Letter 2031: Those who have enrolled in military service must devote themselves to public duties.

31. KING THEODERIC TO THE BARGEMEN [dromonarii, operators of light river vessels]. [1] Those who have given their names to the service ought to sweat for the public benefit. For what is a man to do, if he fails in the duty he has professed, so that he neither finds private advantages nor wins the glory of energetic effort? And therefore our authority has instructed the Count of the Sacred Largesses that you are to be stationed at the place called Hostilia, so that, restored by the bounty of the treasury, you may make your runs with the post-couriers along the channel of the Po in the customary manner, in order that, by dividing the labor, the public horses may be relieved, since your own course is not worn down, being carried out over watery roads. For it does not befall you to limp from excessive toil, you who walk with your hands. Your vehicle feels no injury and suffers no failure, since it is borne rather by the running wave.

XXXI. DROMONARIIS THEODERICUS REX. [1] Publicis debent utilitatibus insudare qui nomen dedere militiae. quid enim agat homo, si professo desit obsequio, ut nec commoda privata reperiat nec gloriam strenuitatis adquirat? et ideo comiti sacrarum largitionum nostra praecepit auctoritas, ut in Hostiliensi loco constitui debeatis, quatenus fiscali humanitate recreati excursus cum veredariis per alveum Padi solito more faciatis, ut diviso labore equis publicis debeat subveniri, quando cursus vester non atteritur, qui per vias liquidas expeditur. non enim vobis nimio labore claudicare contingit, qui manibus ambulatis. vehiculum vestrum non sentit iniuriam nec defectum patitur, quod unda potius currente portatur.