[371] Saltem is explained by Serv. “quia nautae semper vagantur:” by Wagn. “quod unum est mortuo solatium.” It seems possible to combine both views: Palinurus would seek for rest as a consolation for his untimely end, and rest in the grave after his wanderings, as he could not have the rest which is the great theme of the Aeneid, rest in a Trojan settlement. This latter view will not oblige us to connect ‘saltem’ with ‘in morte,’ which the order of the words and the general requirements of the line are against. ‘Sedibus quiescam’ v. 328, where however the sense is different. We may comp. also Virg.'s language about Antenor, 1. 247 foll. “sedesque locavit . . . . . nunc placida conpostus pace quiescit,” though the rest there is not that of death, but that of settled abode.
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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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