by Ritter for his edition, and by Usener for Keller and Holder. It is assigned by Ritter and by Usener to the 9th century. It forms part of a quarto volume, which contains also Servius' Commentary on Virgil, two Treatises on Rhetoric, Bede's History, and Ovid's Metamorphoses. It is imperfect, omitting all the Epistles and the Satires, with the exception of the first two and part of the third of Book I, besides large portions of the Odes. The Odes are not arranged in their usual order, the copyist having apparently started with the intention of an arrangement according to metres, for he begins with nineteen Sapphic Odes. These follow the common order, though the distinction of Books is not marked. They are succeeded by some of the Epodes, then by the Carm. Sec., then by the remaining Odes and Epodes, also in their usual order. The Ars Poet. 1-440 follows the Epodes, then Sat. 1. 1, 2 and part of 3. The omissions in the Odes and Epodes are as follows:-of whole Odes in Book I, Odes 3-7, 9, 11, 33 and 34; in Book III, Ode 3; and of Book IV, Odes 3 and 15, besides parts of twenty-one more Odes and Epodes, viz. Odes 1. 10. 14, 1. 15. 20–32, 1. 16. 15–28, 1. 17. 15, 16, 1. 19. 11-13 and 15, 1. 29. 7-16, 2. 7. 19–28, 2. 17. 7-9, 3. 2. 2, 5-12, 17-32, 3. 4. 17-28, 39-52, 3. 6. 11-13, 15-48, 3. 16. 7-27, 29-44, 3. 22. 5-8, 3. 23. 12-20, 3. 24. 30-64, 4. 14. 5-52; Epodes 2. 37-70, 3. 9-22, 9. 13-38, 11. 13-28. 3. Of the 10th century the following MSS. have been collated for Keller's edition : (a) A. Paris, 7900. This has been held by Otto Jahn and others to belong to the century before. With it Holder closely connects a MS. known as a, formerly belonging to Avignon, now in the Ambrosian Library at Milan (No. 136), which he has collated for the Satires and Epistles. I had the opportunity of inspecting it for a few hours, and have taken account of its readings in some of the more disputed passages in the Odes. Paris, 7971, like the old Bernese, a relic of the Fleury Library. Paris, 7974. The common readings of this and the last MS. are Paris, 7972. (7) Leyden MS, which was one of which Bentley made use. This is marked 1. Paris, 7973, belonged, like B and y, to Pierre Daniel. Paris, 10310. Holder seems to put this MS. rather later, and to attribute less value to it. Zurich. Carol. 6. With this Holder connects a MS. (D) of about (D) the same age, which was in the library of Strasburg, and perished in the recent siege. Keller has given, at the end of vol. i, a list of its most important readings in the Odes 1, 2 and 3. I, 2. (Orelli's S) St. Gall. To these Keller and Holder add a Paris MS. (7975) of the 11th century, to which they both attribute high value (y). Of the 10th century also is the MS. in Queen's College, Oxford, a collation of which is given at the end of this volume (Reg.). It has been already suggested, that the only method by which conclusive evidence upon questions of disputed reading could be gathered from MSS. of such late date, would be by grouping them in families. or 'recensions,' each family being made by its common readings to bear witness to some archetype of much greater antiquity than the copies which we now possess. This has been attempted by Keller, and with more completeness by Holder1. A and a, λ and 7, 4 and √, as we have seen, have been supposed to be severally related in this way, and the readings of their imagined archetypes are indicated by Holder by the signs A', X', F. With his fuller apparatus criticus' on the Satires and Epistles, the process is carried still further, and the result is, to the extent that uniform readings can be obtained, a certain number of conjecturally restored MSS. of the 7th and 8th centuries. These and the other solitary representatives of older MSS. are again. grouped into three classes. The first of these is distinguished as containing, with many faults of carelessness, and with a certain number of grammatical corrections The Prolegomena to Keller and Holder's critical edition of Horace (Teubn. 1864 and 1868) are still to Their general conclusions are to be found, as regards Keller, who is come. b responsible for the Odes and Epodes, in the Rhein. Mus. vol. xix, p. 211-227; as regards Holder, who undertakes the Satires and Epistles, in the Preface to vol. ii. (e. g. 'videri,' against the metre in Epod. 16. 