The Letters of Cassiodorus Part 83

6. SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PRAEFECT, TO ALL THE SUBORDINATE GOVERNORS OF THE PRAEFECTURE[818].

[Footnote 818: 'Universis Praefecturae t.i.tulos administrantibus.']

[Sidenote: General instructions to subordinate Governors.]

'The exhortations addressed to you by the inborn piety of our Lords ought to suffice; but nevertheless, that we may be doubly a.s.sured, we will address to you our threats against all who shall wield their power unrighteously. Cease from avarice, from arrogance, from venality. What will your money avail you when the day of inquisition comes? _We_ shall not be tempted by it. Let it be clearly understood that we shall not sell pardons to unjust Judges, but shall hunt them to their ruin.

'But all you, good and honest rulers, continue to serve the State without fear. No rival will buy your offices over your heads; you are secure in your seats so long as you do well, until the time fixed by our Lords expires. Be earnest, therefore, that my good deeds may be imitated and receive their due meed of praise in your persons.'

7. SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PRAEFECT, TO THE TAX-COLLECTOR OF THE VENETIAN PROVINCE[819].

[Footnote 819: 'Canonicario Venetiarum.']

[Sidenote: Remission of taxes on account of invasion by the Suevi.]

'A good Sovereign will always exert himself to repair fortuitous disasters, and will allow those who have paid their taxes punctually in prosperity, considerable liberty in times of barbaric invasion. On this ground, and on account of the incursions of the Suevi, the King grants for this year, the fifteenth Indiction[820], a discharge of all claims by the Fiscus preferred against A and B. And in all similar cases where you shall be satisfied that the property has really been laid waste by those Barbarians, you are at liberty to remit the taxes for this Indiction. Afterwards you will use all the ordinary methods, in order that you may be able to pay over the stipulated sum to the Royal Treasurer. But meanwhile the poor cultivator has the best of all arguments against paying you, namely, that he has nothing left him wherewith to pay. Thus is his calamity his best voucher for payment[821]; and we do not wish that he who has been already alarmed by the arms of the robber should further tremble at the official robe of the civil servant[822].

[Footnote 820: Sept. 1, 536, to Sept. 1, 537.]

[Footnote 821: 'Validas contra te apochas invenerunt.']

[Footnote 822: 'Chlamydes non pavescant, qui arma timuerunt.']

8. SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PRAEFECT, TO THE CONSULARIS OF THE PROVINCE OF LIGURIA.

[Sidenote: Permission to pay taxes direct to Royal Treasury.]

'It is a new and delightful kind of profit to be able to grant the request of a pet.i.tioner without feeling any loss oneself. The present suitor, complaining that he is vexed by the exactions of the tax-gatherer on account of certain farms mentioned in the subjoined letter, offers to bring the amount due from them himself to our Treasurers[823]. We are willing to grant this request, on condition that the Fiscus does not suffer thereby; and therefore desire your Respectability to warn all _Curiales_, _Compulsores_, and all other persons concerned, to remove for this Indiction every kind of legal process from the before-mentioned properties; the condition of this immunity being that he shall, before the kalends of such and such a month produce the receipts[824] of the _Arcarius_, showing that he has discharged his debt to the State. Otherwise the debt must be exacted by ordinary process. But it is delightful to us whenever the tax is paid without calling in the aid of the _Compulsor_. Would that the peasant would always thus freely antic.i.p.ate the needs of the Treasury!'

[Footnote 823: 'Arcarii.']

[Footnote 824: 'Apochae.']

9. SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PRAEFECT, TO PASCHASIUS, PRAEFECT OF THE CORN-DISTRIBUTIONS[825].

[Footnote 825: 'Praefectus Annonae.']

[Sidenote: African claims to succeed to estate of an intestate countryman.]

[To make this letter intelligible we must presuppose a custom, certainly a very extraordinary one, by which on the death of an African without heirs, any other African in Italy was allowed to claim the inheritance. By 'African,' no doubt, we must understand one of the indigenous inhabitants of Africa, perhaps a man of Negro race. The custom certainly cannot have applied to African Provincials of Roman descent. It was perhaps based on some old tribal notions of joint possession and mutual inheritance.]

'It is a work of wondrous kindness to oblige a foreign race with public benefits, and not only to invite blood relations to enjoy the advantages of property, but to permit even strangers to share them.

This kind of heirs.h.i.+p is independent of the ties of kindred, independent of succession from parents, and requires nothing else save only power to utter the speech of the fatherland.

'This is the privilege which, as the African a.s.serts, was of old bestowed on his race. By virtue thereof they lawfully demand the inheritance of others, and thus obtain a right which the Roman in a similar case could never claim. Nor have they this benefit in their own land; but here they are for this purpose looked upon as all related to one another.

