CATULLUS.
CHAPTER I.
THE LIFE OF VALERIUS CATULLUS.
Valerius Catullus—about whose prænomen there is no evidence to show whether it was Caius or Quintus, and need be still less concern, as wherever the poet speaks of himself in his poems it is by his surname Catullus—was born at Verona B.C. 87, and died, it is probable, in B.C. 54 or 53. Like the two somewhat later elegiac poets usually associated with him, his life and flower were brief; but there is internal evidence to prove that he was alive after B.C. 57, his death-date in the Eusebian Chronicle; and the silence of his muse as to public events immediately subsequent to 54 B.C., the death of Clodius in 52, and the civil wars in 49-47 amongst the number, forbids the probability that he attained a longer span than some thirty-four years. A colour has been sought to be given to a later date from the supposed mention in
