[2] 'Multa satis lusi.'—lxviiia. 17. The context shows that the 'lusi,'—like Horace's 'lusit Anacreon,'—refers to the composition of amatory poetry founded on his own experience. It was for this kind of poetry that Manlius had applied to him, and he pleads his grief as an excuse for his inability to write any at that time, although he had written much in his earliest youth.
[3] E.g. xvi. 12; liv. 6.
[4] Martial iv. 14,—
Sic forsan tener ausus est Catullus
Magno mittere passerem Maroni.
Ibid. xi. 6. 16,—
Donabo tibi passerem Catulli.
[5] B. Schmidt conjectures that the collection as we now have it was made after books were generally written in parchment. His whole collected poems would thus be more easily enclosed in a single volume, than when written on the old papyrus rolls.
[6] Three poems formerly attributed to Catullus,—those between xvii and xxi,—are now omitted from all editions. On the other hand, one poem, lxviii, must, in all probability, be divided into two, and possibly some lines now attached to others are parts of separate poems.
[7] Cf. B. Schmidt, quoting Bruner, Prolegomena, p. xcviii.