and in Virgil (A. 1. 478), "Per terram, et versa pulvis inscribitur hasta," is probably to be originally accounted for by the fact that pulvis = pulvis-s as Ceres = Ceres-s. But there is some difficulty about such a scansion as populūs (Enn. Ann. 90), "Iamque expectabat populus atque ora tenebat;" followed by Virgil, G. 3. 189, 4. 453, A. 5. 337 : "Invalidus, etiamque tremens, etiam inscius aevi :" "Non te nullius exercent numinis irae :" "Emicat Euryalus, et munere victor amici." This is a licence which is doubtful even in Plautus (Müller, Pl. Pr. p. 52), and it seems most probable that Ennius (and after him Virgil) was imitating the lengthening of the Greek -os of the second declension in such lines as Iliad 1. 153, 244, Δεῦρο μαχησόμενος, ἐπεὶ οὔτι μοι αἴτιοί εἰσιν. Χωόμενος, ὅτ ̓ ἄριστον ̓Αχαιῶν οὐδὲν ἔτισας. 'Fatalisque manus, infensa Etruria Turno" (A. 12. 232) and "Sicubi magna Iovis antiquo robore quercus " (G. 3. 332) may perhaps be considered an extension of this licence. So A. 3. 112, “ Idaeumque nemus: hic fida silentia sacris." Whether Ennius lengthened the dative plural in -bus cannot be ascertained, and such a scansion is not frequent in Plautus. But Virgil does not hesitate to write (A. 4. 64) "Pectoribus inhians spirantia consulit exta." (b) Verbs. The only cases seem to be A. 9. 610, “Terga fatigamus hasta,” a quantity for which no analogy can be proved in Ennius, though Plautus perhaps has "Venimus " Curc. 438, and Lucilius "iacimus "9 p. 6 (Gerlach): and 11. 111, "Oratis: equidem et vivis concedere vellem." (3) Endings in t. Third person singular of verbs. The -at of the indicative present 1st conjugation, though long by nature and frequently scanned accordingly in Plautus, is of variable quantity in Ennius, but mostly long. Compare with "Solus avem servat: at Romulus pulcher in alto" (Ann. 83), 66 Missaque per pectus dum transit striderăt hasta" (Ann. 365). Virgil has no imitation of this. -At of the imperfect is long in Plautus, and so in Ennius even in thesis, Ann. 314, "Noenum rumores ponebat ante salutem :" but short, Ann. 141, Volturus in spinis miserum mandebăt homonem." So Virgil (but only in arsis 8), E. 1. 39, A. 5. 853, 7. 174, 10. 383, 12. 772 : "Regibus omen erat: hoc illis curia, templum :" "Per medium qua spina dabat: hastamque receptat:" "Hic hasta Aeneae stabat: huc impetus illam." -Et in the present and future indicative and imperfect subjunctive is both long and short in Plautus. Ennius uses it long even in thesis, Ann. 86 : "Omnibus cura viris uter esset induperator:" in arsis, Ann. 100, 171, 349, 409, "Nec pol homo quisquam faciet inpune animatus :" "Pugnandi fieret aut duri finis laboris :" "Nec me rem decet hanc carinantibus edere chartis." Compare the cases from Lucretius quoted above and Virgil, A. 1. 308, 651: -It of the present (3rd conjugation) is constantly short in Ennius, but long Ann. 123, 'Mensas constituit idemque ancilia" So occasionally in the comedians (C. F. W. Müller, p. 79). Virgil, E. 7. 23, A. 9. 9, 10. 433, has "Versibus ille facit; aut si non possumus omnes:" 'Sceptra Palatini sedemque petit Evandri:" "Tela manusque sinit. Hic Pallas instat et urget." -It of the fourth conjugation is long in Ennius, Ann. 258, "Alter nare cupit, alter pugnare paratust (if cupit be from cupire). Comp. Ann. 419, 432, "It eques et plausu cava concutit ungula terram :" Configunt parmam, tinnit hastilibus umbo:" 386 (thesis), "Infit, O cives, quae me fortuna ferocem." Virgil has no instances. -It of the first future is short Enn. Ann. 153, "Hac noctu filo pendebit Etruria tota,” and there is no instance in his fragments of its being lengthened. Virgil has erit twice; E. 3. 97, A. 12. 883: "Ipse ubi tempus erit, omnes in fonte lavabo:" "Te sine, frater, erit? O quae satis ima dehiscat "." -It of the present subjunctive and second future is long in Plautus: so also Ennius has fuerit and dederit, Ann. 128, 165, "Si quid me fuerit humanitus ut teneatis:" 66 At sese, sum quae dederit in luminis oras." -It of the perfect indicative is often long in Plautus (references in Müller, Pl. Pr. p. 71), but Ennius, though he writes (Ann. 599) "Qua murum fieri voluit, urgentur in unum," makes it mostly short: a strange fact, as the original length of the vowel is unquestionable. The long scansion was afterwards taken up by Ovid in the case of words compounded with eo (subiit &c.), and Virgil writes (G. 2. 211, A. 8. 