Page:The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, Volume 1, 1854.djvu/48

 38 Journal of Philology. was fiercely assailed by Memmius, at that time Praetor and at deadly feud with him. It is not unlikely that in these pointed verses the poet alludes to Caesar's army, and that in the words, I. 42, Nee Memmi clara propago Talibus in rebus communi desse saluti, he refers to Memmius' opposition to Caesar and Clodius the tool of the triumvirs. I. 271, surely portus should be read for cortus with the Flor. MS. xxxv. 31 ; and vi. 237 : usque adeo pellens fervore, instead of tellens, " continually beating upon it with its heat." Lachmann's pollens is hardly so suitable, and differs more from the MSS. n. 2G7, I should read conquiri for conciri: I have above given other instances of the confu- sion of q and c. i. 657, I do not hesitate to read Sed quia multa sibi cernunt contraria nasci; the MS. reading muse or mu t shews that the word was somewhat obliterated, and supposing the final i to have been lost, the other letters would at once in- terchange. The MS. reading of vi. 550 is very corrupt, Nee minus exultant es dupuis cumque vim; there is no doubt that Lachmann rightly substitutes viai for vim ; but et ubi lapis for the other corrupt words is much less likely, and to me indeed hardly intelligible ; for surely Lachmann means tecta to be the nomina- tive to exultant, and then the comparison tells you nothing at all. As the rest of the passage is sound enough, it seems not improbable that some unusual word has deceived the copyists ; scrupus would suit the sense, and is near the ductus literarum. " Scrupi dicuntur aspera saxa et difficilia attrectatu," says Festus ; lexicons only give two other instances of its use, one from Cicero in a metaphorical, and one from Petronius in a literal sense: Cum per omnes scrupos traxissemus cruentos pedes; though Servius, ad JEn. vi. 238, also mentions the word ; but Lucretius himself, iv. 523, uses the adjective scruposus, and Virgil scrupeus. The verse must then be completed by adding qua which may have been absorbed in quomque, or perhaps by prefixing ut " when," absorbed in the last two letters of exultant; for as Lu- cretius' contemporaries Cicero and Caesar use ut in this sense, I am not sure that he would not have so employed it once ; Catul- lus and perhaps Virgil JEn. v. 329 use ut for " where." vi. 762, Lachmann's strange Puteis seems to me not to suit the passage, if the word were otherwise allowable ; Lucretius appears to be speaking here, not of the lake Avernus only, but of such places generally. Since / and p are often interchanged, as facto for pacto,