to the empire of the east, tempted them to assert a claim, which they were incapable of supporting, either by reason or by arms. He is condemn. man senate, A. D. 397. When Stilicho had given a firm and ed by the Ro- decisive answer to the pretensions of the Byzantine court, he solemnly accused the tyrant of Africa before the tribunal, which had formerly judged the kings and nations of the earth; and the image of the republic was revived, after a long interval, under the reign of Honorius. The emperor transmitted an accurate and ample detail of the complaints of the provincials, and the crimes of Gildo, to the Roman senate; and the members of that venerable assembly were required to pronounce the condemnation of the rebel. Their unanimous suffrage declared him the enemy of the republic; and the decree of the senate added a sacred and legitimate sanction to the Roman arms." A people, who still remembered, that their ancestors had been the masters of the world, would have applauded, with conscious pride, the representation of ancient freedom; if they had not long since been accustomed to prefer the solid assurance of bread, to the unsubstantial visions of liberty and greatness. The subsistence of Rome depended on the harvests of Africa; and it was evident, that a declaration of war would be the signal of famine. The præfect Symmachus, who presided in the deliberations of the senate, admonished the minister of his just apprehension, that as soon as the revengeful Moor should prohibit the exportation of corn, the tranquillity, and perhaps the safety, of the capital, would be threatened by the hungry rage of a turbulent multitude. The prudence of Stilicho conceived, and executed, without delay, the most effectual measure for the relief of the Roman people. A large and seasonable supply of corn, collected in the inland provinces of Gaul, was embarked on the rapid stream of the Rhone, and transported, by an easy navigation, from the Rhone to the Tyber. During the whole term of the African war, the granaries of Rome were continually filled, her dignity was vindicated from the humiliating dependence, and the minds of an immense people were quieted by the calm confidence of peace and plenty.t The African war, The cause of Rome, and the conduct A. D. 398. of the African war, were intrusted by Stilicho to a general, active and ardent to avenge his private injuries on the head of the tyrant. The spirit of discord, which prevailed in the house of Nabal, had excited a deadly quarrel between two of his sons, Gildo and Mascezel." The a Inque tuam sortem numerosas transtulit urbes. Clandian (de Bell. Gildonico, 230-324.) has touched, with political delicacy, the intrigues of the Byzantine court, which are likewise mentioned by Zosimus, (1. v. p. 302.) r Symmachus (1. iv. epist. 4.) expresses the judicial forms of the senate; and Claudian (i Cons. Stilich. 1. i. 325, &c.) seems to feel the spirit of a Roman. Claudian finely displays these complaints of Symmachus, in a speech of the goddess of Rome, before the throne of Jupiter, (de Bell. Gildon, 28-128.) + See Claudian, (in Eutrop. 1. i. 401, &c. i Cons. Stil. I. i. 306, &c. ii Cons. Stilich. 91, &c.) u He was of a mature age; since he had formerly (A. D. 373.) served against his brother Firmas. (Ammian. xxix. 5.) Claudian, who under usurper pursued, with implacable rage, the life of his younger brother, whose courage and abilities he feared; and Mascezel, oppressed by superior power, took refuge in the court of Milan: where he soon received the cruel intelligence, that his two innocent and helpless children had been murdered by their inhuman uncle. The affliction of the father was suspended only by the desire of revenge. The vigilant Stilicho already prepared to collect the naval and military forces of the western empire; and he had resolved, if the tyrant should be able to wage an equal and doubtful war, to march against him in person. But as Italy required his presence, and as it might be dangerous to weaken the defence of the frontier, he judged it more advisable, that Mascezel should attempt this arduous adventure, at the head of a chosen body of Gallic veterans, who had lately served under the standard of Eugenius. These troops, who were exhorted to convince the world that they could subvert, as well as defend, the throne of a usurper, consisted of the Jovian, the Herculian, and the Augustan, legions; of the Nervian auxiliaries; of the soldiers, who displayed in their banners the symbol of a lion, and of the troops which were distinguished by the auspicious names of Fortunate, and Invincible. Yet such was the smallness of their establishments, or the difficulty of recruiting, that these seven bands,* of high dignity and reputation in the service of Rome, amounted to no more than five thousand effective men. The fleet of galleys and transports