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Pauperis et tuguri congeftum cefpite culmen,
Poft aliquot mea regna videns mirabor aristas?

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and the roof of my poor cottage. formed of turf, and my own 70 realms after fome years?

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following manner; "As the Poet "has already faid indefinitely, longo "poft tempore, it is a contradiction

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to add after fome years, which "contracts the expreffion to a fhort " and in a manner definite time. "For if it is never, and not after a "long time, how can it be after "fome years? Befides this expref"fion, many beards are paft, for

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many fummers, feems to be parti "cular and filly; just as if any one "fhould fay many clusters are paft, "for many autumns. Nor am I at "all moved by the authority of "Claudian, who uses decimas emen→

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fus ariftas for decem annos. There"fore Germanus will have the par "ticle poft to fignify only the order "of time, which makes the fhep"herd to speak thus; Shall I ever "wonder at only a few fraggling "beards appearing in my once flourish"ing field? As if he should say, "Shall I never, nor after a long "time, feeing the borders of my 66 country, feeing the roof of my poor cottage thatched with turf, feeing my realms, wonder at the appear"ance of only a few fraggling "beards? Or more clearly, Shall I never be allowed the fmall fatif faction, hereafter to fee, hereafter to wonder at the deformity of my "field? For he prefumes, that he "fhall never return to the borders "of his country, to his roof, to his "realms; and therefore fhall never "wonder at the thinnefs of his This explication is con

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roofs of houfes were called culmina
because they were thatched with
ftraw (culmus). Meliboeus defcribes
the meanness of his cottage, by re-
prefenting it as covered with turf.
70. Poft aliquot . . . . ariftas.]
Servius, and moft others interpret"
after feveral years; taking it for
rural expreffion, ufing beards of
n for harvefts, and harvefts for
ars. La Cerda rejects this inter-
retation, and declares himself a
llower of the learned Germanus,
hofe opinion he supports in the

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corn.

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Shall the impious foldier poffefs Impius haec tam culta novalia miles habebit ? thefe fo well cultivated fields ?

NOTES.

"firmed by the three following verfes; in which the fhepherd "complains, that his fields and ❝ cultivated lands will be deformed

by the impious foldier, and his 66 corn wafted by a Barbarian, "which is nothing elfe, than that only a few ftraggling beards will <remain. For what elle can be ex"pected, when the fields are in the ❝ poffeffion of a foldier and a Bar"barian?" To thefe objections may be answered, that there is no contradiction between after a long time and after fome years. Surely Surely any man may call fome years of ba nishment, with the lofs of his eftate a long time. That Meliboeus does not fay he fhall never fee his country, or he fhall not fee it after a long time; but makes a queftion whether he fhall ever be permitted to return; at the fame time expreffing fome little hope, that it may come to pass, as was obferved in the note on ver. 68. That there is no impropriety in ufing beards for years, it being very natural for a countryman to measure time by harvests. The beards are a very confpicous part of the bearded wheat, which was the only fort known to the Roman husbandmen. Hence we very frequently find arifta put for the corn itself, as in the first Georgick,’

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Chaoniam pingui glandem muta"vit arifta."

And

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and nothing is more frequent among the Poets, than to ufe fummers and years promifcuoufly. In the laft place, that it feems more harfh, to understand aliquot ariftas to mean the bad husbandry of the foldiers to whom the lands were given, than to take poft aliquot ariftas for post aliquot annos. Ruaeus is willing to fancy poft ariftas to be used in the fame manner, as tu poft carecta latebas in the third Eclogue; and to be a defcription of the lands of Meliboeus, whofe farm confifted of a few acres, adjoining to a poor little cottage, the roof of which was fo low, as hardly to appear above the tall corn, and therefore it might be

