simple, or foolish: "These sely clerkes han ful fast yronne." But in the "Legend of Good Women" it has another meaning: "O sely woman, full of innocence."