[28] In his preface to the Eclogues.
[29] Page 248. Cf. also tua Maecenas haud mollia iussa, G. iii. 41.
[30] Ascraeumque cano Romana per oppida carmen, G. ii. 176.
[31] The words Ille ludere quae vellum calamo permisit agresti (Ecl. i. 10), might seem to contradict this, but the Eclogues were of a lighter cast. He never speaks of the Georg. or Aen. as lusus. So Hor. (Ep. i. 1, 10), versus et cetera ludicra pono; referring to his odes.
[32] Hor. A. P. 218.
[33] See G. i. 500, sqq. where Augustus is regarded as the saviour of the age.
[34] We have observed that except Lucretius all the great poets were from the municipia or provinces.
[35] The tenth; imitated in Milton's Lycidas.
[36] In its form it reminds us of those Epyllia which were such favourite subjects with Callimachus, of which the Peleus and Thetis is a specimen.
[37] Said to have been uttered by Cicero on hearing the Eclogues read; the rima spes Romae being of course the orator himself. But the story, however pretty, cannot be true, as Cicero died before the Eclogues were composed.