is seems to have been very slight, if it existed at all; but
the dignity of the latter office was probably somewhat the greater.]

[Sidenote: Rector Provinciae.]

'It is important to repress crime on the spot. If all criminal causes
had to wait till they could be tried in the capital, robbers would
grow so bold as to be intolerable. Hence the advantage of Provincial
Governors. Receive then for this Indiction the office of Rector of
such and such a Province. Look at the broad stripe (laticlave) on your
purple robe, and remember the dignity which is betokened by that
bright garment, which poets say was first woven by Venus for her son
Priapus, that the son's beautiful robe might attest the mother's
loveliness.

'You have to collect the public revenues, and to report to the
Sovereign all important events in your Province. You may judge even
Senators and the officers of Praefects. Your name comes before that of
even dignified Provincials, and you are called Brother by the
Sovereign. See that your character corresponds to this high vocation.
Your subjects will not fear you if they see that your own actions are
immoral. There can be no worse slavery than to sit on the
judgment-seat, knowing that the men who appear before you are
possessors of some disgraceful secret by which they can blast your
reputation.

'Refrain from unholy gains, and we will reward you all the more
liberally.'

22. FORMULA OF THE COUNT OF THE CITY OF SYRACUSE.

[Sidenote: Comitiva Syracusana.]

'We must provide such Governors for our distant possessions that
appeals from them shall not be frequent. Many men would rather lose a
just cause than have the expense of coming all the way from Sicily to
defend it; and as for complaints against a Governor, we should be
strongly inclined to think that a complaint presented by such distant
petitioners must be true.

'Act therefore with all the more caution in the office which we bestow
upon you for this Indiction. You have all the pleasant pomp of an
official retinue provided for you at our expense. Do not let your
soldiers be insolent to the cultivators of the soil (possessores). Let
them receive their rations and be satisfied with them, nor mix in
matters outside their proper functions. Be satisfied with the dignity
which your predecessors held. It ought not to be lowered; but do not
seek to exalt it.'

23. FORMULA OF THE COUNT OF NAPLES.

[Sidenote: Comitiva Neapolitana.]

'As the sun sends f