PLINIUS. 21 



tingulshed soldier. He was appointed Augur at 

 Rome, and subsequently had supreme power in 

 Spain. These were not apparently the positions 

 which were likely to stimulate a young man of wealth 

 to study natural history, and certainly, in later 

 days, the military man and active politician have 

 not proved, as a rule, enthusiastic students of plants 

 and animals. Want of time and inclination are, of 

 course, the usual excuses of such men, and the love 

 of luxury and of intellectual idleness might be added 

 also. Nevertheless there is an instance in the case 

 of the elder Plinius, where a man, greatly and im- 

 portantly occupied, spent much time in studying 

 nature, in compiling the observations made by his 

 predecessors, and in writing books which have 

 given him a fame which will last with the world. 

 In summer he began his work as soon as it was 

 light ; in winter, generally at one in the morning — 

 never later than two, and sometimes earlier.-'" No 

 man, writes his nephew, spent less time in bed, and 

 sometimes he would, without retiring from his 

 books, indulge in a short sleep, and then pursue 

 his studies. Before daybreak he went to the 

 Emperor Vespasian, who chose to transact business 

 at that hour, and when the Emperor had finished, 

 Plinius returned to his studies. After a slender repast 

 at noon, he would in the summer recline in the sun, 

 and during the time some book was read to him, 

 and he made extracts from the author. He used to 

 say that " no book was so bad but something might 

 be learned from it." After this he had a cold bath 



