a camp of seven thousand Goths to intercept the convoys of Sicily and Campania. The granaries of Rome were insensibly exhausted, the adjacent country had been wasted with fire and sword; such scanty supplies as might yet be obtained by hasty excursions, were the reward of valour, and the purchase of wealth: the forage of the horses, and the bread of the soldiers, never failed; but in the last months of the siege, the people were exposed to the miseries of scarcity, unwholesome food, and contagious disorders. Belisarius saw and pitied their sufferings; but he had foreseen, and he watched, the decay of their loyalty, and the progress of their discontent. Adversity had awakened the Romans from the dreams of grandeur and freedom, and taught them the humiliating lesson, that it was of small moment to their real happiness, whether the name of their master was derived from the Gothic or the Latin language. The lieutenant of Justinian listened to their just complaints, but he rejected with disdain the idea of flight or capitulation; repressed their clamorous impatience for battle; amused them with the prospect of sure and speedy relief; and secured himself and the city from the effects of their despair or treachery. Twice in each month he changed the station of the officers to whom the custody of the gates was committed: the various precautions, of patroles, watch-words, lights, and music, were repeatedly employed to discover whatever passed on the ramparts; outguards were posted beyond the ditch, and the trusty vigilance of dogs supplied the more doubtful fidelity of mankind. A letter was intercepted, which assured the king of the Goths, that the Asinarian gate, adjoining to the Lateran church, should be secretly opened to his troops. On the proof or suspicion of treason, several senators were banished, and the pope Sylverius was summoned to attend the representative of his sovereign, at his head-quarters in the Pincian palace." The ecclesiastics who followed their bishop, were detained in the first or second apartment, and he alone was admitted to the presence of Belisarius. The conqueror of Rome and Carthage was modestly seated at the feet of Antonina, who reclined on a stately couch: the general was silent, but the voice of reproach and menace issued from the mouth of his imperious wife. Accused by credible witnesses, and the evidence of his own subscription, the successor of St. Peter was despoiled of his pontifical ornaments, clad in the mean habit of a monk, and embarked, without pope Exile of Sylverius, A. D. 537. Nov. 17. nor can such a double intersection, at such a distance from Rome, be clearly ascertained from the writings of Frontinus Fabretti and Eschi. nard, de Aquis and de Agro Romano, or from the local maps of Lameti and Cingolani. Seven or eight miles from the city, (50 stadia,) on the road to Albano, between the Latin and Appian ways, I discern the remains of an aqueduct, (probably the Septimian,) a series (630 paces) of arches twenty-five feet high, (in coayav.) They made sausages, Aλaras, of mule's flesh unwholesome, if the animals had died of the plague. Otherwise the famous Bologna sausages are said to be made of ass flesh. (Voyages de Labat, tom. ii. p. 218.) u The name of the place, the hill, and the adjoining gate, were all derived from the senator Pincius. Some recent vestiges of temples and churches are now smoothed in the garden of the Minims of the Trinità del Monte. (Nardini, 1. iv. c. 7. p. 196. Eschinard, p. 209, 210. At the em delay, for a distant exile in the east. peror's command, the clergy of Rome proceeded to the choice of a new bishop; and after a solemn invocation of the Holy Ghost, elected the deacon Vigilius, who had purchased the papal throne by a bribe of two hundred pounds of gold. The profit, and consequently the guilt, of this simony, was imputed to Belisarius: but the hero obeyed the orders of his wife; Antonina served the passions of the empress; and Theodora lavished her treasures, in the vain hope of obtaining a pontiff hostile or indifferent to the council of Chalcedon." The epistle of Belisarius to the em- Deliverance of the city. peror announced his victory, his danger, and his resolution. "According to your commands, we have entered the dominions of the Goths, and reduced to your obedience, Sicily, Campania, and the city of Rome; but the loss of these conquests will be more disgraceful than their acquisition was glorious. Hitherto we have successfully fought against the multitudes of the barbarians, but their multitudes may finally prevail. Victory is the gift of Providence, but the reputation of kings and generals depends on the success or the failure of their designs. Permit me to speak with freedom: if you wish that we should live, send us subsistence; if you desire that we should conquer, send us arms, horses, and men. The Romans have received us as friends and deliverers: but in our present distress, they will be either betrayed by their confidence, or we shall be oppressed by their treachery and hatred. For myself, my life is consecrated to your service: it