fhould make you a great-grandfather.. fhe did in the lofs of them. To fay the truth (and I may now fafely tell it you), fhe was in the utmost hazard of her life; not indeed from any fault of her own, but a little from the inexperience of her youth. To this must be imputed the caufe of her miscarriage, and the fad experience fhe has had of the confequence of not knowing the was breeding. But though this misfortune has deprived you of the confolation of a nephew, or niece, to fupply the lofs of your brother; you must remember that blefling feems rather to be deferred than denied, fince her life is preferved from whom that happiness is to be expected. I intreat you then to reprefent this accident to your father † in the most favourable light; as your fex are the best advocates in cafes of this kind. Farewel. LETTER CVI. To Minutianus. The inexperience of her youth rendered LETTER CV. To Hifpulla. WHEN I confider that you love your niece even more tenderly than if he were your own daughter, I ought in the first place to inform you of her recovery before I tell you the has been ill; that the fentiments of joy at the one may leave you no leifure to be afflicted at the other; though I fear indeed, after your first tranfports of gratulation are over, you will feel fome concern, and in the midst of your joy for the danger the has efcaped, will tremble at the thought of that which fhe has undergone. She is now, however, in good fpirits, and again reftored to herself and to me; as the is making the fame progrefs in the recovery of her ftrength and health that • His wife's aunt. † Fabatus, grandfather to Calphurnia, Pliny's wife. tended i tended the cause in which I was interefted? And am I lefs indebted, now that my whole care and bufinefs is of the literary kind, for his affiduity in my concerns of this fort? A point which, if not the only, is however the principal inftance wherein I can be obliged. But though I owed him no return of this nature; though I were not engaged to him by the reciprocal tie of the fame good offices he has done me; yet not only the beauty of his extenfive genius, as polite as it is feverely correct, but the dignity of his fubject would strongly incite me to be of his audience. He has written an account of the deaths of feveral illuftrious perfons, fome of which were my particular friends. It is a pious office then, it fhould feem, as I could not be prefent at their obfequies, to attend, at leaft, this (as I may call it) their funeral oration; which, though a late, is, however, for that reafon, a more unfufpected tribute to their memories. Farewel. I LETTER CVII. To Genialis. MUCH approve of your having read my orations with your father. It is highly for your advantage to learn from a man of his cloquence, what to admire in compofitions of this kind, and what to condemn; as you will at the fame time be trained up in an habitual cuftom of fpeaking your real fentiments. You fee whofe fteps it is you ought to follow; and happy are you in having a living example before you, which is at once the nearest and the nobleft model you can purfue! In a word, that he whom nature defigned you should moft refemble, is, of all others, the perfon whom you fhould moft imitate. Farewel. received the fame bad accounts of my own little farms; and am myfelf therefore at full leifure to write books for you, provided I can but raife money enough to furnish me with good paper. For fhould I be reduced to the coarfe and fpungy fort, either I must not write at all, or whatever I compofe, whether good or bad, muft neceffarily undergo one cruel blot! Farewel. LETTER CIX. THE ficknefs which has lately ru through my family, and carried off feveral of my domeftics, fome of them too in the prime of their years, has deeply afflicted me. I have two confolations, however, which though they are not equal to fo confiderable a grief, fill they are confolations. One is, that as I have always very readily manumifed my flaves, their death does not feem altogether immature, if they lived long enough to receive their freedom; the other, that I have allowed them to make a kind of wil! *, which I obferve as religiously as if they were legally entitled to that pri vilege. I receive and obey their lat`requefts as fo many authoritative commands, fuffering them to difpofe of their effects to whom they pleafe; with this fingle reftriction, that they leave them to fome in my family, which to perfons in their station is to be esteemed as a fort of commonwealth. But though I endeavour to acquiefce under thefe reflections, yet the fame tendernefs which led me to fhew them thefe indulgences, ftill breaks out and overpowers my ftrongeft refolutions. However, I could not wish to be infenfible to thefe foft impreffions of humanity; though the generality of the world, I know, look upon loffes of this kind in no other view, than as a diminution of their property, and fancy, by cherishing fuch an unfeeling temper, they difcover a fuperior fortitude and good fenfe. Their wifdom and magnanimity I fhall not difpute; but manly I am fure they are not; for it is the very criterion of true manhood to feel thofe impreffions of forrow which it endeavours to refift; and to ad mit, not to be above, the want of confolation. But perhaps I have detained you too long upon this fubject,-though