The audience which enjoyed the privilege of hearing Virgil read his compositions has bequeathed a fascinating testimonial to his wonderful voice. We need not disbelieve the remark of Melissus, Maecenas' freedman, that he spoke hesitantly and almost like an uneducated man; nor the Elder Seneca that his genius deserted him in prose. But when reciting his own poetry he became a different being, gifted with a voice of sweetness and magical charm. Julius Montanus was so far moved as to confess that he would have stolen some of Virgil's verses if he could only have stolen his voice, expression, and dramatic power as well, for what on the poet's lips sounded splendid became comparatively muted when another read them.

VIRGILS RECITATIONS

It is possible that the voice of Virgil was first heard in a significant way in the autumn of 40 B.C., when to the nobles assembled in Rome for the marriage of Antony and Octavia he recited his epithalamium, the Fourth Eclogue. He had probably met Octavian and Maecenas before, but he certainly did so then, and was ever after held by them in the highest esteem. Nor need we doubt that this was fully returned: in lines 7 and 42 of the First Eclogue the poet unequivocally nails his colours to the mast as a supporter of Caesar's heir.