mpute
the national riches by the use and abuse of the public credit. Yet the
maxims of antiquity are still embraced by a monarch formidable to his
enemies; by a republic respectable to her allies; and both have attained
their respective ends of military power and domestic tranquillity.

[Footnote 28: Voyage de Benjamin de Tudele, tom. i. c. 5, p. 44-52. The
Hebrew text has been translated into French by that marvellous child
Baratier, who has added a volume of crude learning. The errors and
fictions of the Jewish rabbi are not a sufficient ground to deny the
reality of his travels. * Note: I am inclined, with Buegnot (Les
Juifs d'Occident, part iii. p. 101 et seqq.) and Jost (Geschichte
der Israeliter, vol. vi. anhang. p. 376) to consider this work a mere
compilation, and to doubt the reality of the travels.--M.]

[Footnote 29: See the continuator of Theophanes, (l. iv. p. 107,)
Cedremis, (p. 544,) and Zonaras, (tom. ii. l. xvi. p. 157.)]

[Footnote 30: Zonaras, (tom. ii. l. xvii. p. 225,) instead of pounds,
uses the more classic appellation of talents, which, in a literal
sense and strict computation, would multiply sixty fold the treasure of
Basil.]

Whatever might be consumed for the present wants, or reserved for the
future use, of the state, the first and most sacred demand was for the
pomp and pleasure of the emperor, and his discretion only could define
the measure of his private expense. The princes of Constantinople were
far removed from the simplicity of nature; yet, with the revolving
seasons, they were led by taste or fashion to withdraw to a purer air,
from the smoke and tumult of the capital. They enjoyed, or affected to
enjoy, the rustic festival of the vintage: their leisure was amused by
the exercise of the chase and the calmer occupation of fishing, and in
the summer heats, they were shaded from the sun, and refreshed by the
cooling breezes from the sea. The coasts and islands of Asia and Europe
were covered with their magnificent villas; but, instead of the modest
art which secretly strives to hide itself and to decorate the scenery of
nature, the marble structure of their gardens served only to expose
the riches of the lord, and the labors of the architect. The successive
casualties of inheritance and forfeiture had rendered the sovereign
proprietor of many stately houses in the city and suburbs, of which
twelve were appropriated to the ministers of state; but the great
palace, [31] the centre of