Ne gravidis procumbat cul- faid to lie hid among the beards or 66 mus ariftis:"

behind them, poft ariftas. I cannot

help

Barbarus has fegetes? En quo difcordia cives
Perduxit miferos !' en queis confevimus agros!
Infere nunc, Meliboee, pyros, pone ordine vites:
Ite meae, felix quondam pecus, ite capellae.
Non ego vos pofthac, viridi projectus in antro,
Dumofa pendere procul de rupe videbo.

a. Barbarian these lands? &e: wbitber difcord bas brought bur miferable citizens! See, for whom we bave foron these fields! Now, Meliboeus, in

75 graft your pears, and plant your

Carmina nulla canam: tion, me pafcente, capellae rock, whilst I repose myself in the muffy cave. No more fhall I fing:

NOTES.

help being of Dr Trapp's opinion, that this interpretation is frangely abfurd.

71. Novalia.] See the note on ver. 71. of the firft Georgick.

72. Barbarus has fegetes.] Heinfus, as he is quoted by Burman, feems to approve of a different pointing in this and the preceding verfe ;

Impius haec tam culta novalia miles

habebit

Barbarus? has fegetes!

73, Perduxit.] Pierius found perduxit in the old Vatican, and Lombard manufcripts, and produxit in the Roman, Medicean, and fome other manufcripts. Heinfius, and after him. Burman reads produxit, but perduxit, is the common, and most approved reading.

En queis confevimus agros.] Pietius fays it is his nos confevimus agris in the Roman manufcript, and highly approves of this reading. Burman obferves, that it is confevimus in Stephens's edition of Pierius, which Mafvicius made ufe of; but that it is confuevimus in the Brefcia edition, which indeed feems to agree better with what Pierius fays, than confevimus. Catrou contends vehemently for confuevimus instead of confevi

Vines in rows. Go, my goats, go my once bappy cattle,

all no more fee you afar off, banging down from the bufpy no more, my goats,

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mus, and accordingly translates thefe words Malheureufes compagnes que l'habitude nous avoit rendu fi chères. For this reading he depends upon the authority of an edition printed at Bafil in 1586. But Burman obr ferves, that the expreffions ufed in the Bafil edition are all copied from Pierius, without owning his name.

74. Infere nunc. This is an "ironical apoftrophe, of Meliboeus "to himself, wherein he expreffes "his indignation at his having be"ftowed fo much vain labour in "cultivating his gardens and vines "for the use of Barbarians. Nunc "is a particle adapted to irony. "Thus Juvenal,

"I nunc, et ventis vitam com"mitteRUAEUS.

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fball you pluck from my band Florentem cytifum et falices carpetis amaras, the flowering cytifus, and bitTIT. Hic tamen hanc mecum poteris requiefcere noctem

ter willows.

TIT. But yet you may reft bere this night with me

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other examples of noctem being used in like manner in the accufative cafe; as in the fourth Georgick,

At illa

"Flet noctem."

In the firft Aeneid,

"In faciem illius noctem non am"plius unam

"Falle dolo.".

And in the fifth,

"Complexi inter fe noctemque diemque morantur.'

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In like manner we find the accufative plural in the third Aeneid,

"Erramus pelago totidem fine fi "dere noctes."

And in the fixth,

Noctes atque dies patet atri janua "Ditis."

And,

In the Milan editions of 1481 and 1539, the Paris editions of 1541 and 1600, the old London edition by Pynson, and in the Antwerp edition of 1543, it is bac nocte. The fame reading is acknowledged alfo by Robert Stephens, Ruaeus, and Mafvicius. Guellius, Suffannaeus, Aldus, Pulman, La Cerda, Heinfius, Cuningam and Burman, read hanc noctem, which I find alfo in the Venice edition of 1562, and in the And in the ninth, printed copy of the Medicean. Hanc noctem feems to be the best reading, as it expreffes an invitation to ftay "diesque the whole night. We have feveral " Urgebam.

"Veftibulum infomnis fervat noctefn que diefque."

cr

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Tibi quam noctes feftina

Poteris.

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