[Footnote III.2: _Some holidays_)--Ver. 8. The Romans had three kinds of public “feriæ,” or holidays, which all belonged to the “dies nefasti,” or days on which no public business could be done. These were the “feriæ stativæ,” “conceptivæ,” and “imperativæ.” The first were held regularly, and on stated days set forth in the Calendar. To these belonged the Lupercalia, Carmentalia, and Agonalia. The “conceptivæ,” or “conceptæ,” were moveable feasts held at certain seasons in every year, but not on fixed days; the times for holding them being annually appointed by the magistrates or priests. Among these were the “feriæ Latinæ,” Sementivæ, Paganalia, and Compitalia. The “feriæ imperativæ” were appointed to be held on certain emergencies by order of the Consuls, Prætors, and Dictators; and were in general held to avert national calamities or to celebrate great victories.] [Footnote III.3: _Worthless ditties_)--Ver. 10. “Nænia” were, properly, the improvised songs that were sung at funerals by the hired mourners, who were generally females. From their trivial nature, the word came to be generally applied to all worthless ditties, and under this name Phædrus, with all humility, alludes to his Fables.] [Footnote III.4: _On the Pierian Hill_)--Ver. 17. Judging from this passage it would appear that Phædrus was a Macedonian by birth, and not, as more generally stated, a Thracian. Pieria was a country on the south-east coast of Macedonia, through which ran a ridge of mountains, a part of which were called Pieria, or the Pierian mountain. The inhabitants are celebrated in the early history of the music and poesy of Greece, as their country was one of the earliest seats of the worship of the Muses, and Orpheus was said to have been buried there. It is most probable that Phædrus was carried away in slavery to Rome in his early years, and that he remembered but little of his native country.] [Footnote III.5: _As Sinon said_)--Ver. 27. He here alludes to the words of Sinon, the Grecian spy, when brought before Priam, in the Second Book of Virgil, 77-78:-- “Cuncta equidem tibi, rex, fuerit quodcumque fatebor Vera, inquit----” Others, again, suppose that this was a proverbial expression in general use at Rome. It is not improbable that it may have become so on being adopted from the work of Virgil: “Come what may of it, as Sinon said.”] [Footnote III.6: _And your goodness_)--Ver. 30. “Honori et meritis dedicam illum tuis.” We learn from ancient inscriptions that this was a customary formula in dedications.] [Footnote III.7: _Slavery_)--Ver. 34. He probably alludes to Æsop’s state of slavery, in the service of the philosopher Xanthus.]