Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 1.pdf/64

 one of the most perfect, the which, after long entreaty, and sometimes threats of Augustus, he was at last prevail'd upon to recite: This fell out about four Years before his own Death: That of Marcellus, whom Cæsar design'd for his Successor, happen'd a little before this Recital: Virgil therefore with his usual dexterity, inserted his Funeral Panegyrick in those admirable Lines, beginning,

O nate, ingentem luctum ne quære tuorum, &c.

His Mother, the Excellent Octavia, the best Wife of the worst Husband that ever was, to divert her Grief, would be of the Auditory. The Poet artificially deferr'd the naming Marcellus, till their Passions were rais'd to the highest; but the mention of it put both Her and Augustus into such a Passion of weeping, that they commanded him to proceed no further; Virgil answer'd, that he had already ended that Passage. Some relate, that Octavia fainted away; but afterwards she presented the Poet with two Thousand one Hundred