[Footnote 203: Doctoring your hair.--Ver. 1. Among the ancient Greeks, black hair was the most frequent, but that of a blonde colour was most valued. It was not uncommon with them to dye it when turning grey, so as to make it a black or blonde colour, according to the requirement of the case. Blonde hair was much esteemed by the Romans, and the ladies were in the habit of washing their hair with a composition to make it of this colour. This was called 'spuma caustica,' or, 'caustic soap,' wich was first used by the Gauls and Germans; from its name, it was probably the substance which had been used inthe present instance.] [Footnote 204: So far as ever.--Ver. 4. By this he means as low as her ancles.] [Footnote 205: Afraid to dress.--Ver. 5. He means to say, that it was so fine that she did not dare to curl it, for fear of injuring it.] [Footnote 206: Just like the veils.--Ver. 6. Burmann thinks that 'fila,' 'threads,' is better here than 'vela,' and that it is the correct reading. The swarthy Seres here mentioned, were perhaps the Chinese, who probably began to import their silks into Rome about this period. The mode of producing silk does not seem to have been known to Virgil, who speaks, in the Second Book of the Georgies, of the Seres combing it off the leaves of trees. Pliny also, in his Sixth Book, gives the same account. Ovid, however, seems to refer to silkworms under the name of 'agrestes tineæ,' in the Fifteenth Book of the Metamorphoses, 1. 372.] [Footnote 208: Neither the bodkin.--Ver. 15. This was the 'discerniculum,' a 'bodkin,' which was used in parting the hair.] [Footnote 210: Bid the bodkin.--Ver. 18. The 'acus' here mentioned, was probably the 'discemicirium,' and not the 'crinale,' or hair-pin that was worn in the hair; as the latter was worn when the hair was bound up at the back of the head; whereas, judging from the length of the hair of his mistress, she most probably wore it in ringlets. He says that he never saw her snatch up the bodkin and stick it in the arm of the 'ornatrix.'] [Footnote 211: Iron and the fire.--Ver. 25. He alludes to the unnecessary application of the curling-iron to hair which naturally curled so well.] [Footnote 212: The very locks instruct.--Ver. 30. Because they naturally assume as advantageous an appearance as the bodkin could possibly give them, when arranged with the utmost skill.] [Footnote 213: Dione is painted.--Ver. 34. Pliny, book xxxv. c. 4, mentions a painting, by Apelles, in which Venus was represented as rising from the sea. It was placed, by Augustus, in the temple of Julius Caesar; and the lower part having become decayed, no one could be found of sufficient ability to repair it.] [Footnote 214: Lay down the mirror.--Ver. 16. The mirror was usually held by the 'ornatrix,' while her mistress arranged her hair.]