Liber in adversos hostes stringatur Iambus, It may be worth while to remark, i wapódy, that Milton, in forty-one Latin scazons, has fallen into twenty-three mistakes; for in nineteen instances he uses the spondee, and in four instances he uses the anapast, in the fifth place before the final spondee. This licence is admitted into Greek scazons (vid. Hephæst. p. 17. Ed. Pau.) but never into Latin. We shall give the words of Terentianus Maurus: Sed quia jugatos scandimus pedes istos, See P. i. 263. Mattaire, Corp. Poet. Avantius and Fabricius, in their dissertation upon the metre of Seneca, prefixed to Schroeder's edition of the Tragedies, give one instance of a scazon with an anapæst in the fifth place. Cum Dardana tecta Dorici raperent ignes. L. 612. Agamemnon. But they are mistaken: for the true reading is raperetis. The verse occurs in a chorus of Monostrophics. It is an iambic trimeter hypercatalectic, and follows a troch. trim. hyperc. Here we should have an additional instance of the resemblance between Greek and Roman verse; for if Dardana be the true reading, two syllables of the second foot are in the first hyperdissyllabic word, where the foot is an anapast. Now Dawes, in the fifth section of the Miscellanea Critica, maintains, that in Greek or Latin iambics the ictus rhythmicus falls on the last syllable of iambics, spondees, and anapæsts, and on the penultimate of Dactyls and Tribrachs admitted into lambic verse: avrina μára is, we believe, an exception in Greek; but the rule certainly holds good in the tragic and comic writers among the Greeks, and in Terence. Let us pursue this subject a little further: Avantius and Fabricius tell us, that in Seneca there are only two instances of the scazon iambus, and that these two occur in the Agamemnon : Cum Dardaua tecta Dorici raperent ignes, Fatale munus Danaum traximus nostra. It has been already observed, that the true reading in the former line is raperetis, and that the verse, therefore, ceases to be a scazon, and becomes an iamb. trimet. hypercat. Now in the text of Seneca the second line is thus read, Danaumque fatale munus duximus nostra. Here the metre is corrupt. It is of little consequence whether we read traximus with Avantius, or duximus with Schroeder; but que, which Avantius omits, is necessary to the construction. The transposition of one word will restore the Danaumque munus duximus fatale nostra. metre, Here we must observe, that lines 611 and 612 correspond to lines 626 and 627: in each instance we have a trim. troch. hypercat. followed by a trim. iamb. hypercat. In the earlier part of this note, we said Terence, because Mr. Dawes, who had corrected Andr. Prol. 23. and Eunuch. 2. 2. 23. says, (p. 212. Ed. Burgess,) "Nullus dubito quin pauca admodum, quæ hodie apud Terent. contra repræsentantur, ad axpíßurav a Græcis servatam sint exigenda; præsertim cum levi ubique manu fieri possit." We shall not for the present controvert the position But upon further consideration we abandoned our opinion, and we think that upon the meaning about Terence; but we deliberately omitted the name of Plautus, and we shall now justify that omission by a series of examples, in which Plautus has not conformed to the rule which Dawes affirms to have been observed by Terence. Hanc fabulam, inquam, hinc Juppiter hodie ipse aget. Prologue to Amphitryo, v. 94. Ita mihi videntur omnia, mare, terra, cœlum consequi. Amphit. Act 5. Sc. 1. v 3. Cum que in potestate habuimus, ea amisimus. Captiv. A. 1. S. 2. v. 40. Oculorum præstringat aciem in acie hostibus. Mil. Glor. A. 1. S. 1. v. 4. We know that with very little trouble we could collect more instances from Plautus; but those which we have adduced are sufficient to show that implicit credit is not to be given to Dawes, when he tells us, without any qualification, "Nec vero in accentuum ratione vel comicis Latinis majorem permitti licentiam mihi persuasum est." (p. 212.) From the very imperfect state in which the fragments of Pacuvius, Afranius, Accius, and other old dramatic writers have come down to us, it is often difficult to speak with confidence upon the structure of their verse; but in justice to Mr. Dawes, we must state that, with one or two doubtful exceptions, their general practice is strictly conformable to his opinion. We shall ever admire the sagacity of Dawes in his remarks on the Greek writers; and our ears are exquisitely sensible of the effect which their delicacy and correctness must have produced upon an Athenian audience: hence, with the exception mentioned above to aurina páλa, we shall admit the canon of Dawes, and recommend it, if recommendation be necessary, to the Editors of Greek dramatic writers: "Severiores Musas coluisse video poetas Atticos quam quæ in vocis hyperdissyllabæ ultimam correptam accentum cadere paterentur." (P. 211. Misc. Crit.) The ground of this practice, as we have above remarked, was a canon laid down in p. 190, where Dawes tells us: "In metris iambicis iambi, spondei, et anapæsti in ultimam, tribrachi, et dactyli, in mediam -- ictus cadit." Our ears are prepared for accuracy in the iambics of the older writers, Solon, Simonides, &c. though the recitation of their verses was not accompanied with music. But, when we consider the gradual changes which have been introduced into the iambic measure of the Greeks, and even of the pronunciation of the language, we must feel some degree of surprise, as well as delight, that even in compositions not dramatic, the canon of Dawes was génerally observed for so many ages. To those who take an interest in these metrical questions, and admire, as we do, the discernment of Dawes, the following references made in support of what he has just now said on the long continued practice of the Greeks, will not be unacceptable. See the iambics of Solon, vol. i. p. 73. and of Simonides, p. 124. the scazons of Aischrio, p. 189. the iambics of Phædimus, p 261. the scazons of Theocritus, p. 381. 