is yours to reflect, whether my death in this situation will contribute to the glory and prosperity of your reign." Perhaps that reign would have been equally prosperous, if the peaceful master of the east had abstained from the conquest of Africa and Italy: but as Justinian was ambitious of fame, he made some efforts, they were feeble and languid, to support and rescue his victorious general. A reinforcement of sixteen hundred Sclavonians and Huns was led by Martin and Valerian; and as they had reposed during the winter season in the harbours of Greece, the strength of the men and horses was not impaired by the fatigues of a sea-voyage; and they distinguished their valour in the first sally against the besiegers. About the time of the summer solstice, Euthalius landed at Terracina with large sums of money for the payment of the troops: he cautiously proceeded along the Appian way, and this convoy entered Rome through the gate Capena,' while Belisarius, the old plan of Buffalino, and the great plan of Nolli.) Belisarius had fixed his station between the Pincian and Salarian gates. (Procop. Goth. 1. i. c. 15.) x From the mention of the primum et secundum velum, it should seem that Belisarius, even in a siege, represented the emperor, and maintained the proud ceremonial of the Byzantine palace. y Of this act of sacrilege, Procopius (Goth. 1. i. c. 25.) is a dry and reluctant witness. The narratives of Liberatus (Breviarium, c. 22) and Anastasius (de Vit. Pont. p. 39) are characteristic, but passionate. Hear the execrations of Cardinal Baronius: (A. D. 536, No. 123. A. D. 538, No. 4-20.) portentum, facinus omni execratione dignum. z The old Capena was removed by Aurelian to, or near, the modern gate of St. Sebastian, (see Nolli's plan.) That memorable spot has been consecrated by the Egerian grove, the memory of Numa, triumphal arches, the sepulchres of the Scipios, Metelli, &c. on the other side, diverted the attention of the Goths | obtained one thousand Thracians and Isaurians, to by a vigorous and successful skirmish. These seasonable aids, the use and reputation of which were dexterously managed by the Roman general, revived the courage, or at least the hopes, of the soldiers and people. The historian Procopius was despatched with an important commission, to collect the troops and provisions which Campania could furnish, or Constantinople had sent; and the secretary of Belisarius was soon followed by Antonina herself, who boldly traversed the posts of the enemy, and returned with the oriental succours to the relief of her husband and the besieged city. A fleet of three thousand Isaurians cast anchor in the bay of Naples, and afterwards at Ostia. Above two thousand horse, of whom a part were Thracians, landed at Tarentum; and, after the junction of five hundred soldiers of Campania, and a train of waggons laden with wine and flour, they directed their march on the Appian way, from Capua to the neighbourhood of Rome. The forces that arrived by land and sea, were united at the mouth of the Tiber. Antonina convened a council of war: it was resolved to surmount with sails and oars the adverse stream of the river: and the Goths were apprehensive of disturbing, by any rash hostilities, the negociation to which Belisarius had craftily listened. They credulously believed that they saw no more than the vanguard of a fleet and army, which already covered the Ionian sea and the plains of Campania; and the illusion was supported by the haughty language of the Roman general, when he gave audience to the ambassadors of Vitiges. After a specious discourse to vindicate the justice. of his cause, they declared, that, for the sake of peace, they were disposed to renounce the possession of Sicily. "The emperor is not less generous," replied his lieutenant, with a disdainful smile, "in return for a gift which you no longer possess; he presents you with an ancient province of the empire; he resigns to the Goths the sovereignty of the British island." Belisarius rejected with equal firmness and contempt the offer of a tribute; but he allowed the Gothic ambassadors to seek their fate from the mouth of Justinian himself; and consented, with seeming reluctance, to a truce of three months, from the winter solstice to the equinox of spring. Prudence might not safely trust either the oaths or hostages of the barbarians, but the conscious superiority of the Roman chief was expressed in the Belisarius re distribution of his troops. As soon covers many as fear or hunger compelled the Goths cities of Italy. to evacuate Alba, Porto, and Centumcellæ, their place was instantly supplied; the garrisons of Narni, Spoleto, and Perusia, were reinforced, and the seven camps of the besiegers were gradually encompassed with the calamities of a siege. The prayers and pilgrimage of Datius, bishop of Milan, were not without effect; and he a The expression of Procopius has an invidious cast-TuxV EK TOU ασφαλους την σφισι συμβησομένην καραδοκειν. (Goth. l. ii. c. 4.) Yet he is speaking of a woman. sea. assist the revolt of Liguria against her Arian tyrant. At