Apology for the Practice of Latin Verse Composition

Extract

‘As I battled with this wind, miserable and blue-nosed, I reflected that if—which heaven forfend—I had had to write a copy of verses about it, I should have called it Eurus, coupled with the most horrific epithet to be found in the Gradus; further, that it was a pity that no one had ever thought of names for the golfing winds. The names of the winds, that one used in doing Latin Verses, gave one a distinct picture of their different personalities, even if it were not quite the same picture that a Roman young gentleman would have had. One thought of them, I am afraid, not as blowing from any particular quarter, but as fitting into a particular part of those jig-saw puzzles called Hexameters and Pentameters. Thus those two entirely opposite characters, Boreas and Zephyrus, seemed to me rather like one another in that they were both sulky, disagreeable creatures who declined to help one in one's utmost need, namely, in getting the end of the line first. They would do no more than fill some position in the middle. That is to be a fair weather friend indeed, since every one knows that when once you have got your tag for the end the deuce is in it if you cannot fit in the rest somehow. Eurus and Auster were far more obliging; they were good, willing fellows, who would lend a hand anywhere in reason if you were not too fussily particular about the sense. Favonius was not trustworthy. As long as he was only wanted to serve in a hexameter he was friendly and useful, but try to use him in a pentameter, and he would plant his four feet firmly on the ground like an obstinate mule so that nothing could be done with him.’