The comparative advantage of Italy

[Martin50]

The earth will not tremble in the least when I say this, but I've
rather changed my mind about the Laudes Italiae.
I'd previously suggested that the two passages where V uses 'bis, bis'
are meant to refer to each other and I'm still inclined to think
this. One of these is the Laudes, and I had thought that the context
in which 'bis, bis' occurs, the report of double fertility of trees
and flocks, is an intimation of the unrealism of nationalist
propaganda.
It's still true that the report of double fertility (Conington gives a
source for it) is the report of a prodigy which V sets alongside both
reports in naturalistic style, such as that Persian balm is good for
asthma and more starkly against reports of foreign prodigies, notably
fire-breathing monsters. He didn't need to tell the post-Lucretian
generation that reports of prodigies are often false, but I think he
can make the point without anti-natinalist sarcasm that whereas exotic
countries make themselves in their fictins sound dangerous to human
habitation the Italian temperament is to tell stories of productivity
and abundance.
I was going to say that V now has a basis for calling for empire but
empire in benevolent form. But I've got to meet my daughter from a
plane and it's getting in early. I'll test your patience more later.