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MOST of the late Mr. Conington's friends and pupils will remember his lectures on Persius, which were perhaps the most generally popular of all that he gave during his tenure of the chair of Latin at Oxford, owing to the sympathetic humour with which he caught the peculiar force and flavour of his author's manner, as well as to the nerve and spirit of his translation. The lecture prefixed to the commentary and translation now published was among the first-fruits of his professorial labours. I have no means of knowing how far he considered it a final exposition of his views on Persius; but its interest and merit are such that I need not, I am sure, apologize for having it printed exactly as it was delivered. The commentary and translation were written for delivery as lectures. For this purpose they were left pretty nearly complete; but some references had to be filled in, and many, I found as I went on with the revision of the notes, required correction. I verified and corrected a great many for the first edition, and for the second edition I have examined a considerable number more which I had previously taken on trust. A fresh revision of the commentary has convinced me that Mr. Conington would not have considered it complete as a written work, nor is it always possible to know how he would have finally decided in doubtful cases of

reading or of interpretation, or in what form he would have put the last touch to the less finished portions. I have, in several instances, added to the notes a reference to works now recognized as of standard authority, which had not appeared at the time when the commentary was written. Some parallel passages and illustrations I added for the first edition, and have increased their number for the second, enclosing all additions in square brackets [ ]. At the end of the volume are printed a few notes written since the sheets were sent to press. The references to Lucilius, Lucretius, Catullus, and Propertius have been altered (where necessary) to suit Lucian Müller's, Munro's, Ellis', and Paley's editions respectively.

The text adopted by Mr. Conington as a basis for his notes was Otto Jahn's of 1843. In 1868, however, Jahn published a new text, which differs in many places from his earlier one. I do not know how far, if at all, Mr. Conington would have followed him in his alterations, and have therefore been guided by the translation in fixing the reading to be adopted where doubt would have arisen. It will thus be found that the present text approximates, on the whole, more nearly to Jahn's of 1843 than to that of 1868. Since the first edition appeared I have convinced myself, on further consideration, that in three passages in which I was formerly doubtful Mr. Conington intended to follow the older text: viz. 2. 61, where I have now printed in terras for in terris; 3. 12, where I have restored queritur for querimur; and 5. 150, where the translation seems to require pergant avidos sudare for peragant avido sudore. Some unquestionable inconsistencies between the text and translation, which had escaped my eye amid the labour of revision and collation, have been now removed. The orthography is that of Jahn's edition of 1868.

Mr. Conington collated, or had collated for him, seven MSS.

of Persius, two of which are in the Gale collection in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge. One of these is known as Bentley's Codex Galeanus, and is lettered y by Jahn in his edition of 1843. 'It is,' says Mr. Conington in his description of it, 'a small vellum MS. of the 8vo or 12mo size. It contains Horatii Opera, Persii Satirae, Theoduli Eclogae, Cato de Moribus, and Aviani Fabulae. Collations of the Avianus, the Persius, and the Cato, were published in the Classical Journal, vol. 4, the former at pp. 120 foll., the two latter at pp. 353 foll., by M. D. B. The Persius collation is very scanty and not always accurate: but it appears to be the only one known to Jahn. Mr. Bradshaw refers the MS. to the twelfth or thirteenth century, almost certainly the former.' The other MS. in the Gale collection is referred by Mr. Bradshaw to the ninth or tenth century, and is the most valuable of the seven MSS. collated. It consists of one hundred and ten folios in quires of eight, beginning on the second folio of the first quire, and contains Fuvenalis Satirae 1. Annotatio Cornuti 93, Persii Satirarum Proemium 94 verso, Persii Satirae 95. 'It appears,' (I quote from Mr. Conington) 'to be written throughout in the same hand, the glosses being written in a much smaller character. The only doubt is about certain glosses on the margin of the first four pages of the Persius (fol. 94 verso to fol. 96), where the letters are tall and thin, not, as generally, broad and flat. The characters, however, appear to be the same. There are other glosses, apparently written at the same time as the text and in the same hand, some between the lines, some towards the margin, evidently earlier than those just spoken of, which in one place leave a space in the middle of a line for an intrusive word of the earlier gloss written out of the straight line. These earlier glosses are much less copious than the later : they extend, however, somewhat further, to folio 98, the end

of Sat. 1, after which they almost disappear, scarcely averaging one in a page.' The chief peculiarity of the writing of this MS. (which I have myself collated with Jahn's text of 1868) is the shape of r, which is so formed as to be easily confused with n. I initial is often written tall, so that in Sat. 4. 35 it is not at first sight easy to decide whether the reading is in mores or hi mores. As regards orthography, this MS. is much freer from mistakes than the MS. of Juvenal bound in the same cover and apparently written by the same hand, in the tenth satire of which I found such misspellings as gretia for Graecia, canicies for canities, contentus for concentus, sotio for socio, and thomatula for tomacula. This confusion between c and t is almost unknown to the MS. of Persius: patritiae (Sat. 6. 73) being perhaps the only instance of it. In Sat. 1. 116, however, it is difficult to make out whether the scribe has written muti or muci. The chief confusions of consonants which this MS. exhibits are between b and p (obtare for optare, rapiosa for rabiosa): between

g

and gu (pingue for pinge, longuos for longos): between s and ss (ammisus, asigna for amissus, assigna: cassiam, recusso for casiam, recuso, etc.): between m and mm, p and pp, c and cc (imitere for immittere, ammomis for amomis, suppellex for supellex, quipe for quippe, peccori for pecori, etc.) Among the vowels, a and are occasionally confused, as centurianum, Salones for centurionum, Solones: so with o and u (fumusa, furtunare for fumosa, fortunare; sopinus, conditor for supinus, conditur): to say nothing of the interchange, common in such MSS., of ae and e, y and i. The monosyllabic prepositions are almost invariably joined with their nouns (etumulo, inluxum, etc.) and sometimes even assimilated. The same is often the case with monosyllabic conjunctions (cumscribo, noncocta, sivocet, etc.). In words compounded with in, the preposition is sometimes assimilated, sometimes not; thus we find inprimit, inprobe, conpossitum by

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