6. Sauromatas Getasque] 'between the Sauromatae and Getae.' The Getae were the inhabitants of Dacia, which was not subdued by the Romans until A.D. 101. The Sauromatae were a tribe near the southern shores of the Maeotis Palus (Sea of Azof).

10. Apollinea arte] i.e. the art of medicine. Apollo was the god of medicine as well as song, and was father of Aesculapius.

12. narrando] 'by telling stories.'

14. subit] occurs to my mind,' see 5, 34 and index.

15. vincis] 'you are of more importance.'

16. plus parte] 'more than half.'

19, 20. quin etiam sic...ut...] Nay more, they say that I never wandered in my speech without your name being on my lips in my delirium.

loqui aliena, 'to speak beside the purpose,' i.e. deliriously.

sic...ut] Lit. only in such way that your name was, etc.' They may be translated by though' and 'yet.' Cf. Cic. ita eras lupercus ut consul esse meminisse deberes, though you were a lupercus yet you should have remembered that you were a consul.'

21. "Even if I were dying, and my tongue were cleaving to the roof of my mouth.'

23. 6 Suppose some servant were to announce that his mistress had come.'

dominam] 'my wife.'

24. vigoris]' of recovered strength.'

XXI

[The excessive hardness of the winter at Tomi here described by Ovid is unlike what we know of its climate. However, it is said that the cold in Bulgaria is at times much greater than would be expected from its latitude; and Ovid may have experienced an unusually hard winter, and at the same time be willing to paint everything in the worst possible colours. He gives precise details which certainly have the appearance of personal experience: especially he notices the fact mentioned

in 49, 50, of fishes retaining their vitality when embedded in ice, which Mr Church points out Ovid was not likely to know except from personal observation. It is somewhat remarkable that Virgil, who could only know by report, describes this neighbourhood in much the same language. Georg. 3, 349-383. 3. prior, altera] 'the snow of the previous year,' a second fall.'

4. bima] 'two years old.'

5. commoti]' when it has begun to blow a storm,' lit.' has been set in motion.'

7. pellibus et sutis braccis] with skins and sewn trowsers,' means 'with trousers of sewn skins:' like maculis distinctus et auro, which is the same as maculis aureis distinctus. The trowsers here meant are what are called braccaé laxae (Oúλako) * loose trowsers,' not breeches fitting close. Elsewhere Ovid says Pellibus et laxis arcent mala frigora braccis. Look out braccae in Dict. of Antiquities.

11. nuda...vina] By the 'wine standing naked' Ovid means that it will stand without the covering of the jar, from which it can be taken out in a frozen mass and set up on end.

12. nec hausta meri sed data frusta] 'and they swallow not portions of wine drawn out, but bits handed to them.' Grammatically frusta belongs both to hausta and data, but for the sense some such word as pocula must be understood with hausta. Cf. Virgil, G. 3,

caeduntque securibus humida vina.

13. concrescant] are frozen over.'

14. fragiles aquae] 'water that can be broken' (instead of poured), i. e. ice.

15. papyrifero amne] i. e. the Nile. The papyrus no longer exists in the Nile.

17, 18. Hister] The Danube is never now frozen over at its mouth, though higher up stream it is. tectis aquis] 'with its waters covered in by ice.' caeruleos latices] its blue waters.' The colour of the Danube is well known.

21. perque novos pontes] 'and over novel bridges,' i. e. of ice.

22. Sarmatici] Sarmatia and Sarmaticus are used in a general sense to include all the tribes on the north shore of the Black Sea.

24. ratam debet]

for fides see on 7, 2.

a witness ought to have firm credit:' The only 'interest' Ovid can have had in exaggerating these details is to move compassion for himself in Augustus, and secure his recall or at least a change in his place of exile.

25. pontum] i. e. the Black Sea. The harbour of Odessa and others in the Black Sea are blocked in winter now, but not those in the neighbourhood of Tomi.

26. lubrica testa] 'a slippery shell,' a coating of ice.

27. durum calcavimus aequor] 'I have trodden on the sea which was all hard beneath my feet.'

29, 30. Leandre] Leander was drowned while swimming across the Hellespont to Abydos to visit Hero. Mr Church gives the following version of this couplet :

'Had such, Leander, been the sea

That flowed betwixt thy love and thee,

Never on Helles' narrow strait

Had come the scandal of thy fate.'

30. angustae crimen aquae] 'a charge against the narrow strait,' i. e. of having drowned Leander. So in 1, 13 Cacus is called Aventinae infamia sylvae.

31. pandi delphines] 'curly dolphins.' For pandi, cf. pandus asellus.

34. obsesso gurgite] 'on the flood hemmed in with ice.' 37, 8. pisces haerere ligatos] 'fish imprisoned in ice.' It is true that fish thus embedded will long retain life.

40. redundatas flumine aquas] 'the waters which overflowed from the river,' see 9, 8.

41. aequato] 'made a level surface of ice.'

42. invehitur] 'rides down upon us.' invehi is middle, and has a participle invehens.

47. stridentia]' creaking.'

51. hamatis] 'barbed.' Ovid elsewhere has arundo hamata. Anything crooked may be called a hamus, among other things the barbs of an arrowhead.

52. tinctile]' smeared on them,' or 'in which they are dipped' (tingere).

54. hostica] lit. by the invader.'

XXII

1. finitimis armis] the wars of the neighbouring tribes." Cf. 20, 6.

3. quod] sc. carmen.

5. obsto] stand up against.

6. taedia] disgust,' i.e. that I do not commit suicide. 7,8. gratia] 'Thanks to you, my Muse!' Ovid means that the writing of poetry has been his one consolation and employment; it has kept him from suicide, made him forget Tomi, and given him the enjoyment of fame in his lifetime. So Coleridge says, 'Poetry has been to me its own exceeding great reward: it has soothed my afflictions; it has multiplied and refined my enjoyments, it has endeared solitude.'

10. in medio Helicone] on mid Helicon,' i. e. on the Mount of the Muses. See on 17, 39.

By the Muses taking him from the Danube and placing him on mid Helicon, Ovid means that in his poetical pursuits he forgets the dreary neighbourhood of the Danube.

11. vivo] 'while still alive.'

13. detrectat] 'detracts from.' iniquo] 'hostile.'

14. de nostris] sc. operibus.

18. plurimus legor] 'I am read by a very great number of people,' or perhaps the greatest number of any poet.' As a man might boast now-a-days of having the largest circulation. 20. ut] though.'

21, 22. favore...iure] by partiality,'...' deservedly,' ablatives of manner.

carmine] by means of my poetry,' the ablative of the effective cause.

grates ago] 'I thank.' Grates is only plural and is seldom found except in nom. and accus.