not fo long as I would. There is a certain pleafure in giving vent to one's grief, efpecially when we pour out our forrow in the bofom of a friend, who will approve, or at least pardon our tears. Farewel. LETTER CX. To Macrinus. S the feafon with you as rude and boisterous as it is with us? All here is tempeft and inundation; the Tiber has fwelled its channel, and overflowed its banks far and wide. Though the wife precaution of the emperor had guarded. against this evil, by cutting feveral outlets to the river; it has nevertheless flooded all the fields and valleys, and entirely overspread the whole face of the fat country. It feems to have gone out to meet thofe rivers which it used to reteive and carry off in one intermingled fream; and has driven them back to deluge thofe countries it could not reach felf. That most delightful of rivers. the Anio, which feems invited and detained in its courfe by the charming villas that are fituated upon its banks, has almost entirely rooted up and carried away the woods which fhaded its borders. It has overthrown whole mountains, and in endeavouring to find a paflage through the ruins that obftructed its way, has forced down houfes and rifes over the defolation it has occafioned. The inhabitants of the hill countries, who are fituated above the reach of this inundation, have been the melancholy fpectators of its dreadful effects, having feen coftly furniture, inftruments of husbandry, ploughs, and oxen with their drivers, whole herds of cattle, together with the trunks of trees, and beams of the neighbouring villas, floating about in different parts. Nor indeed have these higher places themfelves, to which the waters could not file, efcaped the calamity. A continued heavy rain, as deftructive as the river itfelf, poured down in torrents upon them, and has destroyed all the enclosures which Now called the Teverone, which falls into the Tiber about three miles from Rome. divided that fertile country. It has damaged likewife, and even overturned, fome of the public buildings, where numbers have been miferably buried in the ruins. And thus thofe people, befides the lofs of their effects, have fuffered the additional misfortune of lamenting their friends. I am extremely uneafy left this extenfive ruin fhould have spread to you: I beg, therefore, if it has not, you will immediately eafe me of my fears. And indeed I defire you would inform me though it should; for the difference is not great between fearing a danger, and feeling it; except that the evil one feels has fome bounds, whereas one's apprehenfions have none. For we can fuffer fear all that pofiibly may have, happened. no more than what actually has, but we Farewel. LETTER CXI. IT is a mistaken maxim which is gene rally advanced, that a man's will is a kind of mirror wherein one may clearly fee his genuine character. We have a late inftance to the contrary in Domitius Tullus, who appears a much better man fince his death, than during his life. After having artfully encouraged the expectations of those who paid court to has left his eftate to his niece whom he him, with a view to being his heir, he adopted. He has given likewife feveral very confiderable legacies among his grandchildren, and alfo to his greatgrandfon. In a word, he has fhewn himfelf a kind relation throughout his whole will; which is fo much the more to be admired as it was not expected of him. This affair has been much the subject of converfation: fome reprefent him as guilty of the bafeft falfehood and ingratitude; and while they thus complain of kindred, their invectives betray their own him as if they were actually difinherited difhoneft defigns; others, on the contrary, applaud him extremely for having dif appointed the hopes of this infamous tribe of men, whom, confidering the manners of the age, it is but prudence to deceive. They add farther, that he was not at liberty to make any other will, and that he cannot fo properly be faid to have left, as returned, his estate to his adopted N daughter, daughter, fince it was by her means it That is, would make her free; for the power of a father over his children was unlimited among the Romans. It extended not only to their fortunes, but their lives, and was even greater than what the laws allowed over their flaves; for if a mafter fold his flave, who afterwards obtained his freedom, the former owner had no farther claim; whereas, in the cafe of a fon, the father's right was not abfolutely extinguished by felling him, but if the fon obtained his freedom, he again came under his dominion. And this authority could not be wholly difannulled till the fon had been thrice fold, and as often recovered his liberty, and then it entirely ceafed. The law vefted the fame power likewife as fully in the adoptive father as in the natural. Juftinian obferves, this authority was pecu giving her this eftate which came to him from Afer, as well as all the reft which he poffeffed in common with his brother. His will therefore deferves the highest applaufe, as it is the dictates of nature, juftice, and honour; wherein he has returned his obligations to his feveral relations, according to their respective good offices towards him. He has made a juft acknowledgment likewife to his wife, having bequeathed to that excellent woman, who patiently endured