sailed in tempestuous weather from the port of Pisa, in Tuscany, and steered their course to the little island of Capraria; which had borrowed that name from the wild goats, its original inhabitants, whose place was now occupied by a new colony of a strange and savage appearance. "The whole island (says an ingenious traveller of those times) is filled, or rather defiled, by men, who fly from the light. They call themselves Monks, or solitaries, because they choose to live alone, without any witnesses of their actions. They fear the gifts of fortune, from the apprehension of losing them; and, lest they should be miserable, they embrace a life of voluntary wretchedness. How absurd is their choice! how perverse their understanding! to dread the evils, without being able to support the blessings, of the human condition. Either this melancholy madness is the effect of disease, or else the consciousness of guilt urges these unhappy men to exercise on their own bodies the tortures which are inflicted on fugitive slaves by the hand of justice." Such was the contempt of a profane stood the court of Milan, dwells on the injuries, rather than the merits of Mascezel, (de Bell. Gild. 389-414.) The Moorish war was not wor thy of Honorius, or Stilicho, &c. x Claudian, Bell. Gild. 415-423. The change of discipline allowed him to use indifferently the names of Legio, Cohors, Manipulus, Se the Notitia Imperit, S. 38. 40. y Orosius (1. vii. c. 36. p. 565.) qualifies this account with an expression of doubt; (ut aiunt) and it scarcely coincides with the onMeis adpas of Zosimus, (I. v. p. 303.) Yet Claudian, after some de clamation about Cadmus's soldiers, frankly owns, that Stilicho sent a He afterwards (515-526.) mentions a religious madman on the isle of Gorgona. Fot T Roman allies, dispersed, according to their custom, in tumultuary flight; and Mascezel obtained the honours of an easy, and almost bloodless, victory. The tyrant escaped from the field of battle to the sea-shore; and threw himself into a small vessel, with the hope of reaching in safety some friendly port of the empire of the east; but the obstinacy of the wind drove him back into the harbour of Ta magistrate for the monks of Capraria, who were revered, by the pious Mascezel, as the chosen servants of God. Some of them were persuaded, by his entreaties, to embark on board the fleet; and it is observed, to the praise of the Roman general, that his days and nights were employed in prayer, fasting, and the occupation of singing psalms. The devout leader, who, with such a reinforcement, appeared confident of victory, avoided the danger-braca, which had acknowledged, with the rest of ous rocks of Corsica, coasted along the eastern side of Sardinia, and secured his ships against the violence of the south wind, by casting anchor in the safe and capacious harbour of Cagliari, at the distance of one hundred and forty miles from the African shores.b Defeat and death Gildo was prepared to resist the invasion with all the forces of Africa. By the liberality of his gifts and promises, he endeavoured to secure the doubtful allegiance of the Roman soldiers, whilst he attracted to his standard the distant tribes of Gætulia and Æthiopia. He proudly reviewed an army of seventy thousand men, and boasted, with the rash presumption which is the forerunner of disgrace, that his numerous cavalry would trample under their horses' feet the troops of Mascezel, and involve, in a cloud of burning sand, the natives of the cold regions of Gaul and Germany. But the Moor, who commanded the legions of Honorius, was too well acquainted with the manners of his countrymen, to entertain any serious apprehension of a naked and disorderly host of barbarians; whose left arm, instead of a shield, was protected only by a mantle; who were totally disarmed as soon as they had darted their javelin from their right hand; and whose horses had never been taught to bear the control, Tor to obey the guidance, of the bridle. He fixed his 1 camp of five thousand veterans in the face of a superior enemy, and, after the delay of three days, gave the signal of a general engagement. As Mascezel advanced before the front with fair offers of peace and pardon, he encountered one of the foremost standard-bearers of the Africans, and, on his refusal to yield, struck him on the arm with his sword. The arm, and the standard, sunk under the weight of the blow; and the imaginary act of submission was hastily repeated by all the standards of the line. At this signal the disaffected cohorts proclaimed the name of their lawful sovereign; the barbarians, astonished by the defection of their such profane remarks, Rutilius and his accomplices are styled, by his commentator Barthius, rabiosi canes diaboli. Tillemont (Mem. Eccles. tom. xii. p. 471.) more calmly observes, that the unbelieving poet praises where he means to censure. a Orosius, 1. vii. c. 36. p. 564. Augustin commends two of these Savage saints of the isle of Goats, (epist. lxxxi. apud Tillemont, Mem. Eccles. tom. xiii. p. 317. and Baronius, Annal. Eccles. A. Ú. 398. 