ecently introduced, and a still larger proportion may be allowed for
the industrious provinces of the East. 5. Besides the public revenue,
which an absolute monarch might levy and expend according to his
pleasure, the emperors, in the capacity of opulent citizens, possessed
a very extensive property, which was administered by the count or
treasurer of the private estate. Some part had perhaps been the ancient
demesnes of kings and republics; some accessions might be derived from
the families which were successively invested with the purple; but the
most considerable portion flowed from the impure source of confiscations
and forfeitures. The Imperial estates were scattered through the
provinces, from Mauritania to Britain; but the rich and fertile soil of
Cappadocia tempted the monarch to acquire in that country his fairest
possessions, and either Constantine or his successors embraced the
occasion of justifying avarice by religious zeal. They suppressed the
rich temple of Comana, where the high priest of the goddess of war
supported the dignity of a sovereign prince; and they applied to their
private use the consecrated lands, which were inhabited by six thousand
subjects or slaves of the deity and her ministers. But these were not
the valuable inhabitants: the plains that stretch from the foot of
Mount Argaeus to the banks of the Sarus, bred a generous race of horses,
renowned above all others in the ancient world for their majestic shape
and incomparable swiftness. These sacred animals, destined for the
service of the palace and the Imperial games, were protected by the laws
from the profanation of a vulgar master. The demesnes of Cappadocia were
important enough to require the inspection of a count; officers of an
inferior rank were stationed in the other parts of the empire; and the
deputies of the private, as well as those of the public, treasurer
were maintained in the exercise of their independent functions, and
encouraged to control the authority of the provincial magistrates. 6,
7. The chosen bands of cavalry and infantry, which guarded the person of
the emperor, were under the immediate command of the two counts of the
domestics. The whole number consisted of three thousand five hundred
men, divided into seven schools, or troops, of five hundred each; and in
the East, this honorable service was almost entirely appropriated to
the Armenians. Whenever, on public ceremonies, they were drawn up in the
courts and por