I AM glad to be able at last to publish the first volum edition of Virgil. At the time of its commencement, in had, as the public are aware, the advantage of being associa another editor, the distinguished friend to whom I have satisfaction of inscribing it. In 1854 he was called to othe which removed him from Oxford, while they engrossed h and I had to continue the work alone., Those who know be able to feel how much he might have contributed to the tion of an author one of whose chief characteristics is his sul cacy of expression, and who requires in those who would ap him, not only the power of an analytical critic, but the sympa practised master of the Latin language. Even as it is, this owes not a little to Mr. Goldwin Smith's assistance. The E

the first two Georgics, and a part of the third we read t The notes on the latter part of the first Georgic, the whol second, and the early part of the third, were, to a cons extent, prepared by us in concert for publication: those first five Eclogues are based on some which he composed self: and many passages in both poems have since been between us. The editorial responsibility is however entire and I have exercised it freely with reference to the materia

from a divided editorship, though it is also conceivable cations of this kind may have arisen from changes in nion, such as it is no less natural to expect in the cours tracted work.

...

This very delay, I am well aware, is a circumstance be considered to require apology. I can only hope transient glance at the contents of the present volun that the production of it must necessarily have been time. It does not profess, indeed, any more than the tions of the Bibliotheca Classica, to be a work for the result of elaborate original research. No manuscripts consulted in the formation of the text: a very large po notes may be found in the commentaries of others. light thing to comment on nearly 3000 lines, line b where the materials of the note: are taken from oth Much too depends on the style in which a commentary I have in general studied brevity of expression, abri tations which might have been given in extenso, and a thought which might easily have been pursued. lines of type will often represent the employment o Before I knew the actual nature of the work, I fanci edition of the whole of Virgil, such as I proposed, mig pleted in two or three years: I can now only wonder a perience which suggested the thought.

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My custom has been to take every line as it came befo and ask myself whether I thoroughly understood it; an process has often led me to entertain difficulties which h previously made themselves felt. Some of these I have co think of importance: others a little consideration has suffi dispel but it seemed worth while to endeavour to preclu latter no less than the former. I have not in general des furnish information of a kind which is to be found in Lexic in the. well-known Dictionaries of Antiquities, Biograph Mythology, and Geography. With regard to the last-named however, my practice has not been very consistent: I ha quently referred the reader to them, and as frequently left rces. | refer himself. I trust, however, that this awkwardness h been productive of any serious inconvenience.

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The essays which I have ventured to introduce in differen of the volume are intended in one way or another to illustra literary peculiarities of Virgil's poems. Possibly they m found interesting on their own account, as, with the signal tion of Colonel Mure's unfinished work, our language is sing deficient in sketches of the history of classical literature. as elsewhere, I have written rather for learners than for sch I have sought to popularize what already exists in less acc forms. Two of these essays, those introductory to the Ed and the Georgics, have been substantially delivered as pub

examination of their apparatus criticus. My only a has been my friend Mr. Butler's collation of the Ca in the Bodleian Library-a source which, if it has no with new readings, has occasionally furnished addit for those adopted on other authority. It is greatly t that of the four MSS. which appear to be generall possessing paramount claims to consideration, the fr Vatican, the Roman, the Palatine, and the Medicean, first and fourth, have been satisfactorily collated thro third in particular is supposed to be the source of variations, which, introduced apparently by Commel 1589, for a long time took possession of the common country-variations which in many cases cannot be by any theory of trans-scriptural confusion, and mus supposing the authority of the recensions to be equa or rejected on their intrinsic merits. A critical edi has for some time been announced by Otto Ribbeck and careful editor of the Fragments of the Roma Comic Poets; and though his theory of the comp Eclogues, about which I have spoken elsewhere, induc that I should not always agree with his judgment, look forward with great interest to the result of Meantime I have not unfrequently referred to the tra Medicean MS. published by Foggini (Florence, 17 find that the need of doing so has been almost s Heyne and Wagner's apparatus. After all, it wou

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་ལ་པ 33

less confusion which unskilful transcribers have introduced in text of other authors. The more important MSS., thoug always accurate representatives even of their own recension ply each other's defects: the less important may in gener passed over entirely. The need of critical conjecture is a wholly removed. There are, perhaps, only two instances present volume where the text has been disturbed withou external authority. The one is in Eclogue 7, v. 54, where' qu has been substituted for 'quaeque,' with Heinsius and m the subsequent editors: the other is in Eclogue 8, v. 76, ted for following Jahn, I have enclosed in brackets, it being merel dingly burden of the pastoral song, which the structure of the compo ecepte shows to have been repeated once too often. Such exce -Virgil may fairly be said to prove the rule against which they m

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6

The orthography which I have followed is in general th Wagner's small edition. The notes, I fear, may occasiona found to present a discrepancy, especially in the spelling 'is'o in certain accusatives plural. I hope the English reader's in will not be revolted by the spelling Vergilius,' which seems whole to have the best authority. There seemed no choice adopting it, as Forbiger has done, in Georgic 4. 563; and being so, it would have been mere deference to prejudice tain the common spelling in the title and headings. I am