14), little or no proof of alteration on rhetorical or general grounds. In this class Holder places, of the MSS. named above, A, a (in respect of most readings), D, y, and, though not on an equality with these, T. The second class is supposed to show the corrections of an early and intelligent emender. That such dopeoraí existed in early times is stated by the Pseudo-Acron on Ars Poet. 345. And the name of one is found in the inscription which appears, in slightly different terms, at the end of the Epodes in λ, 7, Reg., g. 'Vettius Agorius Basilius Mavortius V. C. et inl. (vir clarissimus et inlustris) Excom. Dom. excons. ord. (Excomite Domestico, exconsule ordinario) legi et ut potui emendavi, conferente mihi magistro Felice oratore urbis Romae.' Felix is not known, but Mavortius was consul in the year A.D. 527. Asterius, consul 494, is similarly connected with the history of the text of Virgil. Bentley had treated this Mavortian recension as the ultimate point to which the oldest MSS. might be expected to take us back. Holder treats it rather as the first, though not the worst, source of systematic corruption. In the class which he thinks owe their peculiarities to this editing, he places B, V, with g, and in respect of some of their readings, A, a, and λ, the first two of these being in respect of much of their text affiliated to class one, the third to class three. The third class (in which rank F ( = ø4), λ′ ( = λl), u, ñ, σ, and others) is held to be of less value, both as having been derived, in the first instance, from more faulty originals, and as bearing signs of later and less intelligent correction. These conclusions are based upon such an elaborate study of the MSS. that it is impossible to criticise them in the absence of the full explanation and detailed evidence which are still promised. But it may be observed that the tie which is imagined between the MSS. which are classed together is confessedly a loose one. Room is left for considerable influence of MSS. of one class upon those of another. As a fact, there are very few cases indeed of doubtful reading where the division of testimony corresponds at all exactly to the three classes. Doubtless there are a few crucial passages where the value which is set on such MSS. as V or B goes far to decide the choice of a reading, and there must be more cases still where the instinctive feeling of the trustworthiness of particular MSS. on particular points which comes from long intercourse with them, but which no‘apparatus criticus' will convey to a reader, has guided Keller or Holder to a conclusion which the mere inspection of the list of MSS. on one side and the other hardly explains. But a survey of the places where Keller's readings of the Odes and Epodes differ from that of other recent editors will show, I think, that his theory of the relation of the MSS. has not had any very revolutionary effect upon his text, that he admits conjectures at least as largely as others, and that his conclusions, however they were formed, are supported generally by evidence from the Scholia or quotations, or by considerations of style, metre, and the like1. Before we leave the MSS. it may be the place to say a few words upon two subjects which present themselves very early to the reader of any notes upon Horace. 1. The first has been glanced at already. I do not know that conjectural emendation has really been exceptionally busy upon Horace's text. That the two are specially associated in the minds of general readers is due doubtless, in a great measure, to their greater familiarity with the author, to the brilliancy of the conjectures themselves, the contributions of a long series of the greatest scholars from the Renaissance onwards, particularly perhaps to the unrivalled power, learning, and eloquence with which our greatest English scholar recommended the method and its results in his edition of the poet. There was something however in the nature of the critical evidence on which Horace's text rests which made conjectural emendation, if not specially necessary, at least specially tempting. Necessary of course it was not in the sense in which it is necessary in the text of Aeschylus or of Lucretius, to restore sense or metre in a chaos; but in a way the multiplicity of MSS. tempts us to do for one author what the poverty of MSS. almost compels us to do for another. A variety of readings, all consistent with metre and intelligible, and all resting on fairly equal MS. testimony, must imply the hand of one or more emenders of the text at an early period. It is a natural interpretation to assume in such a case that all alike are attempts, 1 Deducting questions of orthography, punctuation, etc, there are thirty-seven places in the Odes and Epodes where Keller's text differs from that of both Ritter and Mr. Munro. Of these nine are due to his introduction into the text of conjectures (Od. 1. 