FOOTNOTES 
 
1 A History of the Literature of Ancient Greece, by K.  O. 
Mueller.  Vol.  i, p.  l9l.  London, Parker, 1858.  
2 Select Fables of Aesop, and other Fabulists.  In three books,
translated by Robert Dodsley, accompanied with a selection of
notes, and an Essay on Fable. Birmingham, 1864.  P.  60.  
3 Some of these fables had, no doubt, in the first instance, a
primary and private interpretation.  On the first occasion of
their being composed they were intended to refer to some passing
event, or to some individual acts of wrong-doing.  Thus, the
fables of the "Eagle and the Fox" and of the "Fox and Monkey' are
supposed to have been written by Archilochus, to avenge the
injuries done him by Lycambes.  So also the fables of the
"Swollen Fox" and of the "Frogs asking a King" were spoken by
Aesop for the immediate purpose of reconciling the inhabitants of
Samos and Athens to their respective rulers, Periander and
Pisistratus; while the fable of the "Horse and Stag" was composed
to caution the inhabitants of Himera against granting a bodyguard
to Phalaris.  In a similar manner, the fable from Phaedrus, the
"Marriage of the Sun," is supposed to have reference to the
contemplated union of Livia, the daughter of Drusus, with Sejanus
the favourite, and minister of Trajan.  These fables, however,
though thus originating in special events, and designed at first
to meet special circumstances, are so admirably constructed as to
be fraught with lessons of general utility, and of universal
application.  
4 Hesiod.  Opera et Dies, verse 202.  
5 Aeschylus.  Fragment of the Myrmidons.  Aeschylus speaks of
this fable as existing before his day.  See Scholiast on the Aves
of Aristophanes, line 808.  
6 Fragment.  38, ed.  Gaisford.  See also Mueller's History of
the Literature of Ancient Greece, vol.  i.  pp.  190-193.  
7 M. Bayle has well put this in his account of Aesop.  "Il n'y a
point d'apparence que les fables qui portent aujourd'hui son nom
soient les memes qu'il avait faites; elles viennent bien de lui
pour la plupart, quant a la matiere et la pensee; mais les
paroles sont d'un autre."  And again, "C'est donc a Hesiode, que
j'aimerais mieux attribuer la gloire de l'invention; mais sans
doute il laissa la chose tres imparfaite.  Esope la perfectionne
si heureusement, qu'on l'a regarde comme le vrai pere de cette
sorte de production."   M. Bayle.  Dictionnaire Historique.   
8 Plato in Ph2done.  
9 Apologos en! misit tibi    
  Ab usque Rheni limite  
  Ausonius nomen Italum  
  Praeceptor Augusti tui     
  Aesopiam trimetriam;   
  Quam vertit exili stylo    
  Pedestre concinnans opus   
  Fandi Titianus artifex.  
        Ausonii Epistola, xvi.  75-80.  
10 Both these publications are in the British Museum, and are
placed in the library in cases under glass, for the inspection of
the curious.  
ll Fables may possibly have been not entirely unknown to the
mediaeval scholars.  There are two celebrated works which might
by some be classed amongst works of this description.  The one is
the "Speculum Sapientiae," attributed to St.  Cyril, Archbishop
of Jerusalem, but of a considerably later origin, and existing
only in Latin.  It is divided into four books, and consists of
long conversations conducted by fictitious characters under the
figures  the beasts of the field and forest, and aimed at the
rebuke of particular classes of men, the boastful, the proud, the
luxurious, the wrathful, &c.  None of the stories are precisely
those of Aesop, and none have the concinnity, terseness, and
unmistakable deduction of the lesson intended to be taught by
the fable, so conspicuous in the great Greek fabulist.  The exact
title of the book is this:  "Speculum Sapientiae, B.  Cyrilli
Episcopi:  alias quadripartitus apologeticus vocatus, in cujus
quidem proverbiis omnis et totius sapientiae speculum claret et
feliciter incipit."  The other is a larger work in two volumes,
published in the fourteenth century by Caesar Heisterbach, a
Cistercian monk, under the title of "Dialogus Miraculorum,"
reprinted in 1851.  This work consists of conversations in which
many stories are interwoven on all kinds of subjects.  It has no
correspondence with the pure Aesopian fable.  
12 Post-medieval Preachers, by S. Baring-Gould.  Rivingtons,
1865.  
13 For an account of this work see the Life of Poggio
Bracciolini, by the Rev.  William Shepherd.  Liverpool.  1801.  
14 Professor Theodore Bergh.  See Classical Museum, No.  viii. 
July, 1849.  
15 Vavassor's treatise, entitled "De Ludicra Dictione" was
written A.D.  1658, at the request of the celebrated M. Balzac
(though published after his death), for the purpose of showing
that the burlesque style of writing adopted by Scarron and
D'Assouci, and at that time so popular in France, had no sanction
from the ancient classic writers.  Francisci Vavassoris opera 
omnia. Amsterdam. 1709.  
16 The claims of Babrias also found a warm advocate in the
learned Frenchman, M. Bayle, who, in his admirable dictionary,
(Dictionnaire Historique et Critique de Pierre Bayle.  Paris,
1820,) gives additional arguments in confirmation of the opinions
of his learned predecessors, Nevelet and Vavassor.  
17 Scazonic, or halting, iambics; a choliambic (a lame, halting
iambic) differs from the iambic Senarius in always having a
spondee or trichee for its last foot; the fifth foot, to avoid
shortness of meter, being generally an iambic.  See Fables of
Babrias, translated by Rev.  James Davies.  Lockwood, 1860. 
Preface, p.  27.  
18 See Dr. Bentley's Dissertations upon the Epistles of
Phalaris.  
19 Dr. Bentley's Dissertations on the Epistles of Phalaris, and
Fables of Aesop examined.  By the Honorable Charles Boyle.