Pam.—Oh! that is certain.Simo.—I consent most joyfully.P. Nempe.S. Scilicet.
Pam.—Oh! that is certain.Simo.—I consent most joyfully.P. Nempe.S. Scilicet.
Pam.—Oh! that is certain.
Simo.—I consent most joyfully.
P. Nempe.
S. Scilicet.
Some commentators interpret these words from Pamphilus and Simo, (Nempe and Scilicet,) as a hint to Chremes, respecting the dowry which they expected to receive with Glycera; and think that the actor who personates Simo ought to produce a bag of money, that he may “suit the action to the word.” An ingenious critic, speaking of this vague and fanciful conjecture, observes, as follows: “This, surely, is a precious refinement, worthy the genius of a true commentator. Madame Dacier, who entertains a just veneration for Donatus, doubts the authenticity of the observation, which is ascribed to him.” Certainly, if either of the words could be wrested to such a meaning, it must beNempe, but Terence has represented Pamphilus as a character, so noble, generous, and high-spirited, that we cannot consistently suppose that he would suffer any mercenary considerations to delay for a single moment his acceptance of his beloved Glycera, when offered to him by her father.
NOTE 208.Chremes.—Pamphilus, my daughter’s portion is ten talents.A Table of the Money current in Greece.
Those who wish for complete information respecting the ancient and modernreal money, and money of account, may be fully satisfied by consulting the following writers on the subject.
Augustinus, Arbuthnot, Budæus, Boisard, Bircherod, Bonneville, Bouteroue, Camden, Du Bost, De Asse, Folkes, Fleetwood, Goltzius, Guthrie, Gerhart, Greaves, Hardouin, Joubert, Krause, Kelly, Lowndes, Le Blanc, Locke, Lord Liverpool, Marien, Morel, Mezzabarba, Norris, Occo, Oiselius, Patin, Pinkerton, Ricard, Richebourg, Raper, Simon, Snelling, Souciet, Seguin, Sirmond, Spanheim, Smith, Tristran, Ursinus, Vicus, Vaillant.
NOTE 209.Simo.—Why do you not immediately give orders for her removal to our house?
Grecian women, in the situation in which Glycera is represented to have been, were usually well enough to go abroad in a litter in one day’s time. This topic is introduced by the poet, in order that Davus may be spoken of, and delivered from confinement; because his remaining in prison would have been contrary to the rules of comedy.
NOTE 210.Simo.—Because he is now carrying on things of great weight, and which touch him more nearly.
——Quia habet aliudmagisex sese etmajus.
There is a pun in the original, which I have attempted to preserve in the translation by a circumlocution which I trust on such an occasion will be deemed allowable. The critics remark, that Terence, by Simo’s pleasantry, (videNote 211,) intended to shew that he was thoroughly reconciled to his son. (VideNote 92.)
NOTE 211.
Simo.—He is chained.Pam.—Ah! dear Sir, that was notwell done.Simo.—I am sure I ordered it to bewell done.S. Vinctus est.P. Pater nonrectèvinctus est.S.Haud ita jussi.
The jest in this sentence turns on the wordrectè, which refers to an Athenian custom of binding criminals’ hands and feet together. Simo (A. 5. S. 3.p.86.) orders Dromo to bind Davus in the manner before mentioned: (atque audin’? quadrupedem constringito.) Pamphilus says,nonrectèvinctus est:rectèhas a double meaning, it signifiesrightly, and alsostraight. Simo pretends to take it in the latter sense, which makes his son’s speech run thus,He is not bound straight or upright: to which Simo replies,I ordered he should not be bound straight, but crooked, or neck and heels. I trust I have made the force of this pun clear to the unlearned reader: the turn given it in the English translation is borrowed from Echard.
NOTE 212.
Pam. (to himself.)—Any one would think, perhaps, that I do not believe this to be true, but I know it is because I wish it so. I am of opinion, that the lives of the gods are eternal, because their pleasures are secure and without end.
“Epicurus observed, that the gods could not but be immortal, since they are exempt from all kinds of evils, cares, and dangers. But Terence gives another more refined reason, which more forcibly expresses the joy of Pamphilus; for he affirms that their immortality springs only from the durability of their pleasures. This passage is very beautiful. Pamphilus prefaces what he is going to say by the expression, “Any one would think, perhaps;” this was in a manner necessary to excuse the freedom which, arising from his joy, makes him assign another reason for the immortality of the gods than those discovered by the philosophers, particularly by Epicurus, whose name was still fresh in the recollection of every person, and whose doctrines were very generally received and adopted.”Madame Dacier.
NOTE 213.Pam.—There is now no impediment to our marriage.Nec mora ulla est, quin jam uxorem ducam.
