LIFE AND WRITINGS OF PLINT. XUl 



death. Commending his memory to Pliny's attentive care, 

 Drusus conjured him to rescue it from the decaying effect 

 of oblivion. Next to these came his three books entitled ' The 

 Student'^, divided, on account of their great size, into six 

 volumes. In these he has given instructions for the training 

 of the orator, from the cradle to his entrance on public 

 life. In the latter years of Nero's reign, he wrote ei^ht 

 books, ' On Difficulties in the Latin Language^ ;' that being 

 a period at which every kind of study, in any way free-spoken 

 or even of elevated style, would have been rendered danger- 

 ous by the tyranny that was exercised. His next work was 

 his ' Continuation of the History of Aufidius Bassus,' in 

 thirty-one books ; after which came his ' Natural History,' 

 in thirty-seven books, a work remarkable for its comprehen- 

 siveness and erudition, and not less varied than Nature her- 

 self. You will wonder how a man so occupied with business 

 could possibly find time to write such a number of volumes, 

 many of them on subjects of a nature so difficult to be 

 treated of. You will be even more astonished when you 

 learn, that for some time he pleaded at the bar as an advo- 

 cate, that he was only in his fifty-sixth year at the time of 

 his death, and that the time that intervened was equally 

 trenched upon and frittered away by the most weighty duties 

 of business, and the marks of favour shewn him by princes. 

 His genius, however, was truly quite incredible, his zeal 

 indefatigable, and his power of application wonderful in the 

 extreme. At the festival of the Vulcanalia^, he began to 

 sit up to a late hour by candle-light, not for the purpose of 

 consulting"* the stars, but with the object of pursuing his 

 studies ; while, in the winter, he would set to work at the 

 seventh hour of the night, or the eighth at the very latest, 

 often indeed at the sixth^. By nature he had the faculty of 

 being able to fall asleep in a moment ; indeed, slumber would 

 sometimes overtake him in his studies, and then leave him 

 just as suddenly. Before daybreak, he was in the habit of 

 attending the Emperor Vespasian, — for he, too, was one who 

 made an excellent use of his nights, — and then betook him- 



1 " Studiosus." This work has perished. 



3 " De Dubia Sermone." A few scattered fragments of it still survive. 



* 23rd of August. * For astrological presages. 



' At midwinter, this hour would answer at Rome to our midnight. 



