6
The emperor, as often as he had leisure from war, held court and used to order that a most liberal supply of water be measured out for the speakers. [
] He made inquiries and answers of greater length, so that exact justice was ensured by every possible expedient. When thus engaged he would often hold court to try the same case for eleven or even twelve days and sometimes
A.D. 172 (a.u. 926)
at night. He was industrious and applied himself diligently to all the duties of his office; and there was nothing which he said or wrote or did that he regarded a minor matter, but sometimes he would consume whole days on the finest point, putting into practice his belief that the emperor should do nothing hurriedly. For he thought that if he should slight even the smallest detail, it would bring him reproach that would overshadow all his other achievements. Yet he was so frail in body that at first he could not endure the cold, but when the soldiers had already come together in obedience to orders he would retire before speaking a word to them; and he took but very little food always, and that at night. It was never his custom to eat during the daytime unless it were some of the drug called theriac. [
] This drug he took not so much because he feared anything as because his stomach and chest were in bad condition. And it is related that this practice enabled him to endure the disease as well as other hardships.
A.D. 172(?) 173(?)