Naides, indigno cum Gallus amore peribat ? Nam neque Parnasi vobis iuga, nam neque Pindi Illum tiam lauri, etiam flevere myricae ; are naturally mentioned in connection with Daphnis, who, according to Id. 7. 92, was married to a Naiad. Here, as in v. 1, they seem to play the part of the Muses, and are consequently associated with Parnassus, Pindus, and Aganippe. This connects them not only with Gallus, but with Virgil, who had just addressed Arethusa, and at the end of his song, v. 70, turns to them again. 10.] Peribat' is restored by Wagn. for 'periret' from a correction in the Med., and from one or two other MSS., and seems to be required by the grammar, as there is no logical relation between 'cum-peribat' and the principal clause, but merely one of time. Indigno amore,' 8. 18 note. 11.] 'Ye were not in any of your usual haunts,' implying that search had been made for them there. The two mountains are mentioned, as Heyne observes, with a reference to the springs belonging to each. 12.] Ulla' has the force of ullo modo.' Comp. 1. 54 note. 'Moram fecere:' "fieret vento mora ne qua ferenti," A. 3. 473. 'Aonie' is the reading of several MSS. for 'Aoniae' or 'Aonia,' and is the natural form in a metrical license like this, intended as an imitation of the Greek. So Sil. 14. 515, quoted by Wund., has 'Ortygie Arethusa.' 13.] From Theocr. 1. 71, 72, where however the mourners are wolves, jackals, and lions, as in E. 5. 26. The neglect of the nymphs is contrasted with the sorrow of the trees and shrubs, which were vocal as echoing to Gallus' lament, the bays being introduced as in 6. 83, the tamarisks as in 6. 10. Such an explanation of the mage was evidently in Virgil's mind (comp. 5. 62 note, 8. 22 note), but he does not put it forward prominently, as it would interfere with the effect of the rest of the passage, where actual mourners are introduced. The text before Heins. had a second 'illum' before the second' etiam :' but its omission, 10 15 besides resting on the authority of the best MSS., decidedly improves both the language and the rhythm of the line. 14.] Comp. 8. 22. 'Sola sub rupe:' so Orpheus, G. 4. 508, 509, is said “rupe sub aeria deserti ad Strymonis undam Flevisse, et gelidis haec evolvisse sub antris." 15.] Lycaei,' G. 1. 16. 16.] Nostri,' of us shepherds. The sheep do not regret their connection with us, and the best of us need not regret his with them. Keightley takes 'nostri of Gallus, which is possible, though he can hardly be right in attempting (Horace, Excursus 2) to get rid of all the instances in which 'nos,' like 'vos,' borrows the genitive sing. of the neuter of its possessive (Madv. § 79, obs. 1). 17.] Nec te poeniteat,' 2. 34 note. Gallus is addressed as if he had been a shepherd, and so doubtless Virgil chooses to regard him : but the language here seems intended to meet an objection that the connexion might disgrace him, so that the sense, stripped of metaphor, will be do not regret or think scorn of your association with pastoral poetry.' 'Divine poeta,' 5. 45, also of a shepherd. 18.] From Theocr. 1. 109, where however the connexion is quite different. The thought here is like that in E. 2. 60. 19.] Upilio' is generally considered a lengthened form of opilio,' an old word for a shepherd found in Plaut. Asin. 3. 1. 36, and doubtless connected with 'ovis.' No authority however is quoted for this lengthening by a change of vowels, which can scarcely be, as Serv. thinks, a hint taken from the Greek use of ovvoua for ovoμa, &c., and the word 'ovilio,' of which it is supposed to be a variety (found in Javolenus, Dig. 33. 7. 26, § 2), would have the second syllable long. It would seem more probable therefore that the word may be really a contraction of Uvidus hiberna venit de glande Menalcas. 20 Omnes "Unde amor iste, rogant, tibi?" Venit Apollo : Perque nives alium perque horrida castra secuta est. ' ovipilio' (with which we may perhaps compare oionolog, and possibly the root' pell in 'compellere,'' depellere '), and that there may have been two forms of the word, opilio' and 'upilio,' like' bobus' and 'bubus' from' bovibus,' each of them long. Unfortunately the passage in Plautus does not enable us to determine the quantity: indeed it rather tends to complicate the question further, by raising a doubt about the second syllable, which there must be scanned as long, unless we admit a hiatus. Thus it is possible that 'upilio' may be intended by Virgil to be scanned as a trisyllable, the lengthening of the first vowel being explained as above. The ' opilio' is mentioned by Cato R. R. 10 among the staff of farm labourers, one being required for a property of two hundred and forty jugera. Subulci' is the reading of all the MSS., 'bubulci,' which Heyne retained and Voss defends, being due to the earlier modern critics (Parrhasius, Ursinus, Erythraeus, Stephanus, Cerda: see Taubmann's note). The reasons alleged for the change were, the parallel passage in Theocr. 