This ill-starred poet, whose life is the subject of Bekker's admirable sketch, was born at Forum Julii (Fréjus) 69 B.C., and is celebrated as the friend of Virgil's youth. Full of ambition and endowed with talent to command or conciliate, he speedily rose in Augustus's service, and was the first to introduce Virgil to his notice. For a time all prospered; he was appointed the first prefect of Egypt, then recently annexed as a province, but his haughtiness and success had made him many enemies; he was accused of treasonable conversation, and interdicted the palace of the emperor. To avoid further disgrace he committed suicide, in the 43d year of his age (27 B.C.). His poetry was entirely taken from Alexandria; he translated Euphorion and wrote four books of love-elegies to Cytheris. Whether she is the same as the Lycoris mentioned by Virgil, [2] whose faithlessness he bewails, we cannot tell. No fragments of his remain, [3] but the passionate nature of the man, and the epithet _durior_ applied to his verse by Quintilian, makes it probable that he followed the older and more vigorous style of elegiac writing. [4] Somewhat junior to him was DOMITIUS MARSUS who followed in the same track. He was a member of the circle of Maecenas, though, strangely enough, never mentioned by Horace, and exercised his varied talents in epic poetry, in which he met with no great success, for Martial says [5]-- "Saepius in libro memoratur Persius uno Quam levis in toto Marsus Amazonide." From this we gather that _Amazonis_ was the name of his poem. In erotic poetry he held a high place, though not of the first rank. His _Fabellae_ and treatise on _Urbanitas_, both probably poetical productions, are referred to by Quintilian, and Martial mentions him as his own precursor in treating the short epigram. From another passage of Martial, "Et Maecenati Maro cum cantaret Alexin Nota tamen Marsi fusca Melaenis erat," [6] we infer that he began his career early; for he was certainly younger than Horace, though probably only by a few years, as he also received instruction from Orbilius. There is a fine epigram by Marsus lamenting the death of his two brother-poets and friends: "Te quoque Virgilio comitem non aequa, Tibulle, Mors invenem campos misit ad Elysios. Ne foret aut molles elegis qui fleret amores, Aut caneret forti regia bella pede." ALBIUS TIBULLUS, to whom Quintilian adjudges the palm of Latin elegy, was born probably about the same time as Horace (65 B.C.), though others place the date of his birth as late as that of Messala (59 B.C.). In the fifth Elegy of the third book [7] occur the words-- "Natalem nostri primum videre parentes Cum cecidit fato consul uterque pari."