363) "At rudis enituit impulso vomere campus:" "Alcides subiit, haec illum regia cepit." 9 The MSS. of Plautus, Men. 1160, give “venibīt,” and “erīt" in Captivi 206. 474 LENGTHENING OF SHORT FINAL SYLLABLES. In A. 10. 394 Virgil extends this licence to lengthening the last syllable of caput. Procul (“ arcemque procul ac rara domorum" A. 8. 98) stands by itself1. It will be seen from the instances quoted that Virgil, though on the whole following the lines marked out by the early Roman poetry, never allows himself these licences except in arsis, and but seldom where there is not a slight break in the sentence 2. By Ennius these limitations were far less rigorously observed. Virgil considered such scansions as antiquarian ornaments, and as such they were to a certain extent taken up from him by Ovid, Propertius, Tibullus, and the later poets. H. NETTLESHIP. 1 Whether the line "Dona dehinc auro gravia sectoque elephanto" 3. 464, is due to any reminiscence of Ennius, in whose fragments the final a of the neut. pl. is always short, cannot be made out. The difficult line 12. 648 is treated of in the note on the passage. 2 Comp. Haupt on Ov. Met. 3. 184. "Ovid setzt kurze Silben statt langer in der Hebung vor griechischen Wörtern oder in der Casur des dritten Fusses vor et und aut." This remark would cover a great many, though by no means all, of the cases quoted from Virgil. ON PARTS OF RIBBECK'S PROLEGOMENA CRITICA TO HIS EDITION OF VIRGIL'. I. M. RIBBECK has conferred a great boon on all critical students of Virgil by the careful collations which he has made or caused to be made of the principal MSS. In his Prolegomena he has accumulated a large amount of collateral learning, bearing on the life of the poet and the criticism of the text, the value of which I cannot appraise as I should wish, owing to my want of acquaintance with the subject. I am anxious to say this at starting, because the remarks which I am going to make will be chiefly concerned with points on which I have the misfortune to differ from him. The parts of his Prolegomena which I purpose to examine are the three later chapters on the Georgics, the chapter on the Aeneid, and a few points in later chapters, all of them connected with the integrity of the text as we at present possess it. The present paper will be confined to the chapters on the Georgics. That Virgil retouched the Georgics after their original publication is likely enough. The lines in the exordium of the Third Book (vv. 30 foll.) seem to point to events belonging to the later years of the poet's life: Servius' story that the Fourth Book was altered after the fall of Gallus (four years after the probable date of the completion of the work) looks the same way: and the grammarians and commentators speak occasionally of verbal changes found in the author's own handwriting. Thus there is nothing prima facie improbable in the supposition of occasional derangements in the text, which it may be reserved for the critical sagacity of modern times to detect and set right. The only question is the question of fact, has modern critical sagacity discovered any such? Let me review successively those which M. Ribbeck has pointed out. After going through the notices of varieties of reading preserved by the older critics, he finds a difficulty in Book 1, vv. 100-103 (" Humida solstitia. . . Gargara messes"). He enumerates the various precepts beginning v. 43, notices a certain symmetry in vv. 94-96, 97-99, and again in vv. 104-110, 111-117, two sentences of three lines each being succeeded by two of seven, and complains that the four lines in question interrupt the natural order of thought. He thinks that they ought to have been placed either at the beginning or at the end of the whole passage, and considers whether room could be found for them after v. 49, but decides that it is impossible. Accordingly, his conclusion is that they were no part of the passage, as it originally stood, but that Virgil wrote them afterwards, intending to work them into the context, but failing to do so. Now I am not disposed to contend that the lines would be in their place in a systematic treatise in prose, or even in a poem so severely didactic as that of Lucretius: I only say that, standing where they do, they are quite in keeping with Virgil's manner. Virgil, above all things, consults liveliness and variety: he approaches one part of his 1 Reprinted