Ovid seems to have been best served in exile by those of his friends who were of no particular eminence. In _Tr_ III iv 3-8 & 43-44 he complains not only of the treatment he has received from Augustus, but also of the lack of assistance from those of his friends most in a position to help. Once Sextus Pompeius had indicated he was willing to be named publicly, Ovid could not ignore the influence that a man of such position could bring to bear; hence the number of poems addressed to him in the fourth book. Ovid starts the poem with an elaborate assertion of his past and present desire to mention Pompeius in his verse (1-22), and then briefly recounts the services Pompeius has rendered to him, and will continue to render (23-26). The reason he is confident that Pompeius will continue to assist him is that Pompeius' past assistance has been such that he is now, in effect, Pompeius' creation, and brings glory to him in the way that great works of art do for their creators (27-36). =1. DEDVCTVM.= 'Composed'. _Deducere_ is often used in reference to the drawing of fibres from the wool on the distaff and the shaping of the thread (Catullus LXIV 311-14). From this meaning derive the two senses the word can have when referring to poetry, 'composed' and 'finely spun, delicate'. The first sense is seen here and at _Tr_ I i 39, _EP_ I v 13, and at _Tr_ V i 71 'ipse nec emendo, sed ut hic _deducta_ legantur', and the second at _Ecl_ VI 4-5 'pastorem, Tityre, pinguis / pascere oportet ouis, _deductum_ dicere carmen', where _deductum ... carmen_ represents the [Greek: Mousan ... leptaleên] of Callimachus _Aetia_ I 24; Servius comments on the metaphor from spinning. It has been suggested that _Met_ I 4 'ad mea perpetuum _deducite_ tempora carmen' shows this meaning as well; see Kenney _Ouidius Prooemians_ 51-52. Hor _Ep_ II i 225 'tenui deducta poemata filo' stands somewhere between the two senses. =2. DEBITOR ... VITAE.= See v 33-36 (Ovid's letter speaking to Pompeius) 'te sibi, cum fugeret, memori solet ore referre / barbariae tutas exhibuisse uias, / sanguine Bistonium quod non tepefecerit ensem, / effectum cura pectoris esse tui'. The passage suggests that Pompeius supplied Ovid with a bodyguard for his journey overland from Tempyra to Tomis, either in an official capacity--Dessau suggests (_PIR_ P 450) that Pompeius might have been proconsul of Macedonia--or, more probably, from his Macedonian estates, for which Dessau and Syme (_HO_ 157) cite xv 15. =3. QVI.= Williams' CVI is possibly correct; the line would then refer to the _titulus_ of the poem in a published text.