much upon his account, feveral delightful villas, befides a large fum of money. And indeed fhe deferved fo much the more at his hands, as he was highly cenfured for her marriage with him. It was thought unworthy a perfon of her rank and merit, after having had a former husband by whom she had iffue, to marry, in the decline of her life, an old man, merely for his riches, who was fo fickly and infirm, that even though he had paffed the best years of his health and youth with her, the might well have been weary of him. He had fo entirely loft the ufe of all his limbs, that he could not move himfelf in bed without affiftance; and all the enjoyment he had of his riches was only to contemplate them. He was even reduced to the wretched neceffity (which indeed one cannot mention without loathing as well as lamenting) of having his teeth washed and cleanfed by others: and he ufed frequently to fay, when he was com plaining of the indecencies which his infirmities obliged him to fuffer, that he was every day forced to take his fervant's fingers into his inouth. Still, however, he lived, and was willing to accept of life upon thefe terms; the prefervation of which was particularly owing to the care of his wife, who, whatever reputation fhe might lofe at firt by her marriage, acquired great honour by her after-conduct towards him. Thus I have given you all the news of the town, where nothing is talked of but Tullus. It is expected Lis curiofities will fhortly be fold by auction. He had fuch vaft numbers of fine itatues, which flood neglected in a lumber-room, that he actually filled a large garden with them the very fame day he purchafed it. If you have any thing worth communicating in return, I hope you will not refufe the trouble of writing to me; not only as we are all naturally ford of news, liar to the Romans, and followed by no other na- but because example has a very beneficial tion whatfoever. Inft. l. 1. influence 179 influence upon our own conduct. Fare- other country which we admire as fruit wel. LETTER CXII. To Maximus. MY ftudies prove both an entertainment and confolation to me: and as there is no pleasure I prefer to them, fo there is no uneafinefs they do not alleviate. In this feafon, therefore, of dejection, occafioned by the indifpofition of my wife, the dangerous fickness of fome of my fervants, and the death of others, I fly to my books, thofe fovereign compofers of my grief. It is true, indeed, they teach me a greater fenfibility to misfortunes, bet they teach me too how to bear them with more patience. It is an established rule with me, before I publish any of my productions, to take the judgment of my friends upon them, efpecially yours. I beg therefore you would examine the performance I here fend you, with ticular care, as I am afraid the difquietude of my mind may have prevented me from giving it the attention I ought. For nough I could command myfelf fo far as to fit down to write, I was not mafter enough of my heart to do fo with eafe and cheerfulness: but if ftudy throws the mind into a pleafing ftate of ferenity, a Eate of ferenity is neceffary to throw a grace upon our ftudies. Farewel. par ful in wonders, they would long fince have been the fubject both of our converfation and inspection. For myself, at leaft, I confess I have lately been entertained with one of these curiofities to which I was an entire ftranger before. My wife's grandfather defired I would look upon his estate near Ameria *. As I was walking over his grounds I was fhewn a lake that lies below them, called Vadimon †, which I was informed had feveral very extraordinary qualities attending it. This raised my curiofity to take a nearer view. It is formed exactly circular: there is not the leaft obliquity or winding, but all is regular and even as if it had been hollowed and cut out by the hand of art. The colour of its water is clearer than than of the fea, though of fmell impregnated with fulphur, and is a deeper green; it feems by its taste and esteemed of great efficacy in all fractures of the limbs, which it is fuppofed to confolidate. Though it is but of a moderate extent, yet the winds have a great effect upon it, throwing it into violent commotions. No veffels are fuffered to fail here, as its waters are held facred; but feveral floating islands fwim about it covered with reeds and rushes, and whatever other plants the neighbouring marsh and the borders of the lake produce. Thefe islands differ in their fize and fhape; but the edges of all of them are worn away by their frequent collifion against the fhore and one another. They have equally the fame height and motion, as their refpective roots, which are formed like the keel of a boat, may be seen hanging down in the water, on whichever fide you ftand. Sometimes they move in a clutter, and feem to form one entire little continent; fometimes they are difPerfed into different quarters by the winds; at other times, when it is calm, they float up and down feparately. You may frequently fee one of the larger iflands failing along with a leffer joined to it, like a fhip with its long-boat; or, perhaps, feeming to ftrive which fhall out-fwim the other; then again they all affemble in one station, and by joining themfelves to the fhore, fometimes on one fide and sometimes on the other, make |