44. FORMULA FOR THE GRANT OF PUBLIC PROPERTY ON CONDITION OF IMPROVEMENT[496]. [Footnote 496: Formula de Competitoribus is the somewhat obscure title of this document, which might perhaps be compared to our Commons' Enclosure Acts.] [Sidenote: De Competitoribus.] 'He who seeks to become owner of public property can only justify his claim by making the squalid beautiful, and by adorning the waste. Therefore, as you desire it, we confer upon you as your full property such and such a place, reserving all mineral rights--brass, lead, marbles--should any such be found therein; but we do this on the understanding that you will restore to beauty that which has become shabby by age and neglect. It is the part of a good citizen to adorn the face of his city, and you may securely transmit to your posterity that which your own labour has accomplished[497].' [Footnote 497: 'Securus etiam ad posteros transmissurus, quod proprio fuerit labore compositum.'] 45. FORMULA OF REMISSION OF TAXES WHERE THE TAXPAYER HAS ONLY ONE HOUSE, TOO HEAVILY ASSESSED. [Sidenote: Formula qua census relevetur ei qui unam casam possidet praegravatam.] 'You complain that the land-tax (tributum) levied upon your holding (possessio) in such a Province is so heavy that all your means are swallowed up in the swamp of indebtedness, and that more is claimed by the tax-collectors than can be obtained from the soil by the husbandman. You might, by surrendering the property altogether, escape from this miserable necessity which is making you a slave rather than, a landowner; but since the Imperial laws (sacratissimae leges) give us the power to relieve a man of moderate fortune in such circumstances, our Greatness, which always hath the cause of justice at heart, decrees by these presents that if the case be as you say, the liability for the payment of so many solidi on behalf of the aforesaid property shall be cancelled in the public archives, and that this shall be done so thoroughly that there shall be no trace of it left in any copy of the taxing-rolls by which the charge may be revived at a future day[498].' [Footnote 498: 'Decernimus ut, si ita est, tot solidos tributario supradictae possessionis ... ita faciatis de vasariis publicis diligenter abradi ut hujus rei duplarum vestigium non debeat inveniri.' Cf. what is said by Evagrius (iii. 39) of the proceedings of Anastasius at the time of the abolition of the Chrysargyron.] 46. FORMULA LEGITIMATING MARRIAGE WITH A FIRST COUSIN. [Sidenote: Formula qua consobrina legitima fiat uxor.] 'After the laws of the two tables, Moses adds the laws wherein God forbids marriages between near kindred, to guard against incest and provide for a wise admixture of divers strains of blood[499]. [Footnote 499: 'Ne dilationem providam in genus extraneum non haberent.']