scent by making the first riddles very easy. The _lapides Pyrrhae_ (I.
41) refer of course to the creation of man; _Saturnia regna_ is, in
Epicurean lore, the primitive life of the early savages; _furtum
Promethei_ (I. 42) must refer to Epicurus' explanation of how fire came
from clashing trees and from lightning. The story of Hylas (I. 43)
probably reminded Varus of Siro's lecture on images and reflection,
Pasiphaë (I. 46) of unruly passions, explained perhaps as in Lucretius'
fourth book, Atalanta (I. 61) of greed, and Phaeton of ambition. As for
Scylla, Vergil had himself in the _Ciris_ (I. 69) mentioned, only to
reject, the allegorical interpretation here presented, according to which
she portrays:

"the sin of lustfulness
and love's incontinence."

Vergil had not then met Siro, but he may have read some of his lectures.

Finally, the strange lines on Cornelius Gallus might find a ready
explanation if we knew whether or not Gallus had also been a member
of the Neapolitan circle. Probus, if we may believe him, suggests the
possibility in calling him a schoolmate of Vergil's, and a plausible
interpretation of this eclogue turns that possibility into a probability.
The passage (II. 64-73) may well be Vergil's way of recalling to Varus a
well-beloved fellow-student who had left the circle to become a poet.

The whole poem, therefore, is a delightful commentary upon Vergil's
life in Siro's garden, written probably after Siro had died, the school
closed, and Varus gone off to war. The younger man's school days are
now over; he had found his idiom in a poetic form to which Messalla's
experiments had drawn him. The _Eclogues_ are already appearing in rapid