The Roman Poets of the Augustan Age: Virgil Part 41

289 'I shall not here detain you with any tale of fancy, and winding digressions and long preambles.'

'The other themes that might have charmed the vacant mind, are all hackneyed now.'

290 Cf. Tac. Ann. ii. 5961: 'M. Silano, L. Norbano consulibus Germanicus Aegyptum proficiscitur _cognoscendae antiquitatis_.' The whole account of the tour of Germanicus ill.u.s.trates the cultivated taste for foreign travel among the Romans of the later Republic, the Augustan Age, and early Empire, and also the mysterious interest which has attached to Egypt from the earliest times known to history.

291 This is distinctly stated by Servius in two places, his introductory comments on Eclogue x, and on Georgic iv, and seems sufficiently attested. Besides, the introduction into the Georgics of such an episode as the 'Pastor Aristaeus' requires some explanation.

292 Both the nexus of the sense and the rhythm condemn the lat.i.tude of transposition which Ribbeck allows himself. Perhaps the only alteration which is absolutely demanded is at iv. 203205. The lines there, as they stand, clearly interrupt the sense, and are more in place either after 196 or after 218. The strong line,

Tantus amor florum et generandi gloria mellis,

is a fitting conclusion for the fine paragraph beginning

Nunc age, naturas apibus quas Iuppiter ipse, etc.

Either of these places seems more suitable for the lines than that after 183. It is possible that the conjecture which Ribbeck adopts from Wagner, 'absoluto iam opere in marginem illos versus a poeta coniectos esse,' may give the true explanation of the misplacement of the lines, though this does not seem to apply to any other pa.s.sage in the poem. Such bold changes as those introduced by Ribbeck at ii. 3546, and again at iii. 120122, are not required by the sense, and are condemned by rhythmical considerations. The line 119,

Exquirunt calidumque animis et cursibus acrem,

is weak for the concluding line of the paragraph, which ends much more naturally with that transposed from 122 to 99,

Neptunique ipsa deducat origine gentem,

as it is Virgil's way to introduce his mythological ill.u.s.trations after his real observations are finished. The paragraph of four lines, Quare agite o proprios ... Taburnum, stands bald and bare in the position Ribbeck a.s.signs it, between 108 and 109. The minor changes for the most part disturb old a.s.sociations and throw no new light on the poet's thought.

293 'While charmed with the love of it, we travel round each detail.'

294 'To invest these poor interests with a new glory.'

295 Cf. Col. iii. 15: 'Ut Mago prodit, quem secutus Vergilius tutari semina et muniri sic praecepit,' etc.

296 Cf. Col. iv. 9: 'Nam illam veterem opinionem non esse ferro tangendos anniculos malleolos quod aciem reformidant, quod frustra Vergilius et Saserna, Stolonesque, et Catones timuerunt,' etc. Also ix. 14: 'Ceterum hoc eodem tempore progenerari posse apes iuvenco perempto Democritus et Mago nec minus Vergilius prodiderunt.' As a trace of Virgil's imitation of Varro, compare the pa.s.sage where, after speaking of the injury done by goats to the vine, Varro says, 'Sic factum ut Libero Patri repertori vitis hirci immolarentur,'

with Georgic ii. 380, 'Non aliam ob culpam,' etc.

297 'From dust in winter, from mud in spring time, you will reap great crops, Camillus.'

298 'He, my son, is a worthy man, and a good farmer, whose implements s.h.i.+ne brightly.'

299 i. 269.

300 'Ceres first taught mortals to turn up the earth with iron.'

301 'Pray, farmers, for wet summers and dry winters'-'And may have called forth the rain by vows'-'Especially wors.h.i.+p the G.o.ds, and offer the yearly sacrifices to mighty Ceres.' Cf. ???. ?a? ?. 463:-

???es?a? d? ??? ?????? ???te?? ?' ????.

302 The great confusion into which it had fallen before its reformation by Julius Caesar may have made this return to the primitive 'Shepherd's Calendar' familiar to Virgil's youth.

303 'When the white bird, abhorred by the long snakes, has come.' Cf.

???. ?a? ?. 448:-

F???es?a? d' e?t' ?? ?e????? f???? ?pa???s??.

304 The same suggestion of the ancient and unchanging nature of this art is vividly conveyed in the Chorus of the Antigone:-

Te?? te t?? ?pe?t?ta? G??

?f??t?? ??a?ta? ?p?t??eta?, ???????? ???t??? ?t?? e?? ?t??, ?ppe?? ???e? p??e???.

305 'There, as they say, there is either the silence of midnight, and a thicker darkness beneath the canopy of night, or else the dawn returns to them from us and brings back the day; and when the morning sun breathes on us with the first breath of his panting steeds, there the glowing star of evening is lighting up her late fires.'

306 'They are glad, now that the rains are over, to revisit their young brood and their dear nests.'

307 Introduction to Notes, ii. p. 315.

308 Compare the contemptuous expressions used by Cicero, Tusc. Disp. ii.

3, of those who had written on the Epicurean philosophy in Latin. It seems strange, if he had any hand in editing his poems, that he makes no exception there in favour of Lucretius.

309 Compare Munro's notes _pa.s.sim_, and specially the note on Lucret.

iii. 449.

310 Compare Georg. iii. 291 with Lucret. i. 926.

311 Chap. iii. p. 109.

312 Merivale's Roman Empire.

313 'What remains of tilled land, even that Nature by its own force would overgrow with briars did not the force of man resist it, inured, for the sake of living, to ply, with pain and labour, the stout mattock, and to split up the new earth with the deep-sunk ploughs: did not we, by turning up the fruitful clods with the plough-share, and subduing the soil of the earth, call forth the seeds to the birth, they could not of their own impulse come forth into the clear air. And after all, sometimes the products of much toil, when they are already in blade and in beauty over the earth, either the Sun in heaven scorches with excessive heat, or sudden rains and chill frosts ruin them, and the blasts of the winds in wild hurricane make them their sport.' Lucret. v. 206217 (See Munro's note on the pa.s.sage). Cf. Georg. ii. 411; i. 198; i. 208; ii. 237; ii. 47; i. 197. Compare also Virgil's use of _subigere_ and _vertere_ as applied to the soil.

314 'And now the aged peasant, shaking his head, often sighs forth the complaint, that the labour of his hands has come to naught.' Lucret.

ii. 1164, etc.

315 v. 932. etc.

316 ii. 1160, etc.

317 ii. 1146; v. 95.

318 Compare Lucret. v. 13671369 with Georg. ii. 36. Compare also Virgil's use of _indulgere_ and _indulgentia_.

319 'After that they essayed now one, now another, mode of tilling the dear plot of ground, and they saw that the earth made wild fruits into fruits of the garden, by a kindly and caressing culture.'

320 De Senectute, xv.

321 v. 204, etc.

322 Georg. i. 2378.

323 Ib. 128.