1810.] 
has repeatedly stated it to be the Agros- 
tis Stolonifera of Linnzus; and which, 
he states, (strengthening the statement 
by the evidence of the Right Honourable 
Isaac Corry, who weighed it,) produced 
in one of his irrigated meadows in Ire- 
Jand, the enormous crop of eight tons 
five cwt. two qrs, twenty-four lbs. of hay, 
from an English acre of ground !! 
The famous Wiltshire long grass meads 
at Orcheston, whose enormous crops of 
watered grass and hay, have so long at- 
tracted attention, are of fiorin grass, as 
appears from the late Mr. Thomas Da- 
vis’s account of them, in Mr. Young’s 
Annals of Agriculture, 1794, vol. xxii. 
page 127. _Your’s, &c. J. Farry. 
Upper Crown-street, Westminster, 
December 5, 1809. 
I 
_ For the Monthly Magazine. 
LYCZUM OF ANCIENT LITERA- 
TURE.—No. XXVII. 
HORACE AND JUVENAL.* 
S it has been usual, in order to depre- 
ciate Juvenal, to compare him with 
* Since the publication of our last Num- 
ber, it) has occurred to us, that it would per- 
haps be better to close our observations upon 
Horace, than be compelied.to return to him 
once more, probably after a very considerable 
interval. By drawing a comparison between 
him and Juvenal, the reader will be better 
able to take a view of their respective merits, 
as Satirists ; and it will also render any future 
separate notice of the latter author, equally 
unnecessary. We shall annex, therefore, te 
this note, the few particulars that are known 
of his life. 
Juvenal was born about the beginning 
of the reign of Claudius, at Aquinum, a town 
belonging to the territory of the ancient 
Volsci, in Campania, and _ since celebrated 
for having given birth to Thomas, surnamed 
Aquinas, the father of scholastic philesophy. 
The poet’s father appears to have been a rich 
freedman, who gave hima liberal education; 
and, agreeably to the taste of the age, bred 
him up to the study of eloquence. In this 
pursuit he is said to have been successful, and 
is conjectured to have-received some lessons 
from Quintilian, who probably aliudes to 
him when, speaking of the Roman satire, he 
says, sunt clari hodie qucque et qui olin: nomina- 
buntur, (Inst. Orat. lib. 10. cap. i,) » From 
the testimony of Martial, it may. be supposed 
that Juvenai had long been distinguished by 
his eloquence, and greatly improved his for- 
tune and interest before he. thought of poe- 
try. Swbactum redolent declamatorem, (say the 
critics;). and he was more than forty before 
he ventured to recite some verses, to a small 
audience of his most intimate fiends, He 
Lyceum of Ancient Literature.x—No. XXVI1. 
117 
Horace, we shall endeavour to show, 
that these two poets, who have, in some 
measure, divided the field of satire be- 
tween them, pursued different objects, 
and attained equal success, by contrary 
methods; the one possessing a pleasing, 
the other a grave, manner. This method 
of viewing the subject, though it be ra- 
ther moral than literary, will not, we 
trust, on this account be the less inter- 
esting. In pursuing it, we must-attend 
to the circumstances under which each 
of these writers drew his picture of man- 
ners, and observe the difference in their 
characters. What we shall advance 
may, in some degree, apply to our mo- 
dern satirists, who have scarcely had 
any other merit than that of borrowing, 
as their subject was gay or serious, or,. as 
they proposed to flatter or instruct, the 
tone, the sentiments, and the ideas of 
one or other of these great masters. 
Horace, with equal sagacity, more 
taste, but considerably less energy than 
Juvenal, seems to have been desirous of 
amusing rather than of reforming. It is 
true the sanguinary revolution which had 
just stifled the last efforts of Roman 
liberty, had not yet gone the length of 
was encouraged, by their applause, to hazarda 
greater publication; the seventh satire, ac- 
cording to the order in which they are usually 
published. But having severely reflected upon 
Paris, then the chief favourite of Domitian, 
he was banished to Egypt, under the pretence 
of giving him the prefecture of a cohorts 
Upon the death of Domitian, he returned ta 
Rome, sufficiently cautioned not only against 
the characters of those in power, but against 
all personal reflections upon the great men 
then living : 
Experiar quid concedatur in illos 
Quorum Flaminia tegitur cinis atque Latina. 
ated 
But be continued his keen sarcastic remarks 
upon the general vices of histimes. He died 
about the middle of Trajan’s reign, at an 
advanced age. ‘That he lived to be an old 
man may be collected from the 1ith Sat. 
where’he says of himself, and of Persicus, to 
whom he addresses it, 
Nostra bibat vernumcontracta cuticula solem, 
Effugiatque Togam. 
In his person, he was of large stature, on 
which account he was supposed to be of 
Gallic extraction. We have no pfecise ace 
counts of his moral character, or manner of 
living ; but from the punishment inflicted 
upon him by the profligate Domitian, and 
from the whole tenor of his writings, we 
may infer that he was areal and uniform 
friend to sobriety and virtue. 
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