the same time, John the Sanguinary, the nephew of Vitalian, was detached with two thousand chosen horse, first to Alba on the Facine lake, and afterwards to the frontiers of Picenum on the Hadriatic "In that province," said Belisarius, "the Goths have deposited their families and treasures, without a guard or the suspicion of danger. Doubtless they will violate the truce: let them feel your presence, before they hear of your motions. Spare the Italians; suffer not any fortified places to remain hostile in your rear; and faithfully reserve the spoil of an equal and common partition. It would not be reasonable," he added with a laugh, "that whilst we are toiling to the destruction of the drones, our more fortunate brethren should rifle and enjoy the honey." The Goths raise the siege of Rome, The whole nation of the Ostrogoths had been assembled for the attack, and was almost entirely consumed in the siege of Rome. If any credit be due to an intelligent spectator, one-third at least of their enormous host was destroyed, in frequent and bloody combats under the walls of the city. The bad fame and pernicious qualities of the summer air, might already be imputed to the decay of agriculture and population; and the evils of famine and pestilence were aggravated by their own licentiousness, and the unfriendly disposition of the country. While Vitiges struggled with his fortune, while he hesitated between shame and ruin, his retreat was hastened by domestic alarms. The king of the Goths was informed by trembling messengers, that John the Sanguinary spread the devastations of war from the Apennine to the Hadriatic; that the rich spoils and innumerable captives of Picenum were lodged in the fortifications of Rimini; and that this formidable chief had defeated his uncle, insulted his capital, and seduced, by secret correspondence, the fidelity of his wife, the imperious daughter of Amalasontha. Yet, before he retired, Vitiges made a last effort, either to storm or to surprise the city. A secret passage was discovered in one of the aqueducts; two citizens of the Vatican were tempted by bribes to intoxicate the guards of the Aurelian gate; an attack was meditated on the walls beyond the Tiber, in a place which was not fortified with towers; and the barbarians advanced, with torches and scaling-ladders, to the assault of the Pincian gate. But every attempt was defeated by the intrepid vigilance of Belisarius and his band of veterans, who, in the most perilous moments, did not regret the absence of their companions; and the Goths, alike destitute of hope and subsistence, clamorously urged their departure, before the truce should expire, and the Roman cavalry should again be united. One year and nine days after the commencement of the siege, an army, so lately strong and triumphant, burnt b Anastasius (p. 40.) has preserved this epithet of Sanguinarius, which might do honour to a tiger. their tents, and tumultuously repassed the Milvian | sidius, a loyal Italian, as he fled from Ravenna to bridge. They repassed not with impunity: their thronging multitudes, oppressed in a narrow passage, were driven headlong into the Tiber, by their own fears and the pursuit of the enemy; and the Roman general, sallying from the Pincian gate, inflicted a severe and disgraceful wound on their retreat. The slow length of a sickly and desponding host was heavily dragged along the Flaminian way; from whence the barbarians were sometimes compelled to deviate, lest they should encounter the hostile garrisons that guarded the high road to Rimini and Ravenna. Yet so powerful was this flying army, that Vitiges spared ten thousand men for the defence of the cities which he was most solicitous to preserve, and detached his nephew Uraias, with an adequate force, for the chastisement of rebellious Milan. At the head of his principal army, he besieged Rimini, only thirty-three miles distant from the Gothic capital. A feeble rampart, and a shallow ditch, were maintained by the skill and valour of John the Sanguinary, who shared the danger and fatigue of the meanest soldier, and emulated, on a theatre less illustrious, the military virtues of his great commander. The lose Rimini ; towers and battering engines of the barbarians were rendered useless; their attacks were repulsed; and the tedious blockade, which reduced the garrison to the last extremity of hunger, afforded time for the union and march of the Roman forces. A fleet which had surprised Ancona, sailed along the coast of the Hadriatic, to the relief of the besieged city. The eunuch Narses landed in Picenum with two thousand Heruli and five thousand of the bravest troops of the east. The rock of the Apennine was forced; ten thousand veterans moved round the foot of the mountains, under the command of Belisarius himself; and a new army, whose encampment blazed with innumerable lights, appeared to advance along the Flaminian way. Overwhelmed with astonishment and despair, the Goths abandoned the siege of Rimini, their tents, their standards, and their leaders; and Vitiges, who gave or followed the example