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Catullus is said to have been born at Verona, of respectable parents; his father and himself being in the habit of intimacy with Julius Caesar. He was brought to Rome by Mallius, to whom several of his epigrams are addressed. The gentleness of his manners, and his application to study, we are told, recommended him to general esteem; and he had the good fortune to obtain the patronage of Cicero.
It was no wonder that what took place after the victories of Metellus was repeated on a greater scale after the defeats of Gnaeus Mallius and Quintus Caepio.
They were opposed on the right bank of the Rhone by the proconsul Cæpio, and on the left by the consul Gnæus Mallius Maximus, and the consular Marcus Aurelius Scaurus. The first attack fell on the latter general, who was taken prisoner and his corps routed.
We hear of no candidate belonging to the highest ranks of the nobility who was deemed to have been defrauded of his birthright on this occasion; but the disappointment of Quintus Lutatius Catulus was deemed wholly legitimate, when Cnaeus Mallius Maximus defeated him at the poll.
"How happy," continues Claudian, "how happy might it be for the people of Italy, if Mallius could be constantly awake, and if Hadrian would always sleep!"
The child whose Jewish name has been turned into that of Jesus was born in Palestine B.C. 105, during the consulate of Publius Rutilius Rufus and Gnaeus Mallius Maximus. His parents were well-born though poor, and he was educated in a knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures.
The modern reader will not find much to interest him in the Coma Berenices, abounding as it does in mythological allusions. The poem to Mallius or Allius, written at Verona, is partly mythological, partly personal, and though somewhat desultory, contains many fine passages.
The repose of Mallius was not disturbed by this friendly and gentle admonition; but the cruel vigilance of Hadrian watched the opportunity of revenge, and easily obtained, from the enemies of Stilicho, the trifling sacrifice of an obnoxious poet.
Before this are the lyrics, chiefly in the phalaecian eleven-syllabled verse which Catullus made so peculiarly his own, but in iambic, sapphic, choriambic, and other metres also, winding up with the fine epithalamium written for the marriage of his friends, Mallius and Vinia.
Travelling was not then very quick; but a messenger, one Mallius Glaucia, a man on very close terms with Titus Magnus, was sent down at once in a light gig to travel through the night and take the information to Titus Capito Why was all this hurry? How did Glaucia hear of the murder so quickly? What cause to travel all through the night?
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