We might say that “pendentis” here was to be taken figuratively in the sense of uncertain, undecided. Mars “pendens” would then be the same as Mars “incertus” or Mars “communis.” “Dii communes,” says Servius (ad. v. 118, lib. xii. Æneid), are Mars, Bellona, and Victory, so called from their favoring both parties in war. And the line,— Pendentisque Dei (effigiem) perituro ostenderet hosti, would mean that the old Roman soldier was accustomed to wear the image of the impartial god in the presence of his enemy, who, in spite of the impartiality, was soon to perish. A very subtle idea, making the victories of the old Romans depend more upon their own bravery than on the friendly aid of their founder. Nevertheless, “non liquet.” Note 18, p. 51. “Till I got acquainted with these Auræ (or sylphs),” says Spence (Polymetis, dial. xiii.), “I found myself always at a loss in reading the known story of Cephalus and Procris in Ovid. I could never imagine how Cephalus crying out, ‘Aura venias’ (though in ever so languishing a manner), could give anybody a suspicion of his being false to Procris. As I had been always used to think that Aura signified only the air in general, or a gentle breeze in particular, I thought Procris’s jealousy less founded than the most extravagant jealousies generally are. But when I had once found that Aura might signify a very handsome young woman as well as the air, the case was entirely altered, and the story seemed to go on in a very reasonable manner.” I will not take back in the note the approval bestowed in the text on this discovery, on which Spence so plumes himself. But I cannot refrain from remarking that, even without it, the passage was very natural and intelligible. We only needed to know that Aura occurs frequently among the ancients as a woman’s name. According to Nonnus, for instance (Dionys. lib. xlviii.), the nymph of Diana was thus named, who, for claiming to possess a more manly beauty than the goddess herself, was, as a punishment for her presumption, exposed in her sleep to the embraces of Bacchus. Note 19, p. 52. Juvenalis Satyr. viii. v. 52–55. ... At tu Nil nisi Cecropides; truncoque simillimus Hermæ! Nullo quippe alio vincis discrimine, quam quod Illi marmoreum caput est, tua vivit imago.