'The whole nation, in what relates to the advantages of succession, is regarded as one family.

'Your Experience is therefore to submit the subject of this man's pet.i.tion to a diligent examination, and if it shall turn out, as he alleges, that the deceased has left no sons nor other persons who might reasonably claim to succeed him, your official staff is to induct him into the aforesaid property according to the established usage.

'He will thus cease to be a foreigner, and will acquire the status of a native possessor, and therewith the usual liability to pay tribute.

He is inferior to other owners only in this one point, that he lacks the power of alienating his property. Let him who has derived so much benefit from our commiseration now relieve others. Fortunate and enviable has turned out his captivity[826], which enables him at one and the same time to enjoy the citizens.h.i.+p of Rome and the privileges of the African.'

[Footnote 826: 'Felix illi contigit et praedicanda captivitas.' A little before, we read, 'Resumat facultatem quam se suspiraverat amississe.' These sentences suggest the idea that the pet.i.tioner had been brought over in the train of the lately deceased person as a slave. This a little lessens the difficulty of his being admitted to the inheritance. Compare Gen. xv. 3, where Abraham, before the birth of a son, says, 'And one born in my house' (i.e. a slave) 'is mine heir.']

10. SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PRAEFECT, TO DIVERS CANCELLARII IN THE PROVINCES.

[Sidenote: Taxes to be punctually enforced.]

'Arrears of tribute are like bodily diseases, serious and enfeebling when they become chronic. A man who is under a load of debt cannot be called free: he has abandoned the power of controlling his actions to another. Your supposed indulgence to the taxpayer is no real kindness.

There comes a time when the whole arrear of debt has to be claimed, and then these venal delays of yours make the demand seem twice as heavy in the eyes of the unfortunate taxpayer. Cease then to trade upon the peasants' losses. Exact the whole amount of taxes for the coming Indiction, and pay them in on the appointed day to the Treasurer[827] of the Province; or else it will be the worse for you, and you will have to return, stripped of all official rank[828], into the Province which you are conscious of having badly administered.

[Footnote 827: 'Arcarius.']

[Footnote 828: 'Degeniatus.']

'I shall not _speak_ again on this subject, but shall, if necessary, extract the sums from you by an irrevocable act of distraint.'

11. SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PRAEFECT, TO PETER, VIR CLARISSIMUS, DISTRIBUTOR OF RELISHES[829].

[Footnote 829: 'Erogatori obsoniorum.']

[Sidenote: Distribution of relishes to Roman citizens.]

'The liberality of a good Sovereign must not be discredited by fraud and carelessness in the person charged with its distribution. Even molten gold contracts a stain if not poured into an absolutely clean vessel. How sweet is it to see a stream flowing clear and unpolluted over a snow-white channel! Even so must you see that the gifts of the Sovereign of the State reach the Roman people as pure and as copious as they issue forth from him.

'All fraud is hateful; but fraud exercised upon the people of Romulus is absolutely unbearable. That quiet and easily satisfied people, whose existence you might forget except when they testify their happiness by their shouts; noisy without a thought of sedition; whose only care is to shun poverty without ama.s.sing wealth; lowly in fortune but rich in temper--it is a kind of profanation to rob such people as these.

'We therefore entrust to you the task of distributing the relishes[830] to the Roman people from this Indiction. Be true to the citizens, else you will become as an alien unto us. Do not be bribed into allowing anyone to pa.s.s as a Latin who was not born in Latium.

[Footnote 830: 'Obsonia.']

'These privileges belong to the Quirites alone: no slave must be admitted to share them. That man sins against the majesty of the Roman people, who defiles the pure river of their blood by thrusting upon them the fellows.h.i.+p of slaves.'

12. SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PRAEFECT, TO ANASTASIUS, CANCELLARIUS OF LUCANIA AND BRUTTII.

[Sidenote: Praise of the cheese and wine of Bruttii.]

'When we were dining, according to our wonted custom, with the Sovereign of the State[831], the conversation happened to turn upon the delicacies of various Provinces, and we praised the wines of Bruttii and the cheese of the district around Mount Sila[832].

[Footnote 831: 'c.u.m apud rerum Dominum solemni more pranderemus.']

[Footnote 832: 'Silanum.' Mount Sila is a range of hills in Calabria immediately to the north of Squillace, forty miles from north to south, and twenty miles from east to west, and occupying the whole of the projecting portion of the south-east side of Italy between the Gulf of Squillace and the Bay of Taranto. The highest peaks, which are about 5,700 feet high, are covered with snow during half the year. It is said that from the beginning of June till far on into October, 15,000 head of cattle and 150,000 sheep, besides horses and mules, graze in these uplands. (See Gael-Fells: Unter Italien, p. 721.)]