MEMOIR OF PLINY. 
19 
as her own. As the two places, however, are not 
very distant from each other, and as it is certain that 
the Plinian family were settled at Comnin, where 
they possessed large property, and where various in- 
scriptions have been found relative to several of its 
members, the presumption is, notwithstanding the 
appellation bestowed on Catullus, that his birthplace 
w'as the usual residence of his ancestors. It was at 
Comum, too, that his nephew, the Younger Pliny, 
was born, so well known by his Letters. 
Without farther pursuing this controversy, which 
has elicited much erudite disquisition, we shall proceed 
to state that at an early age the Naturalist was sent 
to Rome, where be attended the lectures of Appioii. 
By this time the Emperor Tiberius had withdrawn 
to Caprem, for the more secure enjoyment of his 
luxuries and unlawful pleasures ; and it does not ap- 
pear that Pliny ever saw him. But it has been sup- 
posed that he assisted occasionally at the Court. of 
Caligula ; and we have his own authority that he had 
seen the Empress Lollia Paulina, of whose extrava- 
gance in jewellery, he gives so amusing an account, 
that we shall present it in the quaint style of Dr 
Philemon Holland, the only translation (to the shame 
of British literature be it spoken) which our language 
possesses. The passage, moreqver, will serve to give 
us some idea of the female fashions of Rome at that 
period, and the costly passion of the ladies for foreign 
ornaments. “ Our dames take a great pride in 
brauerie, to haue pearles not only hung dangling at 
