el in the works of Homer, but of perusing the laws of epic poetry,
which had been digested by Aristotle, and the various observations made
on the writings of the Greek bard by critics of acuteness and taste;
amongst the chief of whom was his friend Horace, who remarks that

--------quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus.--De Arte Poet.

E'en sometimes the good Homer naps.

Virgil, besides, composed his poem in a state remote from indigence,
where he was roused to exertion by the example of several contemporary
poets; and what must have animated him beyond every other consideration,
he wrote both at the desire, and under the patronage of the emperor and
his minister Mecaenas. In what time Homer composed either of his poems,
we know not; but the Aeneid, we are informed, was the employment of
Virgil during eleven years. For some years, the repeated entreaties of
Augustus could not extort from him the smallest specimen of the work; but
at length, when considerably advanced in it, he condescended to recite
three books--the second, the fourth, and the sixth--in the presence of
the emperor and his sister Octavia, to gratify the latter of whom, in
particular, the recital of the last book now mentioned, was intended.
When the poet came to the words, Tu Marcellus eris, alluding to Octavia's
son, a youth of great hopes, who had lately died, the mother fainted.
After she had recovered from this fit, by the care of her attendants, she
ordered ten sesterces to be given to Virgil for every line relating (171)
to that subject; a gratuity which amounted to about two thousand pounds
sterling.

In the composition of the Aeneid, Virgil scrupled not to introduce whole
lines of Homer, and of the Latin poet Ennius; many of whose sentences he
admired. In a few instances he has borrowed from Lucretius. He is said
to have been at extraordinary pains in polishing his numbers; and when he
was doubtful of any passage, he would read it to some of his friends,
that he might have their opinion. On such occasions, it was usual with
him to consult in particular his freedman and librarian Erotes, an old
domestic, who, it is related, supplied extempore a deficiency in two
lines, and was desired by his master to write them in the manuscript.

When this immortal work was completed, Virgil resolved on retiring into
Greece and Asia for three years, that he might devote himself entirely to
polishing it, and have leisure afterwards to pass the