ds of gold, above one hundred and sixty thousand pounds
sterling; without computing the stated provision of corn and wine,
which, had they been sold, might have equalled in value one third of
the money. Compared to this immoderate wealth, an ordinary revenue of
a thousand or fifteen hundred pounds of gold might be considered as no
more than adequate to the dignity of the senatorian rank, which required
many expenses of a public and ostentatious kind. Several examples
are recorded, in the age of Honorius, of vain and popular nobles, who
celebrated the year of their praetorship by a festival, which lasted
seven days, and cost above one hundred thousand pounds sterling. [27]
The estates of the Roman senators, which so far exceeded the proportion
of modern wealth, were not confined to the limits of Italy. Their
possessions extended far beyond the Ionian and Aegean Seas, to the most
distant provinces: the city of Nicopolis, which Augustus had founded
as an eternal monument of the Actian victory, was the property of the
devout Paula; [28] and it is observed by Seneca, that the rivers, which
had divided hostile nations, now flowed through the lands of private
citizens. [29] According to their temper and circumstances, the estates
of the Romans were either cultivated by the labor of their slaves, or
granted, for a certain and stipulated rent, to the industrious farmer.
The economical writers of antiquity strenuously recommend the former
method, wherever it may be practicable; but if the object should be
removed, by its distance or magnitude, from the immediate eye of
the master, they prefer the active care of an old hereditary tenant,
attached to the soil, and interested in the produce, to the mercenary
administration of a negligent, perhaps an unfaithful, steward. [30]

[Footnote 23: Secundinus, the Manichaean, ap. Baron. Annal. Eccles. A.D.
390, No. 34.]

[Footnote 24: See Nardini, Roma Antica, p. 89, 498, 500.]

[Footnote 25:

Quid loquar inclusas inter laquearia sylvas;
Vernula queis vario carmine ludit avis.

Claud. Rutil. Numatian. Itinerar. ver. 111. The poet lived at the
time of the Gothic invasion. A moderate palace would have covered
Cincinnatus's farm of four acres (Val. Max. iv. 4.) In laxitatem ruris
excurrunt, says Seneca, Epist. 114. See a judicious note of Mr. Hume,
Essays, vol. i. p. 562, last 8vo edition.]

[Footnote 26: This curious account of Rome, in the reign of Honorius, is
found in a fragm