The classic legend attached to these two lines (and there are only two in
the legend) is that the Oxonians sent a challenge to the Cantabs to make
{577} a binomial pentameter corresponding to "Perturbabantur
Constantinopolitani." The Cantabs immediately returned the challenge by
sending "Innumerabilibus sollicitudinibus." Perhaps it is worthy of remark,
though not evident except to a Greek scholar, that the first line contains
at least _one_ false quantity, for "Constantinopol[)i]tani" must have the
antepenultima long, as being derived from [Greek: politês]. The lengthening
of the fourth syllable may perhaps have been considered as a compensation,
though rather a _præ-posterous_ one.