"Huge as Hispulla: scarcely to be slain
But by the stoutest servant of the train." Badham.
[780] Clitumnus was a small river in Umbria flowing into the Tinia, now "Topino," near Mevania, now "Timia." The Tinia discharges itself into the Tiber near Perusia. Pliny (viii., Ep. 8) gives a beautiful description of its source, now called "La Vene," in a letter which is, as Gifford says, a model of elegance and taste. Its waters were supposed to give a milk-white color to the cattle who drank of them. Virg., Georg., ii., 146, "Hinc albi, Clitumne, greges, et maxima taurus victima." Propert., II., xix., 25, "Quà formosa suo Clitumnus flumina luco Integit et niveos abluit unda boves." Sil., iv., 547, "Clitumnus in arvis Candentes gelido perfundit flumine tauros." Claudian., vi., Cons. Hon., 506.
[781] Ignis. Grangæus interprets this of the meteoric fires seen in the Mediterranean, which, when seen single, were supposed to be fatal. Plin., ii., 37, "Graves cum solitarii venerunt mergentesque navigia, et si in carinæ ima deciderint, exurentes." These fires, when double, were hailed as a happy omen, as the stars of Castor and Pollux. "Fratres Helenæ lucida sidera," Hor., I., Od. iii., 2; cf. xii., 27. The French call it "Le feu St. Elme," said to be a corruption of "Helena." The Italian sailors call them "St. Peter and St. Nicholas." But these only appear at the close of a storm. Cf. Hor., ii., seq., and Blunt's Vestiges, p. 37.
[782] Poetica tempestas.
"So loud the thunder, such the whirlwind's sweep,
As when the poet lashes up the deep." Hodgson.
[783] Pictores. So Hor., i., Od. v., 13, "Me tabulâ sacer votivâ paries indicat noida suspendisse potenti vestimenta maris Deo." It seems to have been the custom for persons in peril of shipwreck not only to vow pictures of their perilous condition to some deity in case they escaped, but also to have a painting of it made to carry about with them to excite commiseration as they begged. Cf. xiv., 302, "Naufragus assem dum rogat et pictâ se tempestate tuetur." Pers., i., 89, "Quum fractâ te in trabe pictum ex humero portes." VI., 32, "Largire inopi, ne pictus oberret cæruleâ in tabulâ." Hor., A. P., 20, "Fractis enatat exspes navibus, ære dato qui pingitur." Phæd., IV., xxi., 24. Some think that this picture was afterward dedicated, but this is an error.
[784] Castora. Ov., Nux., 165, "Sic ubi detracta est a te tibi causa pericli Quod superest tutum, Pontice Castor, habes!" This story of the beaver is told Plin., viii., 30; xxxvii., 6, and is repeated by Silius, in a passage copied from Ovid and Juvenal. "Fluminei veluti deprensus gurgitis undis, Avulsâ parte inguinibus causâque pericli, Enatat intento prædæ fiber avius hoste," xv., 485. But it is an error. The sebaceous matter called castoreum (Pers., v., 135), is secreted by two glands near the root of the tail. (Vid. Martyn's Georgics, i., 59, "Virosaque Pontus Castorea," and Browne's Vulgar Errors, lib. iii., 4.) Pliny, viii., 3, tells a similar story of the elephant, "Circumventi a venantibus dentes impactos arbori frangunt, prædâque se redimunt."
[785] Bæticus. The province of Bætica (Andalusia) takes its name from the Bætis, or "Guadalquivir," the waters of which were said to give a ruddy golden tinge to the fleeces of the sheep that drank it. Martial alludes to it repeatedly. "Non est lana mihi mendax, nec mutor aëno. Si placeant Tyriæ me mea tinxit ovis," xiv., Ep. 133. Cf. v., 37; viii., 28. "Vellera nativo pallent ubi flava metallo," ix., 62. "Aurea qui nitidis vellera tingis aquis," xii., 99.
"Away went garments of that innate stain
That wool imbibes on Guadalquiver's plain,
From native herbs and babbling fountains nigh,
To aid the powers of Andalusia's sky." Badham.
[786] Urnæ. Vid. ad vi., 426. Pholus was one of the Centaurs. Virg., Georg., ii., 455. Cf. Stat., Thebaid., ii., 564, seq., "Qualis in adversos Lapithas erexit inanem Magnanimus cratera Pholus," etc.