Letter 6028: I know the reason which prevented your being able to welcome me on my arrival in Campania, but though you were...

Pliny the YoungerHellespontius|c. 104 AD|Pliny the Younger
barbarian invasion

To Pontius.

I know the reason which prevented your being able to welcome me on my arrival in Campania, but though you were absent you still managed to make your way there and your influence felt. So abundant were the supplies of town and country produce offered me in your name, and I was unconscionable enough to accept them all ! For your people begged me to do so, and I was afraid you would be cross both with them and me if I did not. For the future, however, unless you set some bounds to your hospitality, I will have to, and I have even warned your people that, if they bring such a load of things again, I will send them all back. You will say that I ought to help myself to your property as though it were my own. Quite so, but I do so as sparingly as though it were mine. Farewell

Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.

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