Читать книгу: «Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847», страница 11

"You may find yourself mistaken, Captain," replied the Doctor, with admirable seriousness; "yesterday Bouchereau was much exasperated: although of peaceable habits, he is a perfect tiger when his blood is up. It appears that you hurt his feelings, and unless you make a formal apology–"

"Well, well," interrupted Pelletier, "it is not much in my way to apologise, and this is the first time; but with an old friend, I will stretch a point. I would rather make concessions than have to reproach myself hereafter. Shall we go to Bouchereau?"

"Let us go," said the Doctor, who could hardly help smiling to see how the voice of interest instilled sensibility and humanity into the heart of a professed duellist.

When Magnian and the officer entered his drawing-room, Bouchereau, who had not shut his eyes the whole night, experienced all the sensations of the criminal to whom sentence of death is read. But the first words spoken restored fluidity to his blood, for a moment frozen in his veins. The Captain made the most explicit and formal apology, and retired after shaking the hand of his old friend, who, overjoyed at his escape, did not show himself very exacting.

"Doctor, you are a sorcerer!" cried Bouchereau, as soon as he found himself alone with the physician.

"It is almost part of my profession," replied Magnian laughing. "However, the terrible affair is nearly arranged. I have done my share; do yours. When shall you set out for the south?"

The satisfaction depicted on Bouchereau's physiognomy vanished, and was replaced by sombre anxiety.

"Doctor," said he, in an altered voice, "You must tell me the truth; I have resolution to hear my sentence with calmness; my chest is attacked, is it not?"

"You mean your head."

"My head also!" cried Bouchereau, positively green with terror.

"You are mad," said the Doctor, shrugging his shoulders; "I would willingly change my chest for yours."

"You deceive me. I cannot forget what escaped you yesterday. I coughed all night long, and I have a pain between my shoulders which I never perceived before."

"All fancy!"

"I feel what I feel," continued Bouchereau gloomily; "I do not fear death; but I confess that I could not, without regret, bid an eternal adieu, in the prime of life, to my wife and family. It is my duty to be cautious for their sake, if not for my own. Instead of writing to Virginia to return home, I will join her at Fontainbleau, and start at once for Nice."

"Go," said the doctor, "the journey cannot hurt you."

"But do you think it will benefit me?"

"Without a doubt."

"It is not too late, then, to combat this frightful malady."

"Oh, you are not very far gone," said Magnian ironically. "I shall be at Nice myself in less than six weeks, so that you are sure to be attended by a physician in whom you have confidence, if, contrary to all probability, your state of health requires it."

The two friends parted: the Doctor laughing at his patient's fears, the patient imagining himself in imminent peril, and almost doubting whether it would not have been better to fall by the terrible sword of Captain Pelletier than to linger and expire, in the flower of his age, upon an inhospitable foreign shore. In two days, Bouchereau, haunted by his funereal visions, had taken out his passport, arranged his affairs, and completed his preparations. Getting into a post-chaise, he made his unexpected appearance at Fontainbleau; and, exerting his marital authority to an extent he had never previously ventured upon, he carried off his wife, stupified by such a sudden decision, and greatly vexed to leave Paris, which Pelletier's languishing epistles had lately made her find an unusually agreeable residence. By the end of the week, the husband and wife, one trembling for his life, the other regretting her admirer, arrived at Nice, where, towards the close of the autumn, they were joined by Dr Magnian, who thus showed himself scrupulously exact in the fulfilment of his promise.

On an evening of the month of April following, the tragedy of Les Horaces was performed at the Théâtre Français. Thanks to the young talent of Mademoiselle Rachel, rather than to the old genius of Corneille, the house was crowded. In the centre of the right-hand balcony, Captain Pelletier, accompanied by some blusterers of the same kidney, talked loud, laughed ditto, criticised the actors and spectators, and disturbed all his neighbours, without any one venturing to call him to order; so powerful, in certain cases, is the influence of an insolent look, a ferocious mustache, and an elephantine build.

After examining with his opera glass every corner of the theatre, from the pit to the roof, the Captain at last caught sight of a group, snugly installed in a comfortable box, which at once fixed his attention. It consisted of Monsieur and Madame Bouchereau, in front, and of Doctor Magnian, seated behind the lady. The appearance and attitude of these three persons were characteristic. With his usual pallid complexion and unhappy look, his eyes adorned with a pair of blue spectacles—a new embellishment, which he owed to an imaginary ophthalmia—the pacific husband whiled away the entr'acte by the study of a play-bill, which he abandoned when the curtain rose, to bestow his deepest attention on the actors, even though none but the inferior characters were on the stage. Madame Bouchereau trifled with an elegant nosegay, whose perfume she frequently inhaled, and whose crimson flowers contrasted so well with the fairness of her complexion, as to justify a suspicion that there was some coquetry in the manœuvre executed with such apparent negligence. Leaning back in her chair, she frequently turned her head, the better to hear Magnian's smiling and half-whispered remarks. The husband paid no attention to their conversation, and did not seem to remark its intimate and confidential character.

"Who is it you have been looking at for the last quarter of an hour?" inquired one of the Captain's comrades. "At your old flame, Madame Bouchereau? I thought you had forgotten her long ago."

"I did not know she had returned from Nice," replied Pelletier, with a reserved air.

"She has been at Paris a fort-night."