6 No. 51.) b Here the first book of the Gildonic war is terminated. The rest of Claudian's poem has been lost; and we are ignorant how, or where, the army made good their landing in Africa. e Orosius must be responsible for the account. The presumption of Gildo and his various train of barbarians is celebrated by Claudian, (i Cons. Stil. 1. i. 345-355.) d St. Ambrose, who had been dead about a year, revealed, in a vision, the time and place of the victory. Mascezel afterwards related his dream to Paulinus, the original biographer of the saint, from whom it night easily pass to Orosius. e Zosimus (1. v. p. 303.) supposes an obstinate combat; but the the province, the dominion of Honorius, and the authority of his lieutenant. The inhabitants, as a proof of their repentance and loyalty, seized and confined the person of Gildo in a dungeon; and his own despair saved him from the intolerable torture of supporting the presence of an injured and victorious brother.s The captives, and the spoils, of Africa, were laid at the feet of the emperor; but Stilicho, whose moderation appeared more conspicuous and more sincere in the midst of prosperity, still affected to consult the laws of the republic; and referred to the senate and people of Rome the judgment of the most illustrious criminals. Their trial was public and solemn ; but the judges, in the exercise of this obsolete and precarious jurisdiction, were impatient to punish the African magistrates, who had intercepted the subsistence of the Roman people. The rich and guilty province was oppressed by the imperial ministers, who had a visible interest to multiply the number of the accomplices of Gildo; and if an edict of Honorius seems to check the malicious industry of informers, a subsequent edict, at the distance of ten years, continues and renews the prosecution of the offences which had been committed in the time of the general rebellion. The adherents of the tyrant who escaped the first fury of the soldiers and the judges, might derive some consolation from the tragic fate of his brother, who could never obtain his pardon for the extraordinary services which he had performed. After he had finished an important war in the space of a single winter, Mascezel was received at the court of Milan with loud applause, affected gratitude, and secret jealousy; and his death, which, perhaps, was the effect of accident, has been considered as the crime of Stilicho. In the passage of a bridge, the Moorish prince, who accompanied the master-general of the west, was suddenly thrown from his horse into the river; the officious haste of the attendants was restrained by a cruel and perfidious smile, which they observed on the counte narrative of Orosius appears to conceal a real fact, under the disguise of a miracle. f Tabraca lay between the two Hippos. (Cellarius, tom. ii. p. ii. p. 112. D'Anville, tom. iii. p. 84.) Orosius has distinctly named the field of battle, but our ignorance cannot define the precise situation. The death of Gildo is expressed by Claudian, (i Cons. Stil. 1. 357.) and his best interpreters, Zosimus and Orosius. h Claudian (ii Cons. Stilich. 99-119.) describes their trial, (tremuit quos Africa nuper, cernunt rostra reos,) and applauds the restoration of the ancient constitution. It is here that he introduces the famous sentence, so familiar to the friends of despotism: Nunquam libertas gratior exstat But the freedom, which depends on royal piety, scarcely deserves that See the Theodosian Code, 1. ix. tit. xxxix. leg. 3. tit. xl. leg. 19. k Stilicho, who claimed an equal share in all the victories of Thea dosius and his son, particularly asserts, that Africa was recovered by the wisdom of his counsels. (See an inscription produced by Baronius. nance of Stilicho; and while they delayed the necessary assistance, the unfortunate Mascezel was irrecoverably drowned.' Marriage and character of Ho norius, The joy of the African triumph was happily connected with the nuptials of A. D. 398. the emperor Honorius, and of his cousin Maria, the daughter of Stilicho: and this equal and honourable alliance seemed to invest the powerful minister with the authority of a parent over his submissive pupil. The muse of Claudian was not silent on this propitious day he sung, in various and lively strains, the happiness of the royal pair; and the glory of the hero, who confirmed their union, and supported their throne. The ancient fables of Greece, which had almost ceased to be the object of religious faith, were saved from oblivion by the genius of poetry. The picture of the Cyprian grove, the seat of harmony and love; the triumphant