"non enim rumores ponebat ante salutem."
Elision played a prominent part in his system. This was natural, since with all his changes many long or intractable terminations remained, e.g. enim, quidem, omnium, &c. These were generally elided, sometimes shortened as in the line quoted, sometimes lengthened as in the comedians,—
"inimicitiam agitantes."
Very rarely does he improperly shorten a naturally long vowel, e.g. contra (twice); terminations in o he invariably retains, except ego and modo. The final s is generally elided before a consonant when in the thesis of the foot, but often remains in the arsis (e.g. plenu' fidei, Isque dies). The two chief blots on his versification are his barbarous examples of tmesis,—saxo cere comminuit brum: Massili portant invenes ad litora tanas (= cerebrum, Massilitanas), and his quaint apocope, cael, gau, do (caelum, gaudium, domum), probably reflected from the Homeric do, kri, in which Lucilius imitates him, e.g. nol. (for nolueris). The caesura, which forms the chief feature in each verse, was not understood by Ennius. Several of his lines have no caesura at all; and that delicate alternation of its many varieties which charms us in Homer and Virgil, is foreign to the conception, as it would have been unattainable by the efforts, of the rugged epic bard. Nevertheless his labour achieved a great result. He stamped for centuries the character and almost the details of subsequent versification. [6] If we study the effect of his passages, we shall observe far greater power in single lines or sentences than in a continuous description. The solemn grandeur of some of his verses is unsurpassable, and, enshrined in the Aeneid, their dignity seems enhanced by their surroundings. Such are—
"Tuque pater Tiberine tuo cum ilumino sancto."
"Unus homo nobis cunctando restituit rem."
"Quae neque Dardaniis campis potuere perire
Nec quom capta capi, nec quom combusta cremari,
Augusto augurio postquam incluta condita Roma est."
On the other hand he sometimes falls into pure prose;
"Cives Romani tum facti sunt Campani,"
and the like, are scarcely metre, certainly not poetry. Later epicists in their desire to avoid this fault over elaborate their commonplace passages. Ennius tries, however clumsily, to copy Homer in dismissing them without ornament. The one or two similes that are preserved are among his least happy efforts. [7] Among battle scenes he is more at home, and these he paints with reality and strength. There are three passages of considerable length, which the reader who desires to judge of his narrative power should study. They are the dream of Ilia and the auspices of Romulus in the first book, and the description of the friend of Servilius in the seventh. This last is generally thought to be a picture of the poet himself, and to intimate in the most pleasing language his relations to his great patron. For a singularly appreciative criticism of these fragments the student is referred to Sellar's Poets of the Republic. The massive Roman vigour of treatment which shone forth in the Annals and made them as it were a rock-hewn monument of Rome's glory, secured to Ennius a far greater posthumous renown than that of any of the other early poets. Cicero extols him, and has no words too contemptuous for those who despise him, Lucretius praises him in the well known words—