(Marcellinus Comes, sub anno).]

'Go nearer: you will see as it were rivers of dust flowing, and
glowing streams of barren sand moving over the country. You see and
wonder: the furrows of the fields are suddenly lifted to a level with
the tops of the trees; the country, which but now was dressed in a
robe of gladsome greenness, is laid waste by sudden and mournful heat.
And yet, even those sandy tracts of pumice-stone which the mountain
vomits forth, dry and burnt up as they appear, have their promise of
fertility. There are germs within them which will one day spring to
life, and re-clothe the mountain side which they have wasted.

'How strange that one mountain alone should thus terrify the whole
world! Other mountains may be seen with silently glowing summits; this
alone announces itself to distant lands by darkened skies and changed
air. So it still goes on, shedding its dusty dews over the land; ever
parting with its substance, yet a mountain still undiminished in
height and amplitude. Who that sees those mighty blocks in the plain
would believe that they had boiled over from the depths of that
distant hill, that they had been tossed like straws upon the wind by
the angry spirit of the mountain?

'Therefore let your Prudence so manage the enquiry that those who have
really suffered damage shall be relieved, while no room is left for
fraud.'

51. KING THEODORIC TO SYMMACHUS, PATRICIAN[368].

[Footnote 368: The father-in-law of Boethius.]

[Sidenote: Commends the public spirit of Symmachus, as shown in the
restoration of Pompey's theatre.]

Commends him for the diligence and skill with which he has decorated
Rome with new buildings--especially in the suburbs, which no one would
distinguish from the City except for the occasional glimpses of
pleasant fields; and still more for his restoration of the massive
ruins of past days[369], chiefly the theatre of Pompeius.

[Footnote 369: We have here a striking description of the massive
strength of the public buildings of Rome: '[Videmus] caveas illas
saxis pendentibus apsidatas ita juncturis absconditis in formas
pulcherrimas convenisse, ut cryptas magis excelsi montis crederes quam
aliquid fabricatum esse judicares.']

As the letter is addressed to a learned man, it seems a suitable
opportunity to explain why Antiquity reared this mighty pile.
Accordingly a very long digression follows on the origin, progress,
and decline of Tragedy, Comedy, and Pantomime.