The works of Horace : with English notes, critical and ... - Cristo Raul

lilFE OF M/ECENAS. llX
Yet he likewise tells us {Ep. 19) that he -would have k«en very
eloquent if he Had not been spoiled by his good fortune, and allows
him to have possessed an ingenium grande et virile {Ep. 92). According
to Dio Cassius (Iv., 7), Mseoenas first introdaoed short hand,
and instructed many in the art through his freedman Aquila. By
other authors, however, the invention has been attributed to various
persons of an earlier date ; as to Tiro, Cicero's freedman, to Cicero
himself, and even to Ennius.
But, though seemingly in possession of all the means and appliances
of enjoyment, Maecenas can not be said to have been altogether
bappy in his domestic life. His wife, Terentia, though exceedingly
beautiful, was of a morose and haughty temper, and thence quarrels
were continually .occurring between the pair. Yet the natural uxoriousness
of Msecenas as constantly prompted him to seek a recon-
ciliation; so that Seneca {Ep. 114) remarks that he married a wife
a thousand times, though be never had more than one. Her influence
over him was so great, that, in spite of 'his cautious and taciturn temper,
he was on one occasion weak enough to confide an important
state secret to her, respecting her brother Mursena, the conspirator
{Suet., .Aug., 66 ; Dio Cass., liv., 3). Maecenas himself, however,
was probably in some measure to blame for the terms on which he
lived with his -wife, for Tie was far from being the pattern of a good
husband. In his way of life Maecenas was addicted to every species
of luxury. We find several allusions in the ancient authors to the
effeminacy of his dress. Instead of girding his tunic above his knees,
he suffered it to hang loose about his heels, like a woman's petticoat