In a postscript he adds the following:-- "In _Carm._ iii. 8, Horace describes himself as _prope funeratus arboris ictu_, 'wellnigh killed by a blow from a tree.' An artist in expression, such as he was, would not have mentioned any 'blow' if there had been none; he would have said 'well nigh killed by a falling tree'--or the like. It is to be noted that in both passages he uses the word _ictus_. And in ii. 13. 11 (the whole ode is addressed to the tree) he says the man must have been a fellow steeped in every wickedness 'who planted thee an accursed lump of wood, a thing meant to fall (this is the delicate meaning of _caducum_--not merely "falling") on thine undeserving master's head.' Here again the language implies that he was struck, and struck on the head. "Indeed, the escape must have been a narrow one, and it is to me impossible to believe that Horace would have been so deeply impressed by the accident if he had not actually been struck. He refers to it four times:-- _Carm._ ii. 13.--(Ode addressed to the tree--forty lines long.) ii. 17. 27. iii. 4. 27.--(Here he puts the risk he ran on a parallel with that of the rout at Philippi, from which he escaped.) iii. 8. 8. "I insist on all this as strengthening my interpretation, and also as strengthening the assignment of the script to Myers, who would of course be fully alive to all the points to be found in his reference to Faunus and Horace--and, as I have no doubt, believed that Horace did not escape the actual blow, and that it was a severe one." NOTE BY O. J. L. Since some of the translators, especially verse translators, of Horace convey the idea of turning aside or warding off the blow, it may be well to emphasise the fact that most of the scholars consulted gave "lightened" or "weakened" as the translation. And Professor Strong says--"no doubt at all that 'levasset' means 'weakened' the blow; the bough fell and struck the Poet, but lightly, through the action of Faunus. 'Levo' in this sense is quite common and classical." Bryce's prose translation (Bohn) is quite clear--"a tree-stem falling on my head had surely been my death, had not good Faunus eased the blow...." And although Conington's translation has "check'd the blow in mid descent," he really means the same thing, because it is the slaying, not the wounding or striking of the Poet that is prevented:-- "Me the curst trunk, that smote my skull, Had slain; but Faunus, strong to shield The friends of Mercury, check'd the blow In mid descent." ADDITIONAL PIPER SCRIPT Mr. Bayfield also calls my attention to another portion of Piper Script--in this case not a trance or semi-trance sitting, but ordinary automatic writing--dated 5 August, which reached me simultaneously with the one already quoted from, at the beginning of September, and which he says seems intended to prepare me for some personal trouble:--