B.--THE WRITER.


Suidas, the lexicographer of the tenth century, who is profitable for
so many things, has this entry under "Dio":

Dio--called Cassius, surnamed Cocceius (others
"Cocceianus"), of Nicæa, historian, born in the times of
Alexander son of Mammæa, wrote a Roman History in 80 books
(they are divided by decades), a "Persia", "The Getæ",
"Journey-signs", "In Trajan's Day", "Life of Arrian the
Philosopher".

Photius, an influential Patriarch of Constantinople and belonging to
the ninth century, has in his "Bibliotheca" a much longer notice,
which, however, contains almost nothing that a reader will not find in
Dio's own record. This is about the extent of the information afforded
us by antiquity, and modern biographers usually fall back upon the
author's own remarks regarding himself, as found scattered through his
Roman History. Such personal references were for the first time
carefully collected, systematically arranged, and discussed in the
edition of Reimar; subsequently the same matter was reprinted in the
fifth volume of the Dindorf Teubner text.

Just a word first in regard to the lost works with which Suidas
credits Dio. He probably never wrote the "Persia": perhaps it belonged