Another short letter to Antoninus (iv. 18) not merely repeats the praise of his Greek epigrams, but informs us that Pliny himself has put some of these in Latin. A longer one, which follows, to Calpurnia Hispulla, contains an elaborate eulogy of the lady’s niece, Pliny’s second wife, who shows her good taste and virtue by learning her husband’s books by heart, instructing herself in literature generally for love of him, and singing his verses. And later, with something of the same innocence or lack of humour which was a Roman—in fact, has generally been a Latin—characteristic, he tells us that he has been for three days listening _cum summa voluptate_ to a certain Sentius Augurinus, reciting his poems or poemkins (_poematia_). Sentius, it seems, performed many things with lightness, many with sublimity, many with beauty, many with tenderness, many with sweetness, many _with bile_. It is not quite clear under which head comes the specimen he produces, which is a rather feeble compliment to Pliny himself. “Vides,” says Pliny, after quoting it, “quam acuta omnia, quam apta, quam expressa.” Besides, he is the friend of Spurinna and Antoninus. What an _emendatus adolescens_! V. 8[363] is a not uninteresting paper on History. Tutinius Capito wishes him, as he tells us others had done, to write this. Pliny is not ill-disposed to do so, not because he thinks he shall do it very well, but (the sentiment is a fine one, though a little bombastically expressed) because “it seems to him one of the best of actions to rescue from perishing that which ought to be eternal.”[364] His idea of history, however, is not very lofty. Oratory and Poetry, he says, must have style; History pleases howsoever it be written, because of the natural curiosity of man—a doctrine which, in slightly changed matter, has been joyfully accepted by the usual novelist. Besides, his uncle had been a diligent historian. Then why does he delay? Because he wants to execute a careful recension of his speeches in important cases, and he hardly feels equal to both tasks, while, though there is much in common between Oratory and History, they are also different. The contrast is curious, and shows the overweening position which Oratory had with the ancients. To History, says Pliny, things humble and sordid, or at least mediocre, belong: to Oratory, all that is exquisite, splendid, and lofty.[365] The bare bones, muscles, and nerves suit history: Oratory must have the swelling bulk of flesh and the waving plumes of hair. History pleases by rough, bitter energy:[366] Oratory by long-drawn sweetness. Diction, style, construction—all are different. After which he gives a somewhat unexpected turn to the famous Thucydidean saying, by admitting that history is the _ktema_, and the _agonisma_ oratory. And, therefore, he thinks that he had better not attempt at once two things so different. A letter to Suetonius about the books of both (v. 10), another to Spurinna (v.