=31-40.= The argument Ovid here employs ("other have done what I have done, and not suffered for it") is that used at _Tr_ II 361-538 to excuse the _Ars Amatoria_. =31-40. VITABILIS.= A. G. Lee has ingeniously conjectured VITIABILIS (_PCPhS_ 181 [1950-51] 3). It would have the sense _uitiosa_; Lee compares such words as _aerumnabilis_, _perniciabilis_, and _lacrimabilis_. He argued that Hesiod nowhere said that Ascra was 'always to be avoided' (although this is a natural inference from _Op_ 639-40) and that the variants _miserabilis_, _mirabilis_, and _mutabilis_ 'point to the conclusion that the archetype was here difficult to make out'. For _uitium_ used of localities he cited _EP_ III ix 37 'quid nisi de _uitio_ scribam regionis amarae', and for the word _uitiabilis_ (in the sense 'corruptible') Prudentius _Apoth_ 1045 and _Ham_ 215 (there is a variant _uitabilis_ in a ninth-century manuscript of the _Hamartigenia_). Lee's argument is a good one, but _uitabilis_ does not seem in itself objectionable enough to be removed from the text. The variant readings he cites are from unnamed manuscripts of Burman, and are not safe evidence for the condition of the archetype. It can be said in Lee's favour that Heinsius and Bentley before him clearly found _uitabilis_ somewhat strange: Heinsius considered the verse suspect, while Bentley conjectured VT ILLAVDABILIS. =31. ASCRA= _MFILT_. I take ASCRE (_BCH_) to be a hypercorrect formation by the scribes; _Ascra_ is metrically guaranteed at 34 'Ascra suo' and _AA_ I 28 'Ascra tuis'. It is possible that _Ascre_ is correct, although its use would be strange so close to _Ascra_ in 34: Ovid certainly used both _nympha_ and _nymphe_ (_Her_ IX 103; _Met_ III 357). =32. AGRICOLAE ... SENIS.= For Hesiod as an old man compare _AA_ II 3-4 'laetus amans donat uiridi mea carmina palma, / praelata Ascraeo Maeonioque _seni_', Prop II xxxiv 77 'tu canis Ascraei _ueteris_ praecepta poetae', and _Ecl_ VI 69-70 'hos tibi dant calamos, en accipe, Musae, / Ascraeo quos ante _seni_'. =35. SOLLERTE ... VLIXE.= _Sollerte_ could represent either [Greek: polymêchanos] (_Il_ II 173) or [Greek: polytropos] (_Od_ I 1). I believe that Ovid was translating [Greek: polytropos], since Livius Andronicus in translating _Od_ I 1 had used _uersutus_ to represent the adjective: 'Virum mihi, Camena, insece _uersutum_'. It is clear from Cic _Brut_ 236 'genus ... acuminis ... quod erat in reprehendendis uerbis _uersutum et sollers_' that the Romans regarded the two adjectives as having much the same force. At Hor _Sat_ II v 3-5 [Greek: polymêchanos] is translated by _dolosus_: (Tiresias to Ulysses) 'iamne doloso / non satis est Ithacam reuehi patriosque penates / aspicere?'. =36. HOC TAMEN ASPERITAS INDICE DOCTA LOCI EST.= At _Od_ IX 27 Ulysses describes Ithaca to Alcinous as '[Greek: trêchei'] [=_aspera_] [Greek: all' agathê kourotrophos]'.