568).
[Footnote 6: See Chapter VIII.]
[Footnote 7: The brief account of Nicolaus of Damascus (9) mentions that
Octavius had charge of the Greek plays at the triumphal games.]
Then, too, marks of youth pervade the substance of the book. The
questionable witticisms might perhaps be attributed to an attempt to
relieve the strain, but there is an unusual amount of Homeric imitation,
and inartistic allusion to contemporaries which, as in the youthful
_Bucolics_, destroys the dramatic illusion. Thus, Vergil not only dwells
upon the ancestry of the Memmii, Sergii, and Cluentii, but insists upon
reminding the reader of Catiline's conspiracy in the _Sergestus, furens
animi_, who dashes upon the rock in his mad eagerness to win, and
obtrudes etymology in the phrase _segnem Menoeten_ (1. 173). One is
tempted to suspect that the whole narrative of the boat-race is filled
with pragmatic allusions. If the characters of his epic must be connected
with well-known Roman families, it is at least interesting that the
connections are indicated in the fifth book and not in the passages where
the names first meet the reader. Does it not appear that the body of the
book was composed long before the rest, and then left at the poet's death
not quite furbished to the fastidious taste of a later day?
Finally, I would suggest that the strange and still unexplained[8] omen
of Acestes' burning arrow in 11.
Pages:
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85