progress of Venus over her native seas, and the mild influence which her presence diffused in the palace of Milan, express to every age the natural sentiments of the heart, in the just and pleasing language of allegorical fiction. But the amorous impatience, which Claudian attributes to the young prince," must excite the smiles of the court; and his beauteous spouse (if she deserved the praise of beauty) had not much to fear or to hope from the passions of her lover. Honorius was only in the fourteenth year of his age; Serena, the mother of his bride, deferred, by art or persuasion, the consummation of the royal nuptials; Maria died a virgin, after she had been ten years a wife; and the chastity of the emperor was secured by the coldness, or, perhaps, the debility, of his constitution. His subjects, who attentively studied the character of their young sovereign, discovered that Honorius was without passions, and consequently without talents; and that his feeble and languid disposition was alike incapable of discharging the duties of his rank, or of enjoying the pleasures of his age. In his early youth he made some progress in the exercises of riding and drawing the bow: but he soon relinquished these fatiguing occupations, and the amusement of feeding poultry became the serious and daily care of the monarch of the west, who resigned the reins of empire to the firm and skilful hand of his guardian Stilicho. The experience of history will countenance the suspicion, that a prince who was born in the purple, received a worse education than the meanest peasant of his dominions; and that the ambitious minister suffered him to attain I have softened the narrative of Zosimus, which, in its crude sim. plicity, is almost incredible, (1. v. p. 303.) Orosius damns the victorious general, (p. 538.) for violating the right of sanctuary. m Claudian, as the poet laureat, composed a serious and elaborate epithalamium of 340 lines; besides some gay Fescennines, which were sung, in a more licentious tone, on the wedding-night. Calet obvius ire Jam princeps, tardumque cupit discedere solem. (de Nuptiis Honor. et Mariæ, 287.) and more freely in the Fescennines (112-126.) Dices, O quoties, hoc mihi dulcius Quam flavos decies vincere Sarmatas Tum victor madido prosilias toro o See Zosimus, 1. v. p. 333. the age of manhood, without attempting to excite his courage, or to enlighten his understanding. The predecessors of Honorius were accustomed to animate, by their example, or at least by their presence, the valour of the legions; and the dates of their laws attest the perpetual activity of their motions through the provinces of the Roman world. But the son of Theodosius passed the slumber of his life, a captive in his palace, a stranger in his country, and the patient, almost the indifferent, spectator of the ruin of the western empire, which was repeatedly attacked, and finally subverted, by the arms of the barbarians. In the eventful history of a reign of twenty-eight years, it will seldom be necessary to mention the name of the emperor Honorius. CHAP. XXX. Revolt of the Goths.-They plunder Greece.-Two great invasions of Italy by Alaric and Radagaisus. -They are repulsed by Stilicho.-The Germans overrun Gaul-Usurpation of Constantine in the west.-Disgrace and death of Stilicho. Revolt of the If the subjects of Rome could be ignorant of their obligations to the great Theodosius, they were too soon convinced, how painfully the spirit and abilities of their deceased emperor had supported the frail and mouldering edifice of the republic. He died in the month of January; and before the end of the winter of the same year, the Gothic nation was in arms. The barbarian auxiliaries erected their independent standard; and boldly avowed the hostile designs which they had long cherished in their ferocious minds. Their countrymen, who had been condemned, by the conditions of the last treaty, to a life of tranquillity and labour, deserted their farms at the first sound of the trumpet; and eagerly resumed the weapons which they had reluctantly laid down. The barriers of the Danube were thrown open; the savage warriors of Scythia issued from their forests: and the uncommon severity of the winter allowed the poet to remark, "that they rolled their ponderous waggons over the broad and icy back of the indignant river." The unhappy natives of the provinces to the south of the Danube submitted to the calamities, which, in the course of twenty years, were almost grown familiar to their imagination; P Procopius de Bell. Gothico, 1. i. c. 2, I have borrowed the general practice of Honorius, without adopting the singular, and indeed im probable, tale, which is related by the Greek historian. q The lessons of Theodosius, or rather Claudian, (iv Cons. Honor. 