cuite, et en plâtre. Les artistes anciens, ainsi que font les nôtres travailloient ces modeles avec l'ébauchoir, comme on le voit à la figure du Statuaire Alcamene sur un petit bas-relief de la Villa Albani. Mais ils se servoient aussi des doigts, et particulierement des ongles, pour rendre de certaines parties delicates, et pour imprimer plus de sentiment à l'ouvrage. C'est de ces touches fines que parle Polyclete, lorsqu'il dit que la plus grande difficulté dans l'execution ne se manifeste que quand la terre se niche sous les ongles. "Orav Ess ονυχα ὁ πιλος, ἀφεκιται. Du reste, ce passage n'a pas été entendu par les savans, et quand François Junius le traduit par, cum ad unguem exigitur lutum, il ne répand pas plus de jour sur la sentence du Statuaire Grec. Le mot ὀνυχίζειν, ἐξονυχίζειν; paroit désigner les dernieres touches que sculpteur donne à son modele. Ce modele des artistes s'appelloit xívraßes. C'est à ces derniers coups d'ongles donnés au modele, que se rapporte l'expression d'Horace ad unguem factus homo, et ce que le même Poëte dit dans un autre endroit, perfectum decies non castigavit ad unguem. Il me semble que ni ces deux passages Latins, ni l'expression Grecque, n'ont jamais été entendus. On voit qu'on peut appliquer ces façons de parler à la derniere main donnée aux modeles avec les ongles des doigts. Les anciens nomment pareillement le pouce, lorsqu'il est question de la manoeuvre des figures de cire.

Exigite ut mores teneros ceu pollice ducat

Est si quis cera vultum facit.

M

Juv.

Ver. 55.

et pallentis grana cumini.

Cuminum. This plant grows to the height of eight or nine feet in hot countries. In our hot-beds it seldom exceeds three or four. It is planted in considerable quantities in the island of Malta, and the seed is sold for propagation to the inhabitants of other countries. The ancients put this spice into their wine; and those, who drank it thus mixed, were remarkable for their paleness. Pliny observes, Omne cuminum pallorem bibentibus gignit,

Wine sometimes produces this effect bibentibus without the aid of Cumin spice.

Ver. 57.

bunc alea decoquit: ille

In Venerem putret.

Dryden translates this,

"One bribes for high preferment in the state,

A second shakes the box, and sits up late:

Another shakes the bed, dissolving there,

Till knots," &c.

Risum teneatis?

Next let us hear the gentle Brewster.

"This Spark the frail comsuming die devours;
While that dissolves away in loose amours."

Is it the Spark who devours the die, or the die which devours the Spark? If the former, I wish the young gentleman a good digestion. But if it be the die, which devours the young gentleman, as I suppose it is, I have yet to learn, what, in the name of nonsense, is meant

by a frail consuming die. As for the paralytic line which follows, it is so miserably feeble, as really to claim compassion. A ballad writer would be ashamed of the rhyme..

Ver. 60. Tunc crassos transisse dies, lucemque palus

trem.

I do not understand lucemque palustrem, as it is generally translated gloomy light. I rather think, that Persius alludes here to the luminous vapours, which are seen during the night to exhale from fens and bogs, and which are said to mislead the unwary traveller. The sense of this verse then, and of the subsequent, will be: "Then they lament, that they have journeyed through life in darkness and error, with no other light than the treacherous ray of the nocturnal vapour-then, when too late, they regret their past life so much, as even to mourn, that there is any more of life to spend."

This is the word to which I allude in my Preface. It is not pure Latin, but of Spanish or African origin. There is indeed the Greek word naveos, which signifies the corner of the eye; but from which we cannot derive canthus, as Quintilian pronounces it barbarous.

Ver. 79. Marcus Dama, &c.

The ceremony of making a slave free was very short.

The prætor turned him round, laid his wand on his head, and said, hunc esse liberum volo. Forthwith the new man strutted out of the prætor's house with the cap of liberty on his head; and giving himself a prænomen, was saluted by this new appellation as he passed through the streets. It is for this reason, that Persius repeats so often the name of Marcus. But these were not all the advantages which accrued to the novus homo-His name was enrolled in one of the tribes; and upon his producing a ticket, which had been given to him on his manumission, he was entitled to his share in all public distributions of meat and corn, &c.

Ver. 82. Hæc mera libertas! hoc nobis pilea donant! I have rather imitated, than translated Persius in this passage:

O sacred Liberty! O name profaned!

Are thus thine honours, thus thy rights obtain'd? No, 'tis not wealth which lifts the soul to thee, Nor yet thy cap, which makes its wearer free! Brewster has rendered this verse in his usual style:

"A sample here of perfect freedom see;

Thanks to our caps, they make us charming free.” If such versification as this can get a man reputation, I must say that Fame played Sir Richard Blackmore a sorry trick, when she sounded his name through the postern.

Ver. 86. Stoicus hic, aurem mordaci lotus aceto.

The expression of Persius is entirely figurative; and if translated literally into another language (where the metaphor is not employed) would be unintelligible. Ausonius says,

Scillite decies si cor purgeris aceto.

I do not understand Persius, as most of his commentators do. I think, he means the Stoic's acuteness of intellect, and not the severity of his morals. The sense is "here you infer falsely, says the Stoic, whose understanding has been rendered acute, and quick in the perception of truth, by the severe application and constant exercise which he had given his mind."

Ver. 87. Hoc reliquum accipio; licet illud, et ut volo, tolle.

The sense is," I admit, that all who have the power to live as they please, are free; but I deny that you have power, and I still deny that you are free."

that

Ver. 88. Vindicta, &c.

Cicero says, si neque censu, neque vindicta, nec testamento, liber factus est, non est liber.

Ver. 90.

si quid Masuri rubrica notavit.

Masurius was a lawyer, who made a digest of the Roman laws about the time of Tiberius.

Dryden is not inaccurate, when he says, that the text