Pamphilus does not mean by this expression, that he was not married before, but that now that he has his father’s consent to his union, he canducere uxorem,lead his wifepublicly to his own house with the usual ceremonies. The latter phraseducere uxorem,to marry, took its rise from the custom of leading the bride from her father’s to her husband’s house, in a ceremonial procession. For an account of the marriages of the Greeks,videNotes116,117,118. Marriages, among the Romans, were of three kinds. The first, and most binding, by which women of rank and consideration were married, was calledconfarreatio: when the parties were joined by the high priest, in the presence of a great number of witnesses; and ate a cake made of meal and salt. The second kind of marriage wasusus, when the parties lived together for one year. The third kind was calledcoemptioor mutual purchase, in which the bride and bridegroom gave each other a piece of money, and repeated over a set form of words.
NOTE 214.Char. (aside.)—This man is dreaming of what he wishes when awake.
——Num ille somniatEa, quæ vigilans voluit.
——Num ille somniatEa, quæ vigilans voluit.
——Num ille somniat
Ea, quæ vigilans voluit.
The optative influence, (if I may so call it,) on the visions of the night, here alluded to by Terence, has been described at length by a celebrated poet, in verses which charm the ear with their melody, and which command the approbation of the judgment as a faithful portraiture of nature. Their author wrote verses, which, inharmony of measure, excelled those of all the Roman poets, exceptingOvid.
Omnia quæ sensu volvuntur vota diurno,Pectore sopito, reddit amica quies:Venator defessa toro cum membra reponit.Mens tamen ad sylvas, et sua lustra redit.Judicibus lites, aurige somnia currus,Vanaque nocturnis meta cavetur equis.Furto gaudet amans; permutat navita merces;Et vigil elapsas quærit avarus opes.Vatem Musarum studium sub nocte silentiArtibus assuetis solicitare solet.—Claudian.
Omnia quæ sensu volvuntur vota diurno,Pectore sopito, reddit amica quies:Venator defessa toro cum membra reponit.Mens tamen ad sylvas, et sua lustra redit.Judicibus lites, aurige somnia currus,Vanaque nocturnis meta cavetur equis.Furto gaudet amans; permutat navita merces;Et vigil elapsas quærit avarus opes.Vatem Musarum studium sub nocte silentiArtibus assuetis solicitare solet.—Claudian.
Omnia quæ sensu volvuntur vota diurno,
Pectore sopito, reddit amica quies:
Venator defessa toro cum membra reponit.
Mens tamen ad sylvas, et sua lustra redit.
Judicibus lites, aurige somnia currus,
Vanaque nocturnis meta cavetur equis.
Furto gaudet amans; permutat navita merces;
Et vigil elapsas quærit avarus opes.
Vatem Musarum studium sub nocte silenti
Artibus assuetis solicitare solet.—Claudian.
NOTE 215.
Do you, Davus, go home, and order some of our people hither, to remove her to our house. Why do you loiter? go, don’t lose a moment.
Davus.—I am going. You must not expect their coming out: she will be betrothed within, &c.
The concluding lines of the play from “You must not expect,” &c., were not originally spoken by the actor who personated Davus, but formed a sort of epilogue, spoken by a performer, called Cantor; who also pronounced the wordPlaudite, with which thecomediesand tragedies of the Romans usually terminated.VideNote 217, also Quintilian,B. 6. C. 1.,and Cicero and Cato. Horace expressly tells us, that the Cantor said the words, vos plaudite.
“Tu quid ego, et populus mecum desideret audi.Si plausoris eges aulæa manentis, et usqueSessuri,donec Cantor vos plaudite dicat;Ætatis cujusque notandi sunt tibi mores,Mobilibusque decor naturis dandus et annis.”Art ofPoet.,L.153.Attend, whilst I instruct thee how to pleaseHim whose experience guides thee; and the tasteThat rules the present age. If thou wouldst charmOur listening ears, until the scene be done;And in our seatsdetain us till the CantorRequests applause; give to each stage of life,Its attributes: and justly paint the changes,Wrought by the hand of Time.
“Tu quid ego, et populus mecum desideret audi.Si plausoris eges aulæa manentis, et usqueSessuri,donec Cantor vos plaudite dicat;Ætatis cujusque notandi sunt tibi mores,Mobilibusque decor naturis dandus et annis.”Art ofPoet.,L.153.Attend, whilst I instruct thee how to pleaseHim whose experience guides thee; and the tasteThat rules the present age. If thou wouldst charmOur listening ears, until the scene be done;And in our seatsdetain us till the CantorRequests applause; give to each stage of life,Its attributes: and justly paint the changes,Wrought by the hand of Time.
