Page:Frontinus - The stratagems, and, the aqueducts of Rome (Bennet et al 1925).djvu/22

 details with the spirit of the true investigator, displaying at all times a scrupulous honesty and fidelity. Were one asked to point out, in all Roman history, another such example of civic virtue and conscientious performance of simple duty, it would be difficult to know where to find it. Men of genius, courage, patriotism are not lacking, but examples are few of men who laboured with such whole-souled devotion in the performance of homely duty, the reward for which could certainly not be large, and might possibly not exceed the approval of one's own conscience.

In Martial we have a picture of Frontinus spending his leisure days in a delightful environment. Pliny writes of appealing to him as one well qualified to help to settle a legal dispute. In the preface to an essay on farming which Frontinus wrote, it is stated that he was interrupted in his writing by being obliged to serve as a soldier, and it is thought that this may have been on the occasion of Trajan's expedition against the Dacians in 99; this, however, is pure conjecture.

Near Oppenheim in Germany has been found an inscription dedicated by Julia Frontina, presumably xvi