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for searching only. vobis gratia habenda, vobis res ista erit honori .. Haec exornatio, cum multum venustatis habet, turn grauitatis, & acrimoniae plurimum. Quare videtur esse adhibenda & ad exornandam, & ad augendam orationem. Conuersio est, per quam non, vt ante, primum repetimus verbum, sed ad postremum continenter reuertimur, hoc modo: Poenos populus Rom. iustitia vicit, armis vicit, liberalitate vicit.1o1
Shakspere is repeating only the one word with changed adjectives, so the result is repetition, as he himself points out, rather than con-version. This distinction, however, is rather general, and by no means confined to aid Herennium. It is true that Quintilian, though he uses the term, yet does not make a figure of it.102 But Susenbrotus does so,103 and so does Wilson in English.104
Much the same conclusion is true of "affecting the letter." This falls under the general head of compositio, which is not modern composition by any means. On this subject Ad Herennium says,
Compositio, est verborum constructio, quae facit omneis parteis orationis aequaliter perpolitas. Ea conseruabitur . . . si vitabimus eiusdem Iitterae nimiam assiduitatem: cui vitio versus hic erit exemplo. nam hic nihil prohibet in vitiis, alienis exemplis vti, 0 Tite, tute Tati, tibi tanta tyranne tulisti. Et hic eiusdem poetae: Quidquam quisquam cuiquam quod conue niet, neget.l0s
Holofernes says, "I will something affect the letter, for it argues facility."108 Note "the letter," litera. Holofernes was displaying ill taste in defiance of old Herennium, et al. Quintilian discusses clashing "letters" in numerous combinations, but does not appear to center directly upon alliteration. Susenbrotus, however, says,
Huc referri queant compositionis uitia, quae Martianus Capella, lib. de septem artibus liberalibus s. cap. de elocution conscripsit: Paroemion srapo! uop uocant, id est Assimile: & fit cum multae uoces ab eadem litera incipientes, ex ordine collocantur: ut, Machina multa minax minatur maxima muris, Casus Cassandra canebat. Mammam ipsam amo, quasi meam animam, Sol & luzta lute lucent. Iunio, Iuno Iouis iure irascitur. Sosia in solario soleas sarciebat suas. 0 Tite tute Tati tibi tanta Tyranne tulisti,
&c.1Î7
1ÎI Ad Herennuun (Lambinus, Cicerones Opera Omnia (1573), Val. I, pp. 83-84).
102 Quintilian (158o), p. 524 (522); (1538), p. 132 (134)v
10a Susenbrotus (1565), pp. 51, 54.
101 Wilson, Rhetorique (1909), p. 201.
106 did Herennium (Lambinus, Ciceroni: Opera Omnia (1573), Vol. I, p. 82).
106 Loee's Lahor's Lost, IV, 2, 57. Of this use of alliteration, Minturnus says, "we justly laugh at the absurd precepts of grammarians, who order this to be avoided" (Minturnus, De Poets (Venice, 0559), pp. 468 f.); and then marshals a host of illustrations from the Latin classics.
107 Susenbrotus (1565), PP- 38-39.
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