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[Footnote 5: Both born of a Goddess. ]

[Footnote 6: This is transferred, we hope not improperly from Roman to British Superstition. The Latin alludes to Augury, and very justly ridicules the Folly of Divination by the Flight of Birds.]

[Footnote 7: Nor were Clio or her Sisters seen by me, while I tended a Flock in the Valleys of Ascra. This Ascra was a Valley near the Helicon, which was the Residence of the Parents of Hesiod. Now Hesiod was fabled, whilst he was keeping his Father’s Sheep, to have been led by the Muse to the Fountain Hippocrene; and being, I suppose, well ducked in that Water, commenced Poet.]

[Footnote 8: This whole Passage is a manifest Burlesque on the Invocations with which the Ancients began their Poems. Not very different is that Sneer at the Beginning of the Metamorphosis,

—- Dii, caeptis, (NAM VOS MUTASTIS ET ILLAS)
Adspirate —-

But the strongest Piece of Burlesque of this kind is the Invocation to Venus at the Beginning of Lucretius : For what can be more so than a solemn Application to a Deity for her Assistance in a Work, the professed Intention of which is to expose the Belief of any Deity at all; and more particularly of any Concern which such superior Beings might be supposed to take in the Affairs of Men. For my own part, I must confess, I cannot perceive that graceful Air of Enthusiasm which a noble Author observes in the Invocation of the Antients; many of them indeed seem to have been too apparently in jest, to endeavour to impose on their Readers, and in reality to apply to the Muses with less Devotion than our modern Poets, many of whom perhaps believe as much in those Deities as in any other.]

[Footnote 9: Ovid would here insinuate, that the Courtezans only were the Subjects of the ensuing Poem; and in his Tristibus he cites these Lines, and pleads them in his Defence: But he is not over-honest in his Profession; for in many Parts it appears, that his Instructions are calculated for much more than concessa furtia.]

[Footnote 10: Andromeda was the Daughter of Cepheus King of Aethiopia and of Cassiope. Her Mother having offended the Nereids, by contending with them for Superiority in Beauty, Neptune, at their Petition, sent a Sea-Monster, which greatly annoyed the Aethiopians. Upon this they consulted the Oracle of Jupiter Ammon, who ordered them to expose one of the Progeny of Cepheus and Cassiope to be devoured by the Monster. Andromeda was accordingly ty’d to a Rock, where she was espied by Perseus, who killed the Monster, and rescued the Lady; for which he received her at the Hands of her Parents as his Reward. The Story is told in the 4th Book of the Metamorphosis.]

[Footnote 11: Bunches of Grapes in Methymna; a City of Lesbia, the Wine of which Country was famous among the Ancients.]

[Footnote 12: Ears of Corn in Gargara; which was in Mysia, a Province of the Hellespont.]

[Footnote 13: The Original is, And the Mother of AEneas resides in the City of her Son. AEneas, from whom the Romans derived their Original, was the Son of Venus by Anchises.]