214-418.) might compose a fine institution for the future prince of great and free nation. It was far above Honorius, and his degenerate subjects. a The revolt of the Goths, and the blockade of Constantinople, are distinctly mentioned by Claudiau, (in Rufiu. 1. ii. 7-100.) Zosimus, (Lv. p. 292.) and Jornandes, (de Rebus Geticis, c. 29.) b Alii per terga ferocis Danubii solidata ruunt; expertaque remis Frangunt stagna rotis, false wit Claudian and Ovid often amuse their fancy by interchanging the me has been expended in this easy exercise. CHAP. XXX. to TOL resistance, the plains of Macedonia and Thessaly, as far as the foot of Mount Oeta, a steep and woody range of hills, almost impervious to his cavalry. They stretched from east to west, to the edge of the sea-shore; and left, between the precipice and the Malian gulph, an interval of three hundred feet, which, in some places, was contracted to a road capable of admitting only a single carriage. In this narrow pass of Thermopyle, where Leonidas and the three hundred Spartans had gloriously devoted their lives, the Goths might have been stopped or destroyed, by a skilful general; and perhaps the view of that sacred spot might have kindled some sparks of military ardour in the breasts of the degenerate` Greeks. The troops which had been and the various troops of barbarians, who gloried in the Gothic name, were irregularly spread from the woody shores of Dalmatia, to the walls of Constantinople. The interruption, or at least the diminution, of the subsidy, which the Goths had received from the prudent liberality of Theodosius, was the specious pretence of their revolt: the affront was imbittered by their contempt for the unwarlike sons of Theodosius; and their resentment was inflamed by the weakness, or treachery, of the minister of Arcadius. The frequent visits of Rufinus to the camp of the barbarians, whose arms and apparel he affected to imitate, were considered as a sufficient evidence of his guilty correspondence: and the public enemy, from a motive either of gratitude or of policy, was attentive, amidst the general devas-posted to defend the straits of Thermopyla, retation, to spare the private estates of the unpopular præfect. The Goths, instead of being impelled by the blind and headstrong passions of their chiefs, were now directed by the bold and artful genius of -Alaric. That renowned leader was descended from the noble race of the Balti;d which yielded only to Gr the royal dignity of the Amali: he had solicited the command of the Roman armies; and the imperial court provoked him to demonstrate the folly of their refusal, and the importance of their loss. Whatever hopes might be entertained of the conquest of Constantinople, the judicious general soon abandoned an impracticable enterprise. In the midst of a divided court, and a discontented people, the emperor Arcadius was terrified by the aspect of the Gothic arms; but the want of wisdom and valour was supplied by the strength of the city; and the fortifications, both of the sea and land, might securely brave the impotent and random darts of the barbarians. Alaric disdained to trample any longer fer on the prostrate and ruined countries of Thrace and Dacia, and he resolved to seek a plentiful harvest of fame and riches in a province which had hitherto escaped the ravages of war. Alaric marches into Greece, A. D. 396. The character of the civil and military officers, on whom Rufinus had devolved the government of Greece, confirmed the public suspicion, that he had betrayed the ancient seat of freedom and learning to the Gothic invader. The proconsul Antiochus was the unworthy son of a respectable father; and Gerontius, who commanded the provincial troops, was much better qualified to execute the oppressive orders of a tyrant, than to defend, with courage and ability, a country most remarkably fortified by the Alaric had traversed, without hand of nature. e Jerom, tom. i. p. 26. He endeavours to comfort his friend Heliodorus, bishop of Altinum, for the loss of his nephew Nepotian, by a curious recapitulation of all the public and private misfortunes of the times. See Tillemont, Mem. Eccles. tom. xii. p. 200, &c. Baltha, or bold; origo mirifica, says Jornandes, (c. 29.) This illustrious race long continued to flourish in France, in the Gothic province of Septimania, or Languedoc; under the corrupted appella. tion of Baux; and a branch of that family afterwards settled in the kingdom of Naples. (Grotius in Prolegom. ad Hist, Gothic. p. 53.) The lords of Baux, near Arles, and of seventy-nine subordinate places, were independent of the counts of Provence. (Longuerue, Description de la France, tom. i. p. 357.) Zosimus (1. v. p. 293–295.) is our best guide for the conquest of Greece; but the hints and allusions of Claudiau are so many rays of his toric light. tired, as they were directed, without attempting to disturb the secure and rapid passage