Q. Horatii Flacci Carminum Ieiber IV. Edited, with Notes, by
T. E. Page, M.A. (Macmillan and Co.)—Mr. Page shows us that there is still something to be done for Horace, after all the labour which commentators almost without number have bestowed upon him. More than once he finds an usage or a construction, an antithesis or an allusion, which has been missed, or not adequately noted by his predecessors. In iii., 68, the mood of contuderit ("neque res bellica Qaod regam tumidaa contuderit mina, ostendet Capitolio") requires notice, though it can scarcely be de- scribed as " very difficult," an expression which would have been more appropriate, if the poet had used the indicative of a purely hypothetical and conceptive reason. In ix., 49-52, the antithesis between " pains leto fiagitinm timet, non ille pro earls amiois et timidus perire," is well pointed out. In xi., 4, 5, the indicative fulges might have been noted, seeing that Phyllis was not actually wear- ing, but was to wear, the ivy, of which Horace has, he tells her, a good store. Mr. Page would have made the construction of ix., 1 ("ne forte credos," &a.) clearer, if he had told his readers how the me ought not to be taken. It is only too possible that, in the face of his summary and note, a boy may take it as = ne credideris. Possibly it might be well to substitute a comma for the colon at the end of the stanza. We should certainly do so in xii., 21-4, after poculis :— " Cam tuts
Velox moms veni : non ego to male Immunem meditor tingere poculis Plena dives at in domo ;' .
otherwise, the dives might be taken with the subject of veni. We cannot accept the suggestion that plurimum should be taken with nentus, in ii., 29-31,— "Grata carpentis thyme per laborem Plurimum circa nemu.s uvidique Tibnris ripas ;" per laboreni standing for " laboriously " without an adjective does not sound right. But we have no serious fault to find with Mr. Page's edition, but on the contrary, believe it to be a work of very considerable merit, the outcome of a scholarship that is ingenious, as well as accurate.
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