Florus remarks on the
infamous
assassination of
Viriatus, that the Roman senate did him great honour; _ut videretur
aliter vinci non potuisse_; it was a confession that they could not
otherwise conquer him,--Vid.
Camoes - Lusiades
[502] _The heav'n-built towers of Troy._--Alluding to the fable of
Neptune, Apollo, and Laomedon.
[503]
_On Europe's strand, more grateful to the skies,
He bade th' eternal walls of Lisbon rise.--_
For some account of this tradition, see the note on Lusiad, bk. iii. p.
76. Ancient traditions, however fabulous, have a good effect in poetry.
Virgil has not scrupled to insert one, which required an apology:--
_Prisca fides facto, sed fama perennis._
Spenser has given us the history of Brute and his descendants at full
length in the Faerie Queene; and Milton, it is known, was so fond of
that absurd legend, that he intended to write a poem on the subject; and
by this fondness was induced to mention it as a truth in the
introduction to his History of England.
[504] _The brother chief._--Paulus de Gama.
[505] _That gen'rous pride which Rome to Pyrrhus bore._--When Pyrrhus,
king of Epirus, was at war with the Romans, his physician offered to
poison him. The senate rejected the proposal, and acquainted Pyrrhus of
the designed treason.
Florus remarks on the
infamous
assassination of
Viriatus, that the Roman senate did him great honour; _ut videretur
aliter vinci non potuisse_; it was a confession that they could not
otherwise conquer him,--Vid.
Flor. l. 17. For a fuller account of this
great man, see the note on Lusiad, bk. i. p. 9.
[506] _Some deem the warrior of Hungarian race._--See the note on the
Lusiad, bk. iii p. 67.