of flight, never halted till he found a shelter within the walls and morasses of Ra retire to Ravenna. venna. To these walls, and to some forJealousy of the Roman generals, tresses destitute of any mutual supA. D. 538. port, the Gothic monarchy was now reduced. The provinces of Italy had embraced the party of the emperor; and his army, gradually recruited to the number of twenty thousand men, must have achieved an easy and rapid conquest, if their invincible powers had not been weakened by the discord of the Roman chiefs. Before the end of the siege, an act of blood, ambiguous and indiscreet, sullied the fair fame of Belisarius. Pre e This transaction is related in the public history (Goth. 1. ii. c. 8.) with candour or caution; in the Anecdotes (c. 7.) with malevolence or freedom; but Marcellinus, or rather his continuator, (in Chron.) casts a shade of premeditated assassination over the death of Constantine. He had performed good service to Rome and Spoleto, (Procop. Goth. 1. i. Rome, was rudely stopped by Constantine, the The eunuch d They refused to serve after his departure; sold their captives and cattle to the Goths; and swore never to fight against them. Procopius introduces a curious digression on the manners and adventures of this Firmness and malcontent embraced the fair opportunity of revenging his private or imaginary wrongs; and the remaining troops of Belisarius were divided and dispersed from the garrisons of Sicily to the shores of the Hadriatic. His skill and perauthority of severance overcame every obstacle: Belisarius. Urbino was taken, the sieges of Faesulæ, Orvieto, and Auximum were undertaken and vigorously prosecuted; and the eunuch Narses was at length recalled to the domestic cares of the palace. All dissensions were healed, and all opposition was subdued, by the temperate authority of the Roman general, to whom his enemies could not refuse their esteem; and Belisarius inculcated the salutary lesson, that the forces of the state should compose one body, and be animated by one soul. But in the interval of discord, the Goths were permitted to breathe; an important season was lost, Milan was destroyed, and the northern provinces of Italy were afflicted by an inundation of the Franks. But When Justinian first meditated the Invasion of Italy by the Franks, conquest of Italy, he sent ambassadors A. D. 538, 539. to the kings of the Franks, and adjured them, by the common ties of alliance and religion, to join in the holy enterprise against the Arians. The Goths, as their wants were more urgent, employed a more effectual mode of persuasion, and vainly strove, by the gift of lands and money, to purchase the friendship, or at least the neutrality, of a light and perfidious nation. the arms of Belisarius, and the revolt of the Italians, had no sooner shaken the Gothic monarchy, than Theodebert of Austrasia, the most powerful and warlike of the Merovingian kings, was persuaded to succour their distress by an indirect and seasonable aid. Without expecting the consent of their sovereign, ten thousand Burgundians, his recent subjects, descended from the Alps, and joined the troops which Vitiges had sent to chastise the revolt of Milan. After an obstinate siege, the capital of Liguria was reduced by famine, but no capitulation could be obtained, except for the safe retreat of the Roman garrison. Datius, the orthodox bishop, who had seduced his countrymen to rebellion and ruin, escaped to the luxury and honours of the Byzantine court; but the clergy, perhaps the Arian clergy, were slaughtered at the foot of their own altars by the defenders of the catholic faith. Three hundred thousand males were reported to be slain; the female sex, and the more precious spoil, was resigned to the Burgundians; and the houses, or at least the Destruction of walls, of Milan, were levelled with the Milan. ground. The Goths, in their last mo wandering nation, a part of whom finally emigrated to Thule or Scandinavia. (Goth. 1. ii. c. 14, 15.) e This national reproach of perfidy (Procop. Goth. 1. ii. c. 25.) offends the ear of La Mothe le Vayer, (tom. viii. p. 163-165.) who criticises, as if he had not read, the Greek historian. f Baronius applauds his treason, and justifies the catholic bishopsqui ne sub heretico principe degant omnem lapidem movent-a useful caution. The more rational Muratori (Annali d'Italia, t. v. p. 54.) hints at the guilt of perjury, and blames at least the imprudence of Datius. g St. Datius was more successful against devils than against barbarians. He travelled with a numerous retinue, and occupied at Corinth a large house. (Baronius, A. D. 538. No. 89. A. D. 539. No. 20.) ments, were revenged by the destruction of a city, second only to Rome in size and opulence, in the splendour of its buildings, or the number of its inhabitants; and Belisarius sympathized alone in the fate of his deserted and devoted friends. Encouraged by this successful inroad, Theodebert himself, in the ensuing spring, invaded the plains of Italy with an army of one hundred thousand barbarians. The king, and some chosen followers, were