Terence has wrought up the second act of this play with the utmost art and caution: a particular beauty in the pieces written by this great poet appears in the judicious disposition of his incidents, and in his so industriously concealing his catastrophe until the proper time for its appearance. This is a circumstance of great importance in dramatic writing, to which some authors pay too little attention. An ingenious critic of the last age has pointed out a very extraordinary instance of a total deficiency of art in this respect, where both the _plot_ and the _catastrophe_ are completely _revealed in the very title_. This piece is _Venice Preserved, or the Plot Discovered_, which is, in other respects, a very fine production. How much such a title as this must deaden the interest that an audience would otherwise feel from their suspense! This is a point which admits of no argument. “Vestibulum ante ipsum, primoque in limine FINIS Scribitur.”―――― NOTE 139. _Lesbia._ The circumstance of a female officiating as a medical attendant is of some importance. Caius Hyginus, a learned Spaniard, and the freedman of Augustus Cæsar, mentions in his “_Mythological Fables_” an ancient Athenian law, prohibiting women from the practice of physic: this prohibition was productive of great inconvenience in _many cases_, and afterwards repealed; when _free women_ were suffered to practise midwifery. To ascertain the date of this repeal, would afford us some guide to fix on _the times_, when the scenes described in this play were supposed to happen, and the _manners_ of which both Menander and Terence meant to portray. NOTE 140. _Glycera._ I have taken the liberty of following the example of Bernard, Echard, and most of the French translators, in softening the word Glycerium, which, to an English ear, sounds masculine enough for the name of Cæsar or of Alexander. But, for a female’s name, ――――“Why, it is harder, Sirs, than Gordon, Colkitto, or Macdonnel, or Galasp? Those rugged names to our like mouths grow sleek, That would have made _Quintilian_ stare and gasp.” MILTON. NOTE 141. _Mysis.――For, girl or boy, he has given orders, that the child shall be brought up._ Nam quod peperisset _jussit_ tolli. _Vide_ Notes 93, 126. When circumstances would not allow the father of an infant to take it up from the ground himself, if he intended to preserve it, he commissioned some friend to perform the ceremony for him. This is the meaning of _jussit tolli_ in this passage. _Vide_ Pitis Dict., Art. _Expositio_, and Athenæ. B. 10. NOTE 142.