'Your day of promotion is come. Proceed to such and such a Province, in order that you may assist the Judex and his staff in collecting the Bina and Terna, before the first of March, and may forward them without delay to the Count of Sacred Largesses. Let there be no extortion from the cultivator, no dishonest surrender of our rights.'
[23.] Formula of the Vicarius of Portus.
Vicarius Portus.
'Great prudence is necessary in your office, since discords easily arise between two nationalities. Therefore you must use skill to soothe those [the Greek merchants and sailors from the Levant] whose characters are unstable as the winds, and who, unless you bring their minds into a state of calm, will, with their natural quickness of temper, fly out into the extremity of insolence.'
[24.] Formula of the Princeps of Dalmatia.
Princeps Dalmatiarum.
[The Princeps, as observed on [p. 96], seems to have practically disappeared from the Officium of the Praefectus Praetorio. Here, however, we find a Provincial Princeps whose rank and functions are not a little perplexing. It seems probable that, while still nominally only the chief of a staff of subordinates, he may, owing to the character of the superior under whom he served, have practically assumed more important functions. That superior in this case was a Comes, whose military character is indicated by the first letter of this book. The Princeps was therefore virtually the Civil Assessor of this officer.
The Comes under Theodoric would generally be a Goth; the Princeps must be a Roman and a Jurisconsult. The business of the former was war and administration; that of the latter, judgment, though his decisions were apparently pronounced by the mouth of the Comes, his superior in rank.]
'Whosoever serves while bearing the title of Princeps has high pre-eminence among his colleagues. To the Consul of the Provinces power is given, but to you the Judge himself is entrusted. Without you there is no access to the Secretarium, nor is the ceremony of salutation[478] [by subordinate officers] performed. You hold the vine-rod[479] which menaces the wicked; you have the right, withheld from the Governor himself, of punishing the insolence of an orator pleading in his Court. The records of the whole suit have to be signed by you, and for this your consent is sought after the will of the Judge has been explained.'