[20.] A malevolent old Poet)—Ver. 7. He alludes to Luscus Lanuvinus, or Lavinius, a Comic Poet of his time, but considerably his senior. He is mentioned by Terence in all his Prologues except that to the Hecyra, and seems to have made it the business of his life to run down his productions and discover faults in them.
[21.] Composed the Andrian)—Ver. 9. This Play, like that of our author, took its name from the Isle of Andros, one of the Cyclades in the Ægean Sea, where Glycerium is supposed to have been born. Donatus, the Commentator on Terence, informs us that the first Scene of this Play is almost a literal translation from the Perinthian of Menander, in which the old man was represented as discoursing with his wife just as Simo does here with Sosia. In the Andrian of Menander, the old man opened with a soliloquy.
[22.] And the Perinthian)—Ver. 9. This Play was so called from Perinthus, a town of Thrace, its heroine being a native of that place.
[23.] Nævius, Plautus, and Ennius)—Ver. 18. Ennius was the oldest of these three Poets. Nævius a contemporary of Plautus. See a probable allusion to his misfortunes in the Miles Gloriosus of Plautus, l. 211.
[24.] The mystifying carefulness)—Ver. 21. By “obscuram diligentiam” he means that formal degree of precision which is productive of obscurity.
[25.] Are to be taken care of, I suppose)—Ver. 30. “Nempe ut curentur recte hæc.” Colman here remarks; “Madame Dacier will have it that Simo here makes use of a kitchen term in the word ‘curentur.’ I believe it rather means ‘to take care of’ any thing generally; and at the conclusion of this very scene, Sosia uses the word again, speaking of things very foreign to cookery, ‘Sat est, curabo.’”
[26.] To be my freedman)—Ver. 37. “Libertus” was the name given to a slave set at liberty by his master. A “libertinus” was the son of a “libertus.”
[27.] As it were a censure)—Ver. 43. Among the Greeks (whose manners and sentiments are supposed to be depicted in this Play) it was a maxim that he who did a kindness should forget it, while he who received it should keep it in memory. Sosia consequently feels uneasy, and considers the remark of his master in the light of a reproach.
[28.] After he had passed from youthfulness)—Ver. 51. “Ephebus” was the name given to a youth when between the ages of sixteen and twenty.
[29.] And a master)—Ver. 54. See the Notes to the Translation of the Bacchides of Plautus, l. 109, where Lydus, a slave, appears as the “pædagogus,” or “magister,” of Pistoclerus.