from the Journal of Philology, vol. i. Nos. 1 and 2. subject in one way, another in another, not because the different parts require a different treatment for didactic reasons, but because he is a poet, and does not wish to fatigue his readers by harping too long on the same string. As good an instance as any of this peculiarity of his is the first half of the Third Book, where having to deliver much the same series of precepts about oxen and horses, he passes at will from one to the other, talks of the choice of the dams under the head "cow," and changes to the head "horse" when he has to treat of the sires, leaving in each case the remaining half of his advice to be inferred. In the passage before us he had, as he doubtless thought, gone on long enough in the strain of ordinary precept, and so he interposes a relief. He addresses the husbandman directly, but instead of telling him anything more that he is to do about his land, bids him pray for wet summers and dry winters. This is his way of calling attention to another part of the subject, the evils of too much drought and too much wet, and the way to remedy them. The reader's attention thus aroused, he becomes didactic again—recommends irrigation as a remedy for a dry soil and drainage as a remedy for a wet one. M. Ribbeck's next instance is from Book 2, vv. 371 foll., where he finds the same remark delivered twice: in vv. 373-375 cattle are said to do more harm to the young vines than cold or heat, and in vv. 376-379 cold and heat are said not to do so much harm as the teeth of cattle. The two, he says, are obviously different draughts of the same passage, the second being the later and superior. This charge of repetition depends on an arbitrary interpretation of "super" in v. 373, which may just as well mean “beside" as "more than,” and for the purposes of the passage, infinitely better. Virgil amplifies, if that is a fault, but he does not repeat himself. He says that over and above unjust winters and tyrannous suns the young shoots have other enemies to fear, the buffalo, the roe, the sheep, and the heifer. He then goes on to say that these new enemies are worse than the old, and he says it characteristically: he takes a line to dwell on the severity of cold, another line to enforce the oppressiveness of heat, and then says that neither is so injurious as the cattle, the venom of their tooth, and the deep scar they leave on the young tree's bark. He had before tried to give a notion of the number of the assailants: he now pictures the mischief they effect. Each sentence has its relevancy as it stands, and to substitute the one for the other would be to mutilate the thought. We now come to the Third Book, where the passage about the madness of love (vv. 242-283) is similarly accused of confusion and tautology. M. Ribbeck rightly says that after dwelling in the previous paragraph upon the effect of passion on bulls, the poet intends specially to commemorate horses as the subjects of a similar frenzy. But why, he asks, are men introduced promiscuously among a crowd of other animals, instead of having a place of honour reserved for them? and why are horses mixed up with the rest of the creation, when mares are kept for a separate description lower down? Clearly the lines in which Hero and Leander are celebrated ought to follow, not precede, the lines about lynxes, wolves, dogs, and deer: clearly also the horses ought to be introduced before the mares, while the two lines in which the latter are described as scaling mountains and swimming rivers ought to be omitted, as being part of the first edition, written before the poet had resolved to speak of horses as excited to a similar display of energy. Here again I think that a little consideration will show that Virgil intended the passage to stand as it has come down to us. He has just painted his bull-fight as a companion picture to his racer the horses have had their turn in relation to one part of the subject, the oxen have their turn in relation to another. In speaking of sexual passion, then, he does not mean to assign an equal prominence to horses in reference to the didactic object of the poem: but he intends to mention them nevertheless. How does he manage it? By including them in a general description, which he adds by way of digression. To this description he gives a studied appearance of indiscriminateness: the stallion is |