[9] The procurator was in this case practically governor. In some instances he was the representative of a chief governor (_praeses_) to whom he was subject, _e.g._ Pontius Pilate was procurator of Judaea under the Governor of Syria. The _Q.N._ was composed probably about the year 63 or 64. We might content ourselves with the statement of the fact, did not the circumstances of composition throw light upon difficulties of arrangement and sequence which can scarcely be passed unnoticed. The evidence on which we have to rely is chiefly internal. The exact date of Lucilius’ procuratorship in Sicily (159) is unknown, but the consulship of Regulus and Virginius, which witnessed the Campanian earthquake (221), fell in 63, that is, some two years before Seneca’s death. The allusions in the Preface to Book III. (109) are still more direct and convincing. The writer was drawing near his end, pressed hard on the rear by old age, with every necessity and incentive to hurry on the completion of his task. On the other hand, the mission despatched by Nero to the sources of the Nile (235–6) would naturally point to an earlier date during the more promising years of his reign--unless indeed, as is by no means improbable, the complimentary reference to the emperor’s virtues be a piece of adulation. A similar reference recurs in connection with the comet in Nero’s reign (290), the date of which must (after Tacitus) be assigned to the year 61. The Elder Pliny, writing in 77, about a dozen years after Seneca’s death, adds to each Book of his _Natural History_ an exhaustive list of the authorities, native and foreign, that he had used. Book II. deals with many of the subjects of the _Q.N._, of which it is in some places an expansion, but in most little more than an epitome.[10] And yet no mention of Seneca occurs in the list of authorities attached, which seems strange if the work had then been given to the world.[11] [10] See particularly Pliny’s treatment of Comets (ii. xxii.), Winds (xliv.-l.), Lightning (liii.), Floating Islands (xcvi.). But most striking of all is the reproduction (lxiii.) of Seneca’s remark (208 end of c. xv.), “If any nether gods existed, they would have been dug up long ere this in the mines sunk by our avarice and luxury.” The two authors had hit upon the same thought, and Seneca had happened to use it first. Or it may have been a current witticism in an age of unbelief. [11] Seneca’s name does occur in the lists attached to Books VI. IX. and XXXVI.; the first is geographical, dealing with Asia and Africa, the second has for subject fishes and aquatic life in general, while the third deals with the natural history of stones.