PREFACE. THIS book is not a selection of extracts, nor is it an edition of any part of the actual text of Livy. It does not seem to me possible, judging from my own experience in teaching, to use any part of Livy as it stands in the lower forms of schools, for which I understand this series is designed. The difficulties of his rather rhetorical and fanciful style will hardly be absent in any extracts. At the same time everyone who has had practical experience in teaching must be aware of the want of Latin reading-books fit for elementary teaching. Cæsar is often too difficult for beginners, Cornelius Nepos is hardly satisfactory and hardly any others can be mentioned. It seemed to me that though Livy as it stands is unfit for the purpose, yet out of him a fairly satisfactory book might be made, and that a continuous narrative of a not very long period of history was likely to be more interesting and useful than either disconnected extracts or meagre summaries. Accordingly the text of Livy has here been largely re-written and simplified; and this is the part of the work on which most labour has been expended and to which much the most importance is attached. Besides this details have occasionally been added from Polybius (the excellent version of Casaubon being sometimes used for this purpose); and in cases where Livy's account seems to be incorrect, e.g. the passage of the Alps and other points of geography, I have ventured sometimes to omit or alter that which causes difficulty in harmonising his account with others. Probably on these points at least everyone will agree with Niebuhr, that where Livy differs from Polybius, his authority is worthless. For any errors of Latinity in the text I ask pardon and hope that they may be few. The division into chapters is, of course, my own. The notes are rather copious, but I have endeavoured always to avoid as far as possible such direct help as would save labour and thought, and I have made a point of always where possible giving references to the grammar on points of syntax instead of explaining them myself, though the latter might often have been more easily done. It will often be found that the key to the meaning of a sentence is to be found in a rule of syntax, and I am convinced that notes of this kind are more likely than any others to stimulate thought. I hope that knowledge of the rules referred to will be rigorously exacted from boys who use this book. The pages on the syntax of the compound sentence which have been added to the last edition of the Latin Primer have enabled me to adopt that as my chief book of reference. I have added in many cases the references to Roby's Latin Grammar for Schools,' which I hope may be useful to teachers if not to boys. It will be found that the references to the grammar become rather less frequent as the book proceeds, and I have not invariably repeated them when the same point occurs many times. I have called attention where I could to peculiarities in Latin style and idiom, as writing for boys who are probably called upon to do prose composition as well as translation. I have to acknowledge obligations throughout to Mr. W. W. Capes, whose edition of the 21st and 22nd books I have had always before me. |