B. THOROUGHNESS IN SCHOLARSHIP, RESULTING IN PART FROM THE INFLUENCE OF SUCH GERMAN SCHOLARS AS BECKER,—BECKER’S “GALLUS”
We have made some mention of the scholarship of German writers; the Germans were not the only classical scholars whose influence is important in our study, but in some cases made an exceedingly thorough study of the private life of the Romans, and the effect of this is seen upon the English novel of Roman life. An exceedingly careful attention to minute details in the study of the private life of the Romans is seen in the work of Professor W. A. Becker in Gallus, or Roman Scenes in the Time of Augustus, published in Leipsic (1838). This is not a novel at all, though it contains some connected material in the form of fiction. The importance of Becker’s Gallus in its effect upon the novel of Roman life, has been overemphasized by pedantic schoolmen; but it served to show English scholars the necessity for absolute exactness, even to the most minute details, in all matters pertaining to the study of the private life of the Romans. Becker is not in any sense to be considered a pupil of Scott, though his work was published shortly after the world had read the last of Scott’s novels. But Becker showed later German followers of Scott how it was possible to present with minute accuracy the life of the Romans; and these German historical novelists who thus portrayed Roman life, had an important influence upon the English novel of Roman life, as has been suggested in connection with Canon Farrar’s Darkness and Dawn. In Gallus, which we have said is not a novel, Becker says (in the Preface), “His original intention was to produce a systematic handbook, but finding this would lead to too much brevity and curtailment, and exclude altogether several minor traits, ... which were highly necessary to a complete portrait of Roman life, he was induced to imitate the example of Bottiger and Mazois, and produce a continuous story, with explanatory notes on each chapter. Those topics which required more elaborate investigation, have been handled at length in Excursus.” The “continuous story” which Becker chose was that of “Cornelius Gallus, a man whose fortunate rise from obscurity to splendor and honor, love of Lycoris, and poetical talents, render him not a little remarkable.” The author tells the story of Gallus, wherever possible, absolutely in accordance with history. He cites as his sources for this personal history Dio Cassius, Strabo, Suetonius, Vergil, Propertius and Ovid. He says further that “the Augustan age is decidedly the happiest time to select,” for a portraiture of Roman manners, since for the study of Roman private life of that period there is abundant source-material. He says that “apart from the numerous antique monuments which have been dug up, and placed in museums, our most important authorities on Roman private life are the later poets, as Juvenal, Martial, Statius: then Petronius, Seneca, Suetonius, the two Plinys, Cicero’s speeches and letters, the elegiac poets, and especially Horace. Next come the grammarians and the digests; while the Greek authors, as Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Plutarch, Dio Cassius, Lucian, Athenaeus, and the lexicographers, as Pollux, still further enlighten us.” In his careful citation of sources, and careful choice of what were the best sources, Becker pointed the way for all those who wrote of Roman life, whether they wrote in the form of the novel or not. He succeeded in making his work what he wished it to be, “a desirable repository of whatever is most worth knowing about the private life of the Romans.” Moreover, while Becker’s work does not pretend to be a novel, and is far too learned and ponderous to be called a novel, he unconsciously aided later writers of the novel of Roman life by showing them what a mistake it would be to overcrowd such a novel with details of Roman private life. At the same time they might derive some profit from Gallus as a model of accuracy in such matters. Becker’s work was a step in the proof of the fact that the later novel of Roman life must be accurate and precise in matters of scholarship. It is true that Bulwer had done somewhat the same thing that Becker claims to do in Gallus, but Becker’s meticulous regard for detail, while showing English novelists what to avoid, also aided them to a more full appreciation of the necessity for absolute accuracy, even in matters of small importance.