of Alaric; and the fertile fields of Phocis, and Bæotia, were instantly covered by a deluge of barbarians; who massacred the males of an age to bear arms, and drove away the beautiful females, with the spoil, and cattle, of the flaming villages. The travellers, who visited Greece several years afterwards, could easily discover the deep and bloody traces of the march of the Goths; and Thebes was less indebted for her preservation to the strength of her seven gates, than to the eager haste of Alaric, who advanced to occupy the city of Athens, and the important harbour of the Piraeus. The same impatience urged him to prevent the delay and danger of a siege by the offer of a capitulation; and as soon as the Athenians heard the voice of the Gothic herald, they were easily persuaded to deliver the greatest part of their wealth, as the ransom of the city of Minerva, and its inhabitants. The treaty was ratified by solemn oaths, and observed with mutual fidelity. The Gothic prince, with a small and select train, was admitted within the walls; he indulged himself in the refreshment of the bath, accepted a splendid banquet which was provided by the magistrate, and affected to show that he was not ignorant of the manners of civilized nations." But the whole territory of Attica, from the promontory of Sunium to the town of Megara, was blasted by his baleful presence; and, if we may use the comparison of a contemporary philosopher, Athens itself resembled the bleeding and empty skin of a slaughtered victim. The distance between Megara and Corinth could not much exceed thirty miles; but the bad road, an expressive name, which it still bears among the Greeks, was, or might easily have been made, f Compare Herodotus, (1. vii. c. 176.) and Livy, (xxxvi. 15.) The narrow entrance of Greece was probably enlarged by each successive ravisher. g He passed, says Eunapius, (in Vit. Philosoph. p. 93. edit. Comme. lin, 1596.) through the straits, dia TV Av (of Thermopyla) aρηλθεν, ώσπερ δια ταδια και ίπποκρατα πεδια τρεχων. In obedience to Jerom, and Claudian, (in Rufin. l. ii. 191.) I have mixed some darker colours in the mild representation of Zosimus, who wished to soften the calamities of Athens. Nec fera Cecropias traxissent vincula matres. Synesius (Epist. clvi. p. 272. edit. Petav.) observes, that Athens, whose sufferings he imputes to the proconsul's avarice, was at that time less famous for her schools of philosophy than for her trade of honey. impassable for the march of an enemy. The thick and gloomy woods of mount Citharon covered the inland country; the Scironian rocks approached the water's edge, and hung over the narrow and winding path, which was confined above six miles along the sea-shore. The passage of those rocks, so infamous in every age, was terminated by the isthmus of Corinth; and a small body of firm and intrepid soldiers might have successfully defended a temporary intrenchment of five or six miles from the Ionian to the Ægean sea. The confidence of the cities of Peloponnesus in their natural rampart, had tempted them to neglect the care of their antique walls; and the avarice of the Roman governors had exhausted and betrayed the unhappy province. Corinth, Argos, Sparta yielded without resistance to the arms of the Goths; and the most fortunate of the inhabitants were saved, by death, from beholding the slavery of their families, and the conflagration of their cities. The vases and statues were distributed among the barbarians, with more regard to the value of the materials, than to the elegance of the workmanship; the female captives submitted to the laws of war; the enjoyment of beauty was the reward of valour; and the Greeks could not reasonably complain of an abuse, which was justified by the example of the heroic times." The descendants of that extraordinary people, who had considered valour and discipline as the walls of Sparta, no longer remembered the generous reply of their ancestors to an invader more formidable than Alaric. "If thou art a god, thou wilt not hurt those who have never injured thee; if thou art a man, advance-and thou wilt find men equal to thyself." From Thermopyla to Sparta, the leader of the Goths pursued his victorious march without encountering any mortal antagonists; but one of the advocates of expiring paganism has confidently asserted, that the walls of Athens were guarded by the goddess Minerva, with her formidable Ægis, and by the angry phantom of Achilles; and that the conqueror was dismayed by the presence of the hostile deities of Greece. In an age of miracles, it would perhaps be unjust to dispute the claim of the historian Zosimus to the common benefit; yet it cannot be dissembled, that the mind of Alaric was ill prepared to receive, either in sleeping or waking visions, the impressions of Greek superstition. The i Vallata mari Scironia rupes, Claudian de Bell. Getico, 188. The Scironian rocks are described by Pausanias, (1. i. c. 44. p. 107. edit. Kuhn,) and our modern travellers, Wheeler (p. 436.) and Chandler, (p. 298.) Hadrian made the road passable for two carriages. k Claudian (in Rufin, 1. ii. 186, and de Bello Getico, 611, &c.) vaguely, though forcibly, delineates the scene of rapine and destruction. 