Page:The Natural History of Pliny.djvu/19

Rh 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 eight 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 dangerous 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 comprehensiveness and erudition, and not less varied than Nature herself. 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 advocate, 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