CURRENT LITERATURE.
TWO NEW VOLUMES IN " Illh LOEB CLASSICAL LIBRARY."
Dio's Boman History. Translated by E. Cary. 9 vols. Vol 1.—Suetonius. Translated by J. a Rolphe. 2 vole. Vol. L " The Loeb Classical Library." (W. Heinemann. 5s. net per vol.)—Dr. Cary's version of Dio Cassius is based on one by H. B. Foster (1905-6), which was the first to appear in English, and his text is founded (as indeed it was bound to be) on the now standard work of Bolesevain. Dio's value as an historian is somewhat impaired by his inveterate tendency to rhetoric and his marked monarchical bias, and it is (says Professor Cary) chiefly to his, popularity with the Byzantines that we owe the pre- servation of the large mass of his history which has survived. None the less, one can be thankful to the editors of this most useful series for giving us convenient access to this work. In some respects, perhaps, the edition a little underrates its sub- ject, for Dio was enabled' by his official position (he was twice Consul, besides acting as Proconsul in Africa) to write with unusual authority, due in part, as the later books of his history show, to his familiarity with official records. With Suetonins's Lives of the Caesars we are on more familiar ground. The editors have preferred to have a new version made rather than to reprint the famous one of Philemon Holland. And in some ways this is to be regretted, for Holland's translation is unapproachable in the matter of style (though the style is Holland and not Suetonius) and remarkably accurate. But Dr. Rolphe provides a careful and scholarly version which should be widely read.
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