mounted on horseback, and armed with lances: the infantry, without bows or spears, were satisfied with a shield, a sword, and a double-edged battle-axe, which, in their hands, became a deadly and unerring weapon. Italy trembled at the march of the Franks; and both the Gothic prince and the Roman general, alike ignorant of their designs, solicited, with hope and terror, the friendship of these dangerous allies. Till he had secured the passage of the Po on the bridge of Pavia, the grandson of Clovis dissembled his intentions, which he at length declared by assaulting, almost at the same instant, the hostile camps of the Romans and Goths. Instead of uniting their arms, they fled with equal precipitation; and the fertile, though desolate, provinces of Liguria and Æmilia were abandoned to a licentious host of barbarians, whose rage was not mitigated by any thoughts of settlement or conquest. Among the cities which they ruined, Genoa, not yet constructed of marble, is particularly enumerated: and the deaths of thousands, according to the regular practice of war, appear to have excited less horror than some idolatrous sacrifices of women and children, which were performed with impunity in the camp of the most christian king. If it were not a melancholy truth, that the first and most cruel sufferings must be the lot of the innocent and helpless, history might exult in the misery of the conquerors, who, in the midst of riches, were left destitute of bread or wine, reduced to drink the waters of the Po, and to feed on the flesh of distempered cattle. The dysentery swept away one-third of their army: and the clamours of his subjects, who were impatient to pass the Alps, disposed Theodebert to listen with respect to the mild exhortations of Belisarius. memory of this inglorious and destructive warfare was perpetuated on the medals of Gaul; and Justinian, without unsheathing his sword, assumed the title of conqueror of the Franks. The Merovingian prince was offended by the vanity of the emperor ; he affected to pity the fallen fortunes of the Goths; and his insidious offer of a foederal union was fortified by the promise or menace of descending from the Alps at the head of five hundred thousand men. His plans of conquest were boundless and perhaps The h Mupiades Tpiaкоvтa, (compare Procopius, Goth. 1. ii. c. 7. 21.) Yet such population is incredible; and the second or third city of Italy need not repine if we only decimate the numbers of the present text. Both Milan and Genoa revived in less than thirty years. (Paul Diacon. de Gestis Langobard. 1. ii. c. 38.) i Besides Procopius, perhaps too Roman, see the Chronicles of Marius and Marcellinus, Jornandes, (in Success. Regn. in Muratori, tom. i. p. 241.) and Gregory of Tours, (l. iii. c. 32. in tom. ii, of the Historians of France.) Gregory supposes a defeat of Belisarius, who, in Aimoin, (de Gestis Franc. 1. ii. c. 23. in tom. iii. p. 59.) is slain by the Franks chimerical. The king of Austrasia threatened to As soon as Belisarius was delivered The king pointed his spear-the bull overturned a tree on his head -he expired the same day. Such is the story of Agathias; but the original historians of France (tom. ii. p. 202. 403. 558. 667.) impute his death to a fever. m Without losing myself in a labyrinth of species and names-the aurochs, urus, bisons, babulas, bonasus, buffalo, &c. (Buffon, Hist. Nat. tom. xi. and Supplement, tom. iii. vi.) it is certain, that in the sixth century a large wild species of horned cattle was hunted in the great forests of the Vosges in Lorraine, and the Ardennes. (Greg. Turon. tom. ii. l. x. c. 10. p. 369.) n In the siege of Auximum, he first laboured to demolish an old aqueduct, and then cast into the stream, 1. dead bodies; 2. mischievous herbs; 3. quick lime, which is named (says Procopius, 1. ii. c. 29.) τιτανος by the ancients; by the moderns ασβετος. Yet both words are : mured at the continuance of the war, professed But subdues the Go Italy, A. D. 539. used as synonymous in Galen, Dioscorides, and Lucian. (Hen. Steph. Thesaur. Ling. Græc. tom. iii. p. 748.) o The Goths suspected Mathasuintha as an accomplice in the mischief, which perhaps was occasioned by accidental lightning. p In strict philosophy, a limitation of the rights of war seems to im ply nonsense and contradiction. Grotius himself is lost in an idle dis tinction between the jus naturæ and the jus gentium, between poison and infection. He balances in one scale the passages of Homer, (Odyss. A. 259, &c.) and Florus; (1. ii. c. 20. No. 7. ult.) and in the other, the examples of Solon, (Pausanias, 1. x. c. 37.) and Belisarius. See his great work De Jure Belli et Pacis, (l. iii. c. 4. s. 15, 16, 17. and in Barbeyrac's version, tom. ii. p. 257, &c.) Yet I can understand the benefit and va lidity of an agreement, tacit or express, mutually to abstain from certain modes of hostility. See the Amphictyonic oath in Eschines, de Falsa Legatione. q Ravenna was taken, not in the year 540, but in the latter end of 539; and Pagi (tom. ii. p. 569.) is rectified by Muratori, (Annali d'Ita |