the history of the poet's early development, but as a poem possessing in some passages at least real artistic merit. The Ciris was not yet completed at the time when Vergil reached the momentous

rved in the republican army of Brutus and Cassius in 43-2. In it Vergil begs pardon for sending a poem of so trivial a nature at a time when his one ambition is to describe worthily the philosophic system that he

on of authenticity, see, C

cylla, the daughter of Nisus, however, was driven by Juno to fall in love with Minos, her father's enemy; and, to win his love, she yields to the temptation of betraying her father to Minos. The picture of the g

tigia primis egreditur ferroque manus armata bidenti evolat: at demptae subita in formidine vires caeruleas sua furta prius testantur ad umbras. nam qua se ad

d and shivering girl, folds her in her robe, an

nis rorantibus oscula figens persequitur miserae causas exquirere tabis. nec tamen ante ullas patitur sibi reddere voces, marmoreum tremebunda pedem qua

ious though somewhat unpracticed art. Carme tries in vain to dissuade the girl, and must, to calm her, promise to aid her if all other means

ginis et placidam tenebris captare quietem inverso bibulum restinguens lumen olivo incipit ad crebros (que) insani pectoris ictus ferr

rl is captured by Minos-in true Alexandrian technique the catastrophe comes with terrible speed-and she is led, not to marriage, but to chains on the captor's galley. Her grief is expressed in a long soliloquy somewhat too reminiscent of Ariadne's lament in Catu

atrox magno stridore per auras insequitur Nisus; qua se fert Ni

lines occur again in t

fore the blow, the battle of passions that preceded the final act. We notice also in these new poems a preponderance of feminine characters. These the masculine democracy of classical Athens had tended to disregard, but in the capitals of the new Hellenistic monarchies, many influential and brilliant women rose to positions of power in the society of the court. A poet would have been dull not to respond to this influence. This new note was of course one that would immediate

al of the plot. Action might frequently be assumed as known and relegated to a significant line or two here and there. The scenic setting, the individual traits of the heroes

er, and sufficiently elastic to provide space for sentiment and pathos. In his sixty-eighth poem Catullus employs what might be called a geometrical pattern, in fact a pyramid of unequal steps. He mounts to the central theme by a series of verses and descends on the other side by a corresponding series. In the sixty-fourth poem, however, the epyllion which the author of the Ciris clearly had in mind, Catullus used an intricate but by no means balanced form. The poem opens with the sea voyage of Peleus

led to keep his pledge to the maiden. In the midst of the tale, Carme suspends the action by a long reference to Minos' earlier passion for her own daughter, Britomartis, which caused the girl's destruction, but the lament in which this story is disclose

: indeed it is as reminiscent of the former as it is prophetic of the latter. The spondaic

eus, cui semper

sembles Catullus: both to a certain extent distrust the trochaic pause. Its yielding quality, however, brought it back into more favor in various emotional passages of the Aeneid; but there it is carefully modified by the introduction of masculine stops before and after, a nuance which is hardly sought after in the Ciris or in Catul

tc. Giessen, 1914; Rand, Harvard Studies, XXX, p. 150. The introduction which was written last is more reminiscent of Lucretius. On the ques

Cornificius, who employed the same methods. It was from this group, not from Homer or Ennius, that Vergil learned his verse-technique.

yle that threatened to lead to preciosity. What he kept, however, was of permanent value. The new poetry, which had emerged from a society that was deeply interested in science, had taught Vergil to observe the details of nature with accuracy and an appreciation of their beauty. It had also taught him that in an age of sophistication the poet should not hide his personality wholly behind the veil. There is a pleasing self-consciousness in the poet's reflections-never too obtrusive-that reminds one of Catullus. It implies that poetry is recognized in its great role of a criticism of life. But most of all there is revealed in the Ciris an epic poet's first timid probing into the depths of human emotions, a striving to under

lines, indeed whole blocks of its lines with a freedom that cann

les, magnum Jo

), so is the familiar ver

ii, ut me malus

neid I

ens ardentia l

ondaic unelided li

tri et Nept

t that the process of re-using began even in the Eclogues[4] shows that he had decided to reject the poem as early as 41 B.C. A reasonable explanation is near at hand. Messalla, to whom the poem was dedicated, joined his lot with that of Mark An

achmann, Hermes

very line he had written that each might readily fall into the pattern of his new compositions without leaving a trace of the joining. Critics who have tried the t