fe, by
Menander."]

[Footnote 17: _A malevolent old Poet_)--Ver. 22. He alludes to his
old enemy, Luscus Lavinius, referred to in the preceding
Prologue.]

[Footnote 18: _The genius of his friends_)--Ver. 24. He alludes to
a report which had been spread, that his friends Laelius and Scipio
had published their own compositions under his name. Servilius is
also mentioned by Eugraphius as another of his patrons respecting
whom similar stories were circulated.]

[Footnote 19: _As he ran alone in the street_)--Ver. 31. He
probably does not intend to censure this practice entirely in
Comedy, but to remind the Audience that in some recent Play of
Luscus Lavinius this had been the sole stirring incident
introduced. Plautus introduces Mercury running in the guise of
Sosia, in the fourth Scene of the Amphitryon, l. 987, and
exclaiming, "For surely, why, faith, should I, a God, be any less
allowed to threaten the public, if it doesn't get out of my way,
than a slave in the Comedies?" This practice can not, however, be
intended to be here censured by Plautus, as he is guilty of it in
three other instances. In the Mercator, Acanthio runs to his
master Charinus, to tell him that his mistress Pasicompsa has been
seen in the ship by his father Demipho; in the Stichus, Pinacium,
a slave, runs to inform his mistress Philumena that her husband
has arrived in port, on his return from Asia; and in the
Mostellaria, Tranio, in haste, brings information of the
unexpected arrival of Theuropides. The "currens servus" is also
mentioned in the Prologue to the Andria, l. 36. See the soliloquy
of Stasimus, in the Trinummus of Plautus, l. 1007.]

[Footnote 20: _A quiet Play_)--Ver. 36. "Statariam." See the
spurious Prologue to the Bacchides of Plautus, l. 10, and the Note
to the passage in Bohn's Translation. The Comedy of the Romans was
either "stataria", "motoria", or "mixta". "Stataria" was a Comedy
which was calm and peaceable, such as the Cistellaria of Plautus;
"motoria" was one full of action and disturbance, like his
Amphitryon; while the "Comoedia mixta" was a mixture of both, such
as the Eunuchus of Terence.]

[Footnote 21: _What in each character_)--Ver. 47. "In utramque
partem ingenium quid possit meum." This line is entirely omitted
in Vollbehr's edition; but it appears to be merely a typographical
error.]

[Footnote 22: _How little work is done h