1. 80, where swineherds are not named, the absence of any mention of swineherds elsewhere in the Eclogues, only cowherds, shepherds, and goatherds, according to Donatus in his Life of Virgil, coming within the dignity of pastoral poetry, the probability that Menalcas from his occupation is himself intended for a swineherd, the allusion in two passages of Appuleius (Flor. p. 761. Apol. p. 416) to Virgil's opiliones' and 'bubsequae,' a quotation in Terent. Maur. v. 1191, where however 'subulci' has recently been restored on MSS. authority, and the epithet 'tardi,' which is supposed to point to the motion of cows, and consequently of cowherds. In reply it is sufficient to say that swine are elsewhere referred to by Virgil (G. 1. 400., 2. 72, 520) as belonging to rustic life, while, as Voss admits, there is a distinct propriety in mentioning them here, as they were plentiful in Arcadia: that the passages in Apul. do not prove that he read 'bubulci,' which indeed would not necessarily be sy 25 nonymous with 'bubsequae,' the former word generally meaning a ploughman, not a herdman and that 'tardi' implies no more than weariness with their day's labour, which might easily be conceived of a swineherd, even if we had not Eumaeus' complaint of the hardship of the life, Od. 14. 415 foll. 20.] Menalcas is probably a husbandman who has been gathering and steeping acorns, which were the food not only of swine, but, in the winter, of cattle also. Wagn. refers to Cato 54, "Ubi sementim patraveris, glandem parari legique oportet et in aquam conjici. Inde semodios singulis bubus in dies dari oportet." This explains both 'hiberna' and 'uvidus.' For the time of year see Introd. 'Apollo' appoet and the 21.] Theocr. 1. 81 foll. pears as the god both of the shepherd. 22.] Tua cura,' 1. 58. 'She for whom you care so cares nought for you.' 23.] See Introd. 25.] Imitated from Lucr. 4. 587, " Pan Pinea semiferi capitis velamina quassans,' a passage which Virgil has more than once had before him see on 2. 24., 6. 27. 'Quassans' here expresses the size and length of the fennel and lilies. The use of fennel flowers for garlands is vouched for by Pliny, 21. 9, referred to by Voss. 26.] Virgil lays stress on his having been allowed to look on Pan, as he was a fo midable personage (Theocr. 1. 16 foll.), and the sudden sight of him produced madness, hence called panic' (Eur. Rhes. 36, &c.). See on 6. 13, 24. 27.] The details vouch for the reality of the vision, perhaps in a spirit of rustic sim Ecquis erit modus? inquit ; Amor non talia curat; Arcades. O mihi tum quam molliter ossa quiescant, plicity. Both the Greeks and Romans 28.] "Sed quis erit modus?" A. 4. 98. 'Amor non talia curat' answers to Theocritus ̓ ἀφρόντιστος Ερως. Pan, as Serv. remarks, may be speaking from his own experience, bethinking him," in Keats' words, "how melancholy loath he was to lose fair Syrinx." 29, 30.] Pan, as the patron of rural life, chooses his images from the country. Voss observes that he is elsewhere connected with bees, being called μeλioooooog in the Anthology, while honey is offered to him Theocr. 5. 58. Is it merely by accident that in the song to Pan, just quoted, in Keats' Endymion, book 1, 'yellow-girted bees' are said to foredoom their golden honeycombs' to him? For 'gramina rivis' see 3. 111., G. 1. 269. Cytiso apes:' "Cytisum in agro esse quam plurimum maxime refert, quod gallinis, apibus, ovibus, capris, bubus quoque et omni generi pecudum utilissimus est," Col. 5. 12. It is not named in G. 4. Fronde' seems to mean leaves stripped for fodder: otherwise we should have expected some other tree to be particularized as a pendant to 'cytisus.' : 31-43.] 