CATARACTS, AND INUNDATIONS. 77 



yery plausibly contended by Chaupy that the Fons Bland usiae was 

 not at the Sabine Farm, but in the neighbourhood of the birth- 

 place of Horace. This is, however, not only contrary to the opi- 

 nions of (I believe) all his commentators, but (in some degree) to 

 the evidence of Horace himself. For he tells us that he did not 

 commence poet till his paternal estate had betii confiscated ; it is 

 surely therefore less likely that he should write an ode and promise 

 a sacrifice, to a fountain in an estate that he had lost, than in one he 

 had since acquired, and to whose situation he was so partial. 



Notwithstanding what I have seen of Chaupy 's works, I had ra- 

 ther err with other geographers than think right with him : and 

 thus far I acknowledge prejudice : but on the whole, the reasons I 

 have given induce me to think that infollounng I do not err with the 

 multitude. 



The whole of the Lucretilis is so pleasant, that Fannus (vid. 

 Ode 17. B, I.) could have no great loss in changing Lycaeus for it, 

 being now covered, as thickly as it was in the time of Horace, with 

 goats that wander in its groves, to crop the arbutus which abounds 

 there, with the same impunity. 



The epithet of " the leaning Ustica" most happily distinguishes 

 this situation from Tivoli, which he calls " supine," and the ex- 

 pression of ' valle reducta," has a propriety when applied to this 

 place, which the " withdrawing vale" seems not fully to express in 

 English. 



Ode 22. Book I. Horace mentions the circumstance of his having 

 met a wolf upon the mountain, when he had accidentally strolled 

 beyond his boundary and those animals are not yet thoroughly 

 extirpated from the vast woods that cover the heights of the 

 won utain. 



[BradstreeCs Sabine Farm*] 



8. The River P0 5 or Eridanus* 



THE Po, Padus, or Eridanus, for under all these names it has 

 beeu celebrated in history and poetry of the greatest excellence, 

 is the largest and most extensive river of Italy. In the infant state 

 of the Roman republic, its banks were inhabited towards the head 

 of the river by the Salassi, and lower down by the Insubres; both 

 powerful people, who had frequent, and at times, successful contests 