“Tu quid ego, et populus mecum desideret audi.
Si plausoris eges aulæa manentis, et usque
Sessuri,donec Cantor vos plaudite dicat;
Ætatis cujusque notandi sunt tibi mores,
Mobilibusque decor naturis dandus et annis.”
Art ofPoet.,L.153.
Attend, whilst I instruct thee how to pleaseHim whose experience guides thee; and the tasteThat rules the present age. If thou wouldst charmOur listening ears, until the scene be done;And in our seatsdetain us till the CantorRequests applause; give to each stage of life,Its attributes: and justly paint the changes,Wrought by the hand of Time.
Attend, whilst I instruct thee how to please
Him whose experience guides thee; and the taste
That rules the present age. If thou wouldst charm
Our listening ears, until the scene be done;
And in our seatsdetain us till the Cantor
Requests applause; give to each stage of life,
Its attributes: and justly paint the changes,
Wrought by the hand of Time.
NOTE 216.You must not expect their coming out.
Some editors give nearly twenty lines of dialogue between Chremes and Charinus respecting the marriage of the latter with Philumena, but those additional lines are spurious. The critics have decided that the play should terminate with the winding up of Pamphilus’s intrigue, and that that of Charinus should be left to the imagination: as the action must languish, if continued after the interest felt for the principal characters has subsided. Davus here addresses the spectators, as does Mysis, inA. 1. S. 4.Commentators deem this a blemish in the composition of the piece. These addresses, in ancient comedies, were not, I imagine, made to the spectators in general, but to those persons who stood on the stage during the performance, as the chorus, or as musicians.
NOTE 217.Farewell, and clap your hands.
“All the ancient copies have the Greek omega,Ω, placed before the words, ‘clap your hands,’ and before ‘Farewell, and clap your hands,’ in other plays: ‘which,’ says Eugraphius, ‘are the words of the prompter, who, at the end of the play, lifted up the curtain, and said to the audience, ‘Farewell, and clap your hands:’ thus far Faernus. Leng, at the end of every play, subscribes these words, Calliopius recensui, and says Calliopius was the prompter; and he quotes the same words of Eugraphius, which I have here quoted from Faernus. IfΩstands for any thing more than ‘Finis,’ (as some imagine to be placed there by transcribers to signify the end,) it may be designed for the first letterΩδος, which is the Greek for Cantor: and Horace, in his art of poetry, says,
Donec cantor vos plaudite dicat.
“Bentley supposes this Cantor to have been Flaccus the musician, (mentioned in the title,) who, when the play was over, entreated the favour of the audience: but I should rather think Calliopius to have been the Cantor, if there was any foundation in antiquity for his name being at the end of the plays; but the name seems fictitious to me by the etymology thereof, and it being used in this place. It is indeed at the end of every play, in all thethree manuscripts in Dr. Mead’scollection except Phormio, which is the last play in the prosaic copy; and the only reason for Calliopius recensui not being there, is, doubtless, because the play is imperfect, some few verses being out at the conclusion;ωprecedes the farewell in one of the doctor’s copies,οin another, and the largest copy has neither. What is independent of the action of the play, as the last two lines are, may be looked upon as an epilogue, and was probably spoken by the same person, whetherplayer,prompter, orcantor.”—Cooke.
NOTE 218.End of the fifth Act.
At the end of a play, the Romans closed their scenes, which, instead of falling from the roof of the theatre downwards, as among the moderns, were constructed something similarly to the blinds of a carriage; so that when the stage was to be exposed to the view of the spectators, the scene or curtain was let down, and when the piece was concluded, it was drawn up again. The ancients originally performed their plays in the open air, with no scenery but that furnished by nature. As they became more refined, they erected theatres, and introduced scenes, which they divided into three kinds: 1. tragic, 2. comic, 3. pastoral. Some very valuable information on this subject may be gathered from M. Perrault’s Notes on Vitruvius, who has described the various sorts of ancient scenes. Ovid, in the following verses, describes the original simplicity of the Roman dramatic entertainments:
“Tunc neque marmoreo pendebant vela theatro,Nec fuerant liquido pulpita rubra croco.Illic quas tulerant nemorosa palatia frondesSimpliciter positæScenasine arte fuit.”
“Tunc neque marmoreo pendebant vela theatro,Nec fuerant liquido pulpita rubra croco.Illic quas tulerant nemorosa palatia frondesSimpliciter positæScenasine arte fuit.”
“Tunc neque marmoreo pendebant vela theatro,
Nec fuerant liquido pulpita rubra croco.
Illic quas tulerant nemorosa palatia frondes
Simpliciter positæScenasine arte fuit.”
FINIS.
LONDON:Printed byW. Clowes, Northumberland-court.