'So they but Gallus replied: Let me be remembered in your songs, Arcadians; would that I only had been one of you, living your life and enjoying my love; even Lycoris might have stayed with me then.' 30 35 31.] Doubts about the pointing of this line existed as early as the time of Serv., who rightly decides that 'tamen forms part of Gallus' speech. It is more easy to feel the force of the word here than to define it. Wagn. seems right in saying that it naturally introduces a consolatory thought, as in A. 4. 329., 10. 509., though he spoils the effect by referring it directly to what goes before: "licet sciam nullum amoris esse remedium in luctu et lacrimis, iuvat tamen indulgere huic dolori, quod meos amores non tacebunt Arcadia pastores." Serv. shows a truer appreciation: "licet ego duro amore consumar, tamen erit solatium, quia meus amor erit vestra cantilena quandoque," adding, not less justly, "videtur enim neque objurgationes neque consolationes (sc. deorum) recipere obstinate moriturus: nihil enim ad dicta ab eis respondit." In English we may perhaps express it, you will sing for me, though, when I am gone.' 'Cantabitis' seems to be used in an imperative sense, as in Hor. 1 Ep. 13. 2, &c., the speaker assuming what he desires. Quiescant,' v. 33, shows that it can scarcely be an ordinary future. 6 32.] Montibus' seems to be the dative, as in 2. 5, "Montibus et silvis studio iactabat inani," rather than the local ablative. 'Haec' is explained by 'meos amores,' v. 34. 'Soli cantare periti Arcades' may be either a vocative in apposition, or a separate sentence, none but Arcadians know how to sing,' which last seems preferable. For the general sense comp. note on 7. 4. 33.] One of the countless variations of the common formula, 'Sit tibi terra levis.' 35.] The feeling is like that of 2. 28 foll., a comparison of which will show that Gallus does not wish, as Voss thinks, to be a slave in Arcadia, as if even the lowest condition there would be bliss, but merely to take part in their simple rustic life. At the same time it is not wrong to bear in mind that in Italy, at least, such occupations would probably imply slavery, as it helps us to estimate the reality of the feeling ex Aut custos gregis, aut maturae vinitor uvae! pressed in the Eclogues. See the general Introduction. 36.] Vinitor uvae' is a pleonasm (not unlike the Homeric νέκταρ ἐφνοχόει), introduced doubtless on account of the epithet 'maturae' and the picture of the vintage thus presented to the mind. 37.] In Arcadia he could have found some rustic love, and their mode of life would have kept them united. The passage is slightly imitated from Theocr. 7. 86 foll. 'Certe,' at any rate.' 'I could have counted on having my love, whoever it might be with me.' In esset-iaceret,' &c. the tense is changed from 'fuissem,' as Gallus is speaking of what, had his lot been cast in Arcadia, might then be going on. 6 38.] Furor,' like 'cura,' v. 22, 'ignis,' 3.66. 39.] Theocr. 10. 28, kai rò lov μéλav ἐντί, καὶ ἁ γραπτὰ ὑάκινθος. Comp. also E. 2. 16 foll. 40.] The association of the willow with the vine has caused a good deal of perplexity. Vines, however, seemed to have been trained on willows in the Gallicum arbustum,' or 'rumpotinum,' as Columella tells us (5. 7), though he himself thinks the practice prejudicial to the vine, and only allows it when no other tree can be found. Voss puts a comma after 'salices,' making 'lenta sub vite' mark a different spot, which is to a certain extent countenanced by Theocr. 7. 88, νñò ôрvoiv, vπо TEVKais, but can hardly stand from the harshness of the omission of 'aut.' Schrader ingeniously proposed 'inter calices,' which would answer to sub arta Vite bibentem,' Hor. 1 Od. 38. 7. 42.] But why dream of Phyllis and Amyntas? Why might I not be enjoying this life with Lycoris?' The line is imitated from Theocr. 5. 33, where one shepherd 40 45 points out to another a place for singing in. is not old age, here or elsewhere in Virgil, See 44-49.] As it is, I am mad enough to serve in the wars, and you have gone to those wintry Alps-may the frost and ice spare you!' 66 44.] Heyne had long ago remarked that 'Martis' might be taken either with 'amor' or with 'armis;' the former view, however, has been ignored by most of the editors, except Forb., who quotes two strongly parallel passages, Accendamque animos insani Martis amore," A. 7. 