7. 8 'honore,' 1. 15. 36 Pergameas,' 1. 16. 5 'adyti,' 1. 23. 5. 6 vepris . ad ventum,' 3. 5. 15 trahenti,' 4. 4. 17 Raetis,' 4. 10. 5 'Ligurine,' Epod. 2. 27 'frondes,' 5. 87 humana invicem '). Eleven are cases where readings resting on very slight MS. authority, or even upon none, have been received on other grounds, such as the ... authority of the Scholia, etc. (Keller, Od. 1. 3. 37 arduum,' 1. 16. 8 ∙ si,' 1. 20. 10 tum,' 1. 22. 2 Mauri,' 1. 22. 11 'expeditus,' 2. 3. 11' quo et,' 2. 6. 19 'fertilis,' 3.3.55 debacchantur'; Ritter and Munro, 1. 17. 14 hic,' 2. 13. 23 'discretas, 3. 4. 10 'altricis '). There are very few of the remainder where the effect of his view of the MSS. can be distinctly detected in the absence of other arguments from the Scholia, or from internal evidence; such are perhaps 1. 8. 2 hoc,' 3. 21. 10 necgleget,' 4. 9. 31 sileri,' Epod. 16. 33 'flavos,' 17. to 'proderit.' more or less skilful, to fill up a gap in the original authority; and this once believed, a scholar of the 16th or 17th centuries may not unreasonably think himself as competent to guess the riddle as a scholar of the 4th or 5th. It is manifest that no impassable barrier separates cases where the MSS. are divided from those where they are consentient. Division is only a sign of the disease. We have already seen that it is confessedly possible for the same blunder to infest every MS. A modern editor will probably set aside, as a rule, purely conjectural emendations; at any rate, he will hesitate to give them the reality which is implied by printing them in the text; not because he denies the possibility of corruptions, or does not feel the plausibility of many conjectures, but only because experience has taught us that there is no necessary limit even to the cleverest and most plausible guessing, and because it cannot be proved that in such a text as that of Horace guessing on a large scale is necessary. One more remark may be allowed. An editor with the feelings which I have described will yet feel bound to recall, and to some extent to discuss, the more famous conjectures which have become part of the literary history of his author, and in doing so he will run the risk, at times, of seeming to treat great names ungraciously. It must be remembered therefore that to have learnt to distrust a method is not to deny the genius of those who used it, and who, by showing us its results at its best, have taught us the limits of its capability. The solid value of Bentley's edition is diminished very little, if at all, by the fact that very many of his conclusions are such as we cannot now accept with any confidence or even accept at all. There is hardly a question in Horatian exegesis that is not raised by him, and raised, if at times in a form rather more logical than befits the criticism of a poet, yet always with a precision and strength, as well as with a fulness of knowledge, which at least (and it is an editor's chief function) makes us understand and measure the difficulty. 2. To the constructive criticism of previous centuries has been added in the present one the destructive criticism of which the chief examples are to be found in the edition of H. Peerlkamp (Harlem, 1854; Amsterdam, 1862) and in the work of Gruppe, Minos: über die Interpolationen in den römischen Dichtern, Leipzig, 1859. This, like the former, proposes to carry us back beyond the age of MSS. or Scholia unlike the former, it cannot even appeal to indications of disturbance in the MSS. which would explain, if they did not require, its theories. The antecedent probability of defects in the archetype wrongly filled up cannot be denied in the face of evidence that such |