[34] Virg. plunges “in medias res,” as the commentators remark. See Introduction to this Book. The departure from Sicily closes Aeneas's narrative, 3. 715. Forb. takes ‘e conspectu Siculae telluris’ to mean ‘out of sight from Sicily,’ or of those who were in Sicily, comparing 11. 903, “Vix e conspectu exierat;” but there the sense is determined by the context: and the common rendering, ‘out of sight of Sicily,’ is more natural, and equally good Latin. Comp. e. g. “urbis conspectu frui,” Cic. Sull. 9. Generally, though not universally, where the noun in the gen. is a thing, the gen. is that of the object; and, in the present case, we more naturally think of the Trojans looking towards Sicily, than of Sicily looking towards the Trojans.
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John Conington. P. Vergili Maronis opera. P. Vergili Maronis Opera. The works of Virgil, with a Commentary by John Conington, M.A. Late Corpus Professor of Latin in the University of Oxford. London. Whittaker and Co., Ave Maria Lane. 1876.
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