382. and his iambics, p. 380. the trimeter catalectics of Phalecus, p. 421. the iambics of Philippus, vol. ii. p. 216. 219. 221. of Heraclides, p. 261. of Pallas, p. 420. 422. 430. of Comætas, vol. iii. p. 16. In the inscriptions, p. 26. 27. 29. 30. the verses of Leo, p. 128. 199. 130. the ἀναθήματα, p. 140. the ἐπιγράμματα ἀδέσποτα, p. 245. 248. 256. 263. 266. 267. 278. 281. 286. 289. 300. 301. 314. the αἰνίγματα, p. 320. 394. 332. To the foregoing passages, which are to be found in Brunck's Analecta, may be added the dimeter trochees of Archilochus, p. 42. vol. 1. corrected by Brunck; the iambics trimeter ibid., the tetrameter trochaics ibid. p. 43. In of Horace light may be thrown from Terentianus Spondeon, et quos iste pes esse creat, carm. 16. Brunck properly corrects the 7th line, by reading av for va he leaves the 8th line uncorrected; but for tidλov we must read ivάλov, and for op, opiv. See also trochees of Archilochus in carm. 18. p. 44, iambics, p. 45. 46. 47. The learned reader must be well aware, that some of the passages, to which we have referred in Brunck's Analecta, were written when the pronunciation of the Greek language was very corrupt, and when the ordinary rules of the iambic verse were either not known or not understood. Yet, amidst all these corruptions, and all that ignorance, the Greek writers were led by their ear not to let what Dawes calls the metrical ictus fall upon the "ultimam correptam vocis hyperdissyllaba." No scholar will be displeased with us for extending our references to verses, which are scattered over the Bibliotheca Græca of Fabricius. See Emanuelis Philes Iambi Sepulchrales in Phacrasen, p. 542. vol. x. Ed. Hamburgi, 1721. the Carm. of Eman. Phile, in Obitum G. Pachymeras, p. 1719. vol. x. the verses erroneously ascribed to Pisidas, p. 477. vol. i. the Sphæra Empedoclis, p. 478. where in the 4th line we must read yováσs for yovúacı, though in the 37th line the writer uses yovú as necessary to the verse. many Greek iambics, from p. 28. to p. 30. in the first Dissertation of Leo Allatius de Libris Ecclesiasticis Græcorum, published at Hamb. 1712. and inserted by Fabricius in vol. 5. of Bibl. Gr. See a Menologia in p. 64. of the same Dissertation. See Eman. Phile de Animalibus, from p. 697 to p. 709. and his See gaμμara, from p. 710 to p. 715. See also the verses of Joannis Geometræ, p. 716. and Joannis Mauropi, p. 718 to p. 722. vol. vii. See Jenesius, p. 622. vol. vi. and Heliodori Carmen de Chrysopoeia, p. 790 to p. 797. We really do not mean to make any ostentatious parade of references, or quotations; but we were anxious to impress very strongly upon the minds of our readers that property of the iambic verse, which, amidst so many and so gross corruptions of it in other respects, was still preserved in the point which Dawes had the merit of reducing to rule. He would not have been displeased to find, that his own remark upon the Attic writers of the Drama was capable of being extended to so many ἰαμβόγραφο in other kinds of poetry. Admiscuerunt, impari tamen loco. Pedes frequentant, lege servata tamen. Nam nullus alius ponitur, tantum solet Ovid, indeed, calls the Iambic celer in contradistinction to the scazon. But Horace uses citus of the pure Iambic verse, as distinguished from the more slow verses, which the tragic writers adopted, and into which spondees were admitted in the 1st, 3d, and 5th places. It is somewhat remarkable, that, according to the schema trimetrorum Senecæ, drawn up by Avantius, the iambic in the fifth place occurs only nine times, and the tribrach thrice. The spondee, generally, and sometimes an anapæst, are used in that part of the verse. By an error, we suppose, of the press, a dactyl is put in the Metrical Table, for the anapæst. Mr. W. p. 124. of the Geor. corrects a word in line 113. 6th Sat. B. 1. Fallacem circum vespertinumque pererro See Mattaire, Corp. Poet. vol II. p. 1261. For vespertinum he reads vespertinus: we think this correction far more probable than that of Markland, on the 16th Epode, where he proposes vespertinum for vespertinus, and quotes the very line which Wakefield here would alter. As to the sition of que, no objection can be drawn from it against Mr. W.; for Horace writes, po Ore pedes tetigitque crura. parvi me quodque pusilli To the learned reader no apology is necessary for the introduction of the conjectures which we have found in Mr. Wakefield's third part of the Silva Critica, and in his edition of the Georgics. Dr. C. does not profess to have consulted them, and therefore he is not to be blamed for omitting what is contained in them. But the good wishes we have for the Var. Ed. induce us to say that we should have been happy to find this labour anticipated. The Georgics were published in 1788, and of course the observations contained in them might have been somewhere inserted in the Var. edit. The third part of the Silva Critica appeared in 1792, and as the Var. edit. was then far advanced, Dr. C. might have thrown together Mr. W.'s conjectures at the end of his edition, which came out in the winter of 1793. Dr. C. does not mention in his catalogue the conjectures upon Horace, which are to be found in Mr. Markland's edition of the Silva of Statius. But in conformity to our principle of bringing forward supplemental matter to the Variorum edition, we shall lay before our readers the substance of what Mr. Markland has written about Horace, in the work above mentioned. B. iii. Od. xxiii, v. 7. Markland, in his aut dulces alumni Pomifero grave tempus anno. Statius, p. 35, reads, pomi feri anni. Tempus pomiferi anni, says he, ut tem |