"Then all December's revelries refuse,
And give the festive moments to the Muse." Gifford.
[360] Acta legenti. Either the "notary public," or "keeper of the public records," or the historian's reader, who collected facts for the author, or "any one who read aloud the history itself."
[361] Russati. Cf. ad vi., 589. So the charioteer of "the white" was called Albatus. Lacerna, or Lacerta, was a charioteer in the reign of Domitian, some say of Domitian himself. One commentator takes Lacerna to be "any soldier wearing a red cloak;" as Paludatus is "one wearing the general's cloak." Cf. Mart., xiii., Ep. 78, "Prasinus Porphyrion."
[362] Consedere. Cf. Ov., Met., xiii., 1, "Consedere duces; et, vulgi stante corona, Surgit ad hos clypei dominus septemplicis Ajax." Cf. ad xi., 30.
[363] Bubulco." Before some clod-pate judge thy vitals strain." Badham.
[364] Palmæ. Cf. ad ix., 85.
"So shall the verdant palm be duly tied
To the dark staircase where such powers reside." Badham.
[365] Afrorum Epimenia. Most probably alluding to the "monthly rations of onions" allowed to African slaves, who were accustomed to plenty of them in their own country (cf. Herod., ii., 125. Numb., xi., 5), where they grew in great abundance. Martial, ix., Ep. xlvi., 11, enumerates "bulbi" among the presents sent at the Saturnalia to the causidicus Sabellus.
[366] Lagenæ. Mart., u. s. "Five jars of meagre down-the-Tiber wine." Badham.
[367] Aureus. About sixteen shillings English at this time.