I 5 8 l'KOSERPINA. 



of what I so find, better than perhaps even Mr. 

 Smith himself could. 



1 8. In the 586th page of Mr. Smith's volume, 

 you have it written that ' Calvus,' bald-head, was 

 the name of a family of the Licinia gens ; that the 

 man of whom we hear earliest, as so named, was 

 the first plebeian elected to military tribuneship in 

 B.C. 400 ; and that the fourth of whom we hear, 

 was surnamed ' Stolo,' because he was so particular 

 in pruning away the Stolons (stolones), or useless 

 young shoots, of his vines. 



We must keep this word ' stolon,' therefore, for 

 these young suckers springing from an old root. 

 Its derivation is uncertain ; but the main idea 

 meant by it is one of uselessness — sprouting with- 

 out occasion or fruit ; and the words ' stolidus ' and 

 ' stolid ' are really its derivatives, though we have 

 lost their sense in English by partly confusing them 

 with 'solid,' which they have nothing to do with. 

 A ' stolid ' person is essentially a ' useless sucker ' 

 of society ; frequently very leafy and graceful, but 

 with no good in him. 



19. Nevertheless, I won't allow our vegetable 

 ' stolons ' to be despised. Some of quite the most 

 beautiful forms of leafage belong to them ; — 

 even the foliage of the olive itself is never seen 

 to the same perfection on the upper branches as in 



