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tophontes before he has decided upon any plan of action.

Aristophontes of course at once lets the cat out of II. iv. the bag by addressing him as Tyndarus and, unable to think of any better plan, Tyndarus boldly asserts that Aristophontes is a dangerous madman and advises Hegio not to go near him. This at first creates a diversion, for Aristophontes flies into such a passion as almost to bear out Tyndarus' statement, but soon the behaviour of Tyndarus, who is trying to make signs to Aristophontes secretly, arouses Hegio's suspicions and he determines to hear what Aristophontes has to say. When, in proof of his assertion that Tyndarus is an impostor, Aristophontes proceeds to describe the real Philocrates, Hegio recognises the description at once, and seeing how he has been deceived summons the slave-overseers and orders them to bind Tyndarus hand and foot.

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Tyndarus then gives up the game and admits the [II. v. deception, but justifies his conduct in a much higher strain than is usual in Roman comedy; his first duty, he says, was to his young master with whom he had lived all his life and who had been specially committed to his care, and if he must die he will die in the consciousness of having done what he ought. This lofty tone does not tend to conciliate Hegio, who sends him off to labour in the stone-quarries with orders that his life is to be made a burden to him. Then it is that Aristophontes understands the real state of the case and regrets his previous stupidity, the more so as Hegio, on whose good humour he had founded great anticipations, now takes him back to his work on the farm.

14

The fourth Act opens with the appearance of ErgaIV. i. silus running from the harbour in a state of intense excitement and joy. He has completely changed his opinion about the day; it is, he says, the most fortunate and the happiest day in all his life; he has wonderful news

for Hegio: no more asking now and then for a frugal meal : Hegio will be only too delighted to offer him perpetual banquets.

15 While he is approaching the house in this frame of IV. ii. mind, Hegio comes down the street in a state of dejection that serves as a strong contrast; he catches sight of Ergasilus and, supposing him to have come back to dinner, he listens in surprise to the bombastic threats which Ergasilus is pouring forth against all and sundry who may impede his triumphal progress to Hegio's house. When Ergasilus has reached the door he accosts him, and then ensues a game of cross-purposes. Ergasilus proposes the most extravagant preparation for a meal without saying why; Hegio tells him he is raving; Ergasilus insists, Hegio refuses. Then Ergasilus tells his news; he has run all the way from the harbour, where he has just witnessed the return of Philocrates with Hegio's son Philopolemus and the slave Stalagmus who had escaped twenty years before, and whom Philopolemus had recognised and secured in Elis. At first Hegio refuses to believe that this can be true, but when at last he sees that Ergasilus is in earnest he gives him carte blanche as to the preparations for a feast and hurries off to the harbour; Ergasilus rushes into the house in an equal hurry to begin his congenial labours.

16

The fifth Act begins with the appearance of a slave V. i. from the house, who describes the outrageous proceedings of Ergasilus in the kitchen and the pantry. Then Hegio returns with the two young men and the runaway slave, whom he had met at the harbour. He expresses his deep gratitude to Philocrates and wonders how he can ever repay him. 'By restoring Tyndarus,' answers Philocrates, 'to his Elean master, who purposes to emancipate him.' Hegio then relates his discovery of the deception practised upon him and his consequent harshness to Tyndarus, to fetch whom a messenger is despatched at

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once. The young men then go in to bathe after their journey.

Hegio remains behind to question Stalagmus; with V. ii. the greatest indifference and sang-froid this rascal tells how he had stolen off with Hegio's younger son and sold him into slavery at Elis. 'To whom?' asks Hegio. 'To Theodoromedes the father of Philocrates.'

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Hegio summons Philocrates from the house and it V. iii. then appears (as the spectators have known all along) that the long-lost son is no other than the faithful Tyndarus.

19

This is no sooner made clear than Tyndarus himself V. iv. appears, laden with fetters and carrying the pick which he has been using in the quarries. He begins describing his sufferings there, when he is suddenly overwhelmed with joy in recognising Philocrates; his real identity is then explained to him, but he takes some time to grasp the wonderful news. A blacksmith is sent for to transfer his fetters to Stalagmus, and the play ends with a short epilogue sung by the whole of the company.