550; "Saevit amor ferri et scelerata insania belli," ib. 461, though he himself would connect 'Martis,' not very judiciously, with both. Love can have had nothing to do with keeping Gallus in the camp away from Lycoris; and to say with Catrou and Ruaeus that his passion drove him to the war in despair is to say what Virgil does not say, and no authority confirms. On the other hand the connection 'insanus amor Martis' is recommended by the whole tone of the passage, Would I had been a peaceful shepherd, living my life and loving my love! but military madness has made me a soldier, and my love has easily left me.' Heyne read 'te' from a conjecture of Heumann, supposing that Lycoris had gone after a soldier lover, leaving Gallus to pastoral poetry and sorrow : but see the Introduction. 'Nunc,' as things are, used frequently to contrast an actual state with a hypothesis. Forb. comp. Tibull. 1. 10. 11 foll. "Tunc mihi vita foret... nunc ad bella trahor," where the subject as well as the expression is more or less similar. 46.] 'Tantum' seems best taken as equi Alpinas, ah dura, nives et frigora Rheni valent to tantam rem,' the object of 47.] Humboldt (Cosmos, vol. ii. Sabine's trans.) instances the uniform language of the Romans about the savageness and physical discomforts of the Alps as a proof of their insensibility to beauty of scenery. So there is nothing in the Prometheus to show that Aeschylus felt with any distinctness the sublimity of the landscape, on which a modern poet could hardly have failed to dwell. Frigora' is in itself no more than cold weather or winter, as in v. 65, but in connexion with Rheni' it may imply that the river is frozen. In that case, 'frigora laedant' in the next verse will be the same as "glacies secet aspera plantas," v. 49. Dura:' the same hardness of nature which steeled Lycoris against Gallus' love would lead her to brave the Alpine snows. Comp. such passages as Hor. 1 Od. 3. 9 foll. 6 66 48.] Voss comp. Prop. 1. 8. 7, "Tu pedibus teneris positas fulcire pruinas, Tu potes insolitas, Cynthia, ferre nives?" Emm. comp. Ov. M. 1. 508, ne prona cadas, indignave laedi Crura secent sentes," which seems to show that Virgil here may be expressing a caution rather than a wish. 50-61.] I will turn my poems into pastorals, and record my love on the barks of trees; I will hunt with the nymphs and the shepherds, in the hope—a vain hopeof cure.' 50.] Gallus had translated or imitated Euphorion of Chalcis, whose poems, chiefly mythological and of the Alexandrine school, are enumerated in Dict. Biog. As he is 50 said to have been imitated also by Tibullus and Propertius, it seems likely that his elegiac poems may have been those most in favour at Rome: and these accordingly may have been the poems which Gallus put into a Roman dress (possibly in his elegies to Lycoris), and which he now proposes to adapt to the pastoral model of Theocritus. (For other conjectures see Heyne's Excursus.) How the adaptation was to be made is not very easy to see, unless we suppose that Gallus was to speak of himself and his sufferings in pastoral phraseology, changing his actual circumstances into the accidents of a shepherd's life, as Virgil has done for him in this Eclogue. Euphorion was popular in the time of Cicero, who complains (Tusc. 3. 19) of his being preferred to Ennius by the taste of the day, and elsewhere (Div. 2. 64) speaks of his obscurity, a common Alexandrian vice, which, however, seems to have recommended him to Tiberius (Suet. Tib. 70). 51.] Modulabor,' 5. 14. The image by which the change is expressed is that of setting to tune or playing verses already composed. 52.] Spelaea,' σrýλaiα, a word which seems not to occur again till Claudian (B. Get. v. 354), who doubtless copied Virgil, unless we except the author of the Ciris (v. 466). 53.] Malle,' rather than live a soldier's life. Pati,' absolutely; "Disce sine armis Posse pati," Lucan 5. 313. "Et nescis sine rege pati," Id. 9. 262, quoted by Emm. -as we should say, 'to get through life.' 'Amores' used as Ovid uses it as the title of his poems. Perhaps it may have been the title of Gallus' elegies, as the words of Serv. (on v. 1) are "amorum suorum de Cytheride libros scripsit quattuor." With the whole passage comp. Prop. 1. 18. For carving verses on trees see 5. 13. 54.] Heyne comp. Ov. Her. 5. 23, "Et quantum trunci, tantum mea nomina crescunt. Crescite, et in titulos surgite recta Perhaps Virgil may mean, as Voss thinks, not merely that the verses will grow meos. |