1 Τρις μακαρες Δαναοί και τετρακις, &c. These generous lines of Homer (Odyss. 1. v. 306.) were transcribed by one of the captive youths of Corinth and the tears of Mummius may prove that the rude con. queror, though he was ignorant of the value of an original picture, possessed the purest source of good taste, a benevolent heart. (Plutarch. Symposiac. I. ix. tom. ii. p. 737. edit. Wechel.) m Homer perpetually describes the exemplary patience of those female captives, who gave their charms, and even their hearts, to the murderers of their fathers, brothers, &c. Such a passion (of Eriphile for Achilles) is touched with admirable delicacy by Racine. n Plutarch (in Pyrrho, tom. ii. p. 471. edit. Brian) gives the genuine answer in the Laconic dialect. Pyrrhus attacked Sparta with 25,000 foot, 2,000 horse, and 24 elephants; and the defence of that open town songs of Homer, and the fame of Achilles, had probably never reached the ear of the illiterate barbarian; and the christian faith, which he had devoutly embraced, taught him to despise the imaginary deities of Rome and Athens. The invasion of the Goths, instead of vindicating the honour, contributed, at least accidentally, to extirpate the last remains of paganism; and the mysteries of Ceres, which had subsisted eighteen hundred years, did not survive the destruction of Eleusis, and the calamities of Greece.P He is attacked by Stilicho, A. D. 397. The last hope of a people who could no longer depend on their arms, their gods, or their sovereign, was placed in the powerful assistance of the general of the west; and Stilicho, who had not been permitted to repulse, advanced to chastise, the invaders of Greece. A numerous fleet was equipped in the ports of Italy; and the troops, after a short and prosperous navigation over the Ionian sea, were safely disembarked on the isthmus, near the ruins of Corinth. The woody and mountainous country of Arcadia, the fabulous residence of Pan and the Dryads, became the scene of a long and doubtful conflict between two generals not unworthy of each other. The skill and perseverance of the Roman at length prevailed; and the Goths, after sustaining a considerable loss from disease and desertion, gradually retreated to the lofty mountain of Pholoe, near the sources of the Peneus, and on the frontiers of Elis; a sacred country, which had formerly been exempted from the calamities of war." The camp of the barbarians was immediately besieged; the waters of the river' were diverted into another channel; and while they laboured under the intolerable pressure of thirst and hunger, a strong line of circumvallation was formed to prevent their escape. After these precautions, Stilicho, too confident of victory, retired to enjoy his triumph, in the theatrical games, and lascivious dances, of the Greeks; his soldiers, deserting their standards, spread themselves over the country of their allies, which they stripped of all that had been saved from the rapacious hands of the enemy. Alaric appears to have seized the favourable moment to execute one of those hardy enterprises, in which the abilities of a general are displayed with more genuine lustre, than in the tumult of a day of battle. To extricate himself from the is a fine comment on the laws of Lycurgus, even in the last stage of decay. • Šuch, perhaps, as Homer (Iliad, xx. 64.) had so nobly painted him. p Eunapius (in Vit. Philosoph. p. 90-93.) intimates that a troop of monks betrayed Greece, and followed the Gothic camp,, q For Stilicho's Greek war, compare the honest narrative of Zosimus, (1. v. p. 295, 296) with the curious circumstantial flattery of Claudian, (i Cons. Stilich. l. 172-186. iv Cons, Hon. 459-487.) As the event was not glorious, it is artfully thrown into the shade. The troops who marched through Elis delivered up their arms This security enriched the Eleans, who were lovers of a rural life. Riches begat pride: they disdained their privilege, and they suffered. Polybius advises them to retire once more within their magic circle. See a learned and judicious discourse on the Olympic games, which Mr. West has prefixed to his translation of Pindar. Claudian (in iv Cons. Hon. 480.) alludes to the fact without naming the river: perhaps the Alpheus, (i Cons, Stil. I. i. 185.) Et Alpheus Geticis angustus acervis Tardior ad Siculos etiamnum pergit amores. Yet I should prefer the Peneus, a shallow stream in a wide and deep bed, which runs through Elis, and falls into the sea below Cylenne. |