large band of armed men. This was reported to me; but since there was as yet no information who his abductors were nor where they had taken him, though suspicion fell on the man who had frightened him into seeking protection from the Church, I at once communicated with the tribune in command of the coast-guards. He sent soldiers; no one could be found, but in the morning we discovered the house in which he had been detained and found that his keeper had left with him after cock-crow. I also sent to the place to which it was said he had been carried off. When the afore-mentioned officer was found, he refused to grant to the priest I had sent permission even to see him. Next day I sent a letter requesting for him the privilege which the Emperor appointed in such cases as this,^a namely, that those under summons to appear in court should be asked at the municipal bench if they were willing to spend thirty days in that town under lenient observation, to put their affairs in order or to prepare their finances. My expectation was that during that period we could perhaps reach a settlement of his case by friendly discussion. Already, however, he had gone off with that officer and was taken to prison, but there is some fear that if he be brought before the governor’s tribunal, he may suffer some hardship, for although that judge has an excellent reputation for rectitude, Faventius’s opponent in the case is a very wealthy man. So to prevent the exercise of any undue influence in that court by his money, I beg your Holiness, my dearest lord and venerable brother, to hand my letter to the honourable magistrate, a man very dear to me, and to read this one to him, for I do not think it necessary to write a second account