36. IMMENSVM GLORIA CALCAR HABET. The same metaphor at Tr V i 75-76 'denique nulla mihi captatur gloria, quaeque / ingeniis stimulos subdere fama solet', EP I v 57-58 'gloria uos acuat; uos, ut recitata probentur / carmina, Pieriis inuigilate choris', and Hor Ep II i 217-18 'uatibus addere calcar / ut studio maiore petant Helicona uirentem'.
Immensum seems rather strange; I have found no good parallel for it.
37. HIC MEA CVI RECITEM ... CARMINA. A constant complaint of Ovid in exile. Compare Tr III xiv 39-40 'nullus in hac terra, recitem si carmina, cuius / intellecturis auribus utar, adest', Tr IV i 89-90, and Tr V xii 53 'non liber hic ullus, non qui mihi commodet aurem'. Perhaps it is significant that Ovid does not complain in the present passage that he has no books available: certainly he must have had a substantial library at hand when he composed the Ibis.
38. BARBARVS HISTER. The same phrase in the same position (leaving space for the disyllable) at EP III iii 26 'et coit astrictis barbarus Hister aquis'.
Hister was the name of the lower course of the Danube (Pliny NH IV 79). Ovid uses the metrically convenient Hister fifteen times in the Ex Ponto, as against two instances only of Danuuius (IV ix 80 & x 58).
38. OBIT Damsté HABET codd. In support of obit Damsté cited x 22 'gentibus obliqua quas obit Hister aqua' (Mnemosyne XLVI 32). As Professor R. J. Tarrant points out, the only meaning that can be attached to quasque alias gentes barbarus Hister habet is 'the other people that live in the Danube'; he compares Her VI 135-36 'prodidit illa patrem; rapui de clade Thoanta. / deseruit Colchos; me mea Lemnos habet' and Aen VI 362 (Palinurus speaking) 'nunc me fluctus habet'. EP III ii 43-44 'nos ... quos procul a uobis Pontus et [uar barbarus] Hister habet', cited by Lenz in support of habet, is not a good parallel in view of the different subject (Pontus et Hister instead of Hister alone).
Lenz cited Tr II 230 'bellaque pro magno Caesare Caesar obit' for a variant habet; Professor Tarrant cites another instance of the corruption at Met I 551-52 'pes modo tam uelox pigris radicibus haeret, / ora cacumen obit'.
39. MATERIA = 'means' (OLD materia 8).
41. NEC VINVM NEC ME TENET ALEA FALLAX. The same statement at EP I v 45-46 'nec iuuat in lucem nimio marcescere uino, / nec tenet incertas alea blanda manus'. For Ovid's temperance, compare EP I x 30 'scis mihi quam solae paene bibantur aquae'.
Me tenet in the present passage should perhaps be translated 'holds my attention' (OLD teneo 22) rather than 'attracts' (Wheeler).