20

THE MANUSCRIPTS OF PLAUTUS.

In speaking of the manuscripts of Plautus a distinction is drawn between the first eight plays and the last twelve; by the first eight plays one means the Amphitruo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Captiui, Casina, Cistellaria, Curculio and Epidicus; the last twelve are the Bacchides, Menaechmi and the rest. The alphabetical order which obtains (as far as the initial letters are concerned) among the other plays is departed from in the case of the Bacchides, doubtless because it contains an allusion to the Epidicus1, to which it was therefore subsequent in point of time.

1 Bac. 214 Etiam Epidicum, quam ego fabulam aeque ac me ipsum amo,

Nullam aeque inuitus specto, si agit Pellio.

21 At the beginning of the 15th century only the first eight plays, so understood, were known to exist; the last twelve had been lost. But in 1428 a MS. was discovered in Germany which comprised not only the Am., As., Aul., and half the Captiui (to 503), but also the missing twelve. This MS. (now known as D) was brought to Rome and passed into the hands of Cardinal Orsini, after whom it is named the Codex Ursinianus; by him it was placed in the Vatican Library, where it now is. It is a cursive MS. of German origin dating from the 11th century, written by the same hand throughout; the lines are generally run together and the words are often wrongly divided.

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23

Various transcripts were made of it, but, as every transcriber emended as he went along and aimed at giving an intelligible text rather than an accurate copy, the interpolated MSS. which resulted are of no value. One socalled MS. (F) of this date, now in the University Library at Leipsic, may here be mentioned; it was compiled in the first half of the 15th century, and the scholars who edited it took great liberties with the text and were almost entirely ignorant of Plautine prosody.

The editio princeps (quoted by Ritschl as Z) was published at Venice in 1472 by Georgius Merula; he was dependent to a great extent upon interpolated copies of D. 24 In the middle of the 16th century Camerarius of Leipsic obtained possession of two other MSS. previously unknown, B and C, upon which he founded his edition (Lips. 1552); after his death they were purchased and placed in the Palatine Library, and subsequently removed to the Vatican. B still remains there, C was transferred in 1797 to Paris, and in 1815 to Heidelberg, where it still is.

25

B, the Codex Vetus Camerarii, is a cursive MS. of the 11th century, containing all the plays and occupying 213 folio sheets. It is irregularly written by different hands, but, speaking generally (for the execution of the different parts varies considerably), the lines and words are

26

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for the most part correctly divided and the contractions are not many or difficult. There is no division into acts; spaces were left by the original copyists for the headings of scenes and the names of speakers, and in most cases these have been subsequently filled in. In many of the plays corrections have been made by various hands.

C, the Codex Decurtatus (so called because, although it originally contained the whole twenty plays, the first eight had been torn off before it came into the possession of Camerarius), is a cursive MS. of the 11th century, written in Germany by different hands; it bears a strong resemblance to D, but the writing is not so good and the words are more often wrongly divided. It is also very like B, and it is clear that these three MSS. were derived, though not immediately, from the same source.

In 1815 Cardinal Mai discovered that a copy of the Book of Kings in the Ambrosian Library at Milan had been written on parchment which had previously formed part of a MS. of the plays of Plautus, dating probably from the 4th century. This MS. (now known as the Milan Palimpsest and quoted by Ritschl as A) had originally consisted of bundles (fasciculi) of four sheets of parchment laid upon one another and doubled down the middle so as to form sixteen pages in each fasciculus. In the 9th century these had been taken to pieces and some of them washed and scraped so as to receive the new writing and then rebound, but not of course in the original order. The remainder of the original MS. has been lost, while of those sheets which we have the original writing is in some totally illegible, in others only a few lines or a few letters are to be deciphered. Its readings however, where legible, are of course of the greatest authority. It is clearly written in capital letters without any division between words. Originally the MS. contained all the 21 Varronian plays, i.e. the 20 now extant and the Vidularia; but nothing is now left of the first three plays or the Cur