Note 41 — Chapter VIII

confirmed by that of Gellius41, is amply borne out by extant fragments. These criticisms formed a large part of the twenty-sixth book, which Müller supposes to have been the earliest of the compositions of Lucilius. Several lines preserved from that book are either quotations or parodies from the old tragedies42. We observe in these and other quotations the peculiarities of style, noticed in the two tragic poets, such as their tendencies to alliteration and the use of asyndeta, the strained word-formations of Pacuvius, and the occasional inflation of Accius43. We trace the influence of these criticisms in the sneer of Persius,—