[I have altered the order of subjects in this letter, to make it
correspond with that of time. There cannot be much doubt that Arator's
_pomposa legatio_ from Dalmatia was his first introduction to the
Court of Theodoric, and preceded his employment as Advocatus.]

[Sidenote: Arator made Count of the Domestics.]

'By raising Tulum to the Patriciate we have provided for the military
strength of the State. Now must we see to it that she is equally
adorned by the glory of letters, and for this purpose we raise you,
still in the prime of life, to the rank of _Comes Domesticorum_. By
your example it was seen that eloquence could be acquired elsewhere
than at Rome, since in your own Province [probably Dalmatia] your
father, who was an extremely learned man, taught you to excel in this
art: a happy lot for you, who obtained from your father's love that
accomplishment which most youths have to acquire with terror from a
master.

'That I may say something here of a very _recherche_ character[520], I
may mention that, according to some, letters were first invented by
Mercury, who watched the flight of cranes by the Strymon, and turned
the shapes assumed by their flying squadron into forms expressive of
the various sounds of the human voice.

[Footnote 520: 'Ut aliquid studiose exquisitum dicere videamur.']

'You were sent upon a stately embassy[521] by the Provincials of
Dalmatia to our grandfather; and there, not in commonplace words but
with a torrent of eloquence, you so set forth their needs and the
measures which would be for the advantage of the public, that
Theodoric, a man of cautious temperament, listened to your flow of
words without weariness, and all men desired still to listen, when you
ceased speaking.

[Footnote 521: 'Juvat repetere pomposam legationem.']

'[Since then] you have filled the office of Advocate in our Court. You
might have been a trier of causes (Cognitor): you have preferred to be
a pleader, though to all your advocacy you have brought so fair and
judicial a mind that your eloquence and your zeal for your client have
never exceeded the bounds of truth.'

13. KING ATHALARIC TO AMBROSIUS.

[Conferring on him the Quaestorship.]

[This Ambrosius, son of Faustinus, is apparently the same to whom
Ennodius addressed his 'Paraenesis Didascalica,' containing some
important notices of Festus, Symmachus, Boethius, Cethegus, and their
contemporaries. (In Migne's 'Patrologia' lxiii. 250.)]

[S