"Does not Bouchereau look very ill? The southern climate has not done him much good. He is twice as pale as before he went. Poor Bouchereau!"

"Ha! ha!" laughed the officer, "have you been gulled by the story of the decline? That is really too good."

"What is too good?" asked the Captain abruptly.

"The trick that rogue Magnian played Bouchereau and you; for if I may judge from your astonished look, you also have been mystified."

"Berton, you abuse my patience," said Pelletier in a surly tone.

"Wolves do not eat one another," replied Berton laughing; "so let us talk without anger. The story is this:—all Paris, except yourself, has been laughing at it for a week past. It appears that on the one hand, although no one suspected it, the aforesaid Magnian was in love with Madame Bouchereau, and that on the other, finding himself threatened with a pulmonary complaint, he thought it advisable to pass the winter in a warm climate. What did the arch-schemer? He persuaded Bouchereau that it was he, Bouchereau, whose chest was affected; sent him off to Nice with his pretty wife, and, at his leisure, without haste or hurry, joined them there. You have only to look at them, as they sit yonder, to guess the denoûement of the history. The appropriate label for their box would be the title of one of Paul de Kock's last novels; la Femme, le Mari, el l'Amant. Magnian is a cunning dog, and has very ingenious ideas. Fearing, doubtless, that the husband might be too clear-sighted, he threatened him with an ophthalmia, and made him wear blue spectacles. Clever, wasn't it? and a capital story?"

"Charming, delightful!" cried the Captain, with a smile that resembled a gnashing of teeth.

The tragedy was over. Dr Magnian left his box; Pelletier followed his example. The next minute the two men met in the lobby.

"Doctor, a word with you," said the officer sternly.

"Two, if you like, Captain," was Magnian's jovial reply.

"It appears, that in spite of your prognostics, Bouchereau is in perfect health."

"Voudriez-vous qu'il mourût? Would you have him die?" said the Doctor, parodying with a comical emphasis the delivery of Joanny, who had taken the part of the father of the Horatii.

"I know you are excellent at a joke," retorted Pelletier, whose vexation was rapidly turning to anger; "but you know that I am not accustomed to serve as a butt. Be good enough to speak seriously. Is it true that Bouchereau was never in danger?"

"In great danger, on the contrary. Was he not about fighting you?"

"So that when you sent him to Nice–?"

"It was to prevent the duel. As a physician, I watch over the health of my clients; and it was my duty to preserve Bouchereau from your sword, which is said to be a terrible malady."

"One of which you will perhaps have to cure yourself before very long," exclaimed the Captain, completely exasperated by the Doctor's coolness. "The idiot Bouchereau may die of fear, or of any thing else. I certainly shall not do him the honour to meddle with him; but you, my friend, so skilled in sharp jests, I shall be glad to see if your valour equals your wit."

The part of an unfortunate and mystified rival is so humiliating, that Pelletier's vanity prevented his stating his real ground of complaint, and mentioning the name of Madame Bouchereau. The Doctor imitated his reserve, and listened to the officer's defiance with the same tranquil smile which had previously played upon his countenance.

"My dear Captain," he said, "at this moment you would particularly like to pass your good sword through my body, or to lodge a ball in my leg—for, in consideration of our old friendship, I presume you would spare my head. You shall have the opportunity, if you positively insist upon it. But if you kill me, who will arrange your marriage with Mademoiselle Nanteuil?"

Pelletier stared at his adversary with an astonished look, which redoubled the Doctor's good humour.

"Who is Mademoiselle Nanteuil?" he at last said, his voice involuntarily softening.

"An amiable heiress whom I attend, although she is in perfect health; who has two hundred thousand francs in possession, as much more in perspective, and who, if an intelligent friend undertook the negotiation, would consent, I think, to bestow her hand and fortune upon a good-looking fellow like yourself."

"Confound this Magnian!" said the Captain, taking the Doctor's arm, "it is impossible to be angry with him."

BELISARIUS,—WAS HE BLIND?

The name of Belisarius is more generally known through the medium of the novel, the opera, and the print-shop than by the pages of history. Procopius, Gibbon, and Lord Mahon have done less for his universal popularity than some unknown Greek romancer or ballad-singer in the middle ages. Our ideas of the hero are involuntarily connected with the figure of a tall old man, clad in a ragged mantle, with a stout staff in his left hand, and a platter to receive an obolus in his right, accompanied by a fair boy grasping his tattered garments, and carefully guiding his steps.

We shall now venture to investigate the relationship between the Belisarius of romance, and the Belisarius of history; and we believe we shall be able to prove that the historical hero died in full possession of his sight several centuries before the birth of his blind namesake, the hero of romance; that he was not more directly related to the unfortunate sufferer, than our disreputable acquaintance Don Juan of the opera, was to the gallant and presumptuous Don Juan of Austria, the hero of Lepanto; and that in short, as we say in Scotland, there was no connexion but the name. In this case, however, the connexion has proved a pretty close one; for a noble, accomplished and accurate English historian, Lord Mahon, in his "Life of Belisarius" has considered it strong enough to advance a plea of identity between the warrior of history and the beggar of romance.

Such an authority renders the labour of brushing the dust from a few volumes of Byzantine Chronicles to us "a not ungrateful task;" and one that we hope will not prove entirely without interest to our readers. Our object is to re-establish the truth of history, and to restore to some Greek Walter Scott of the middle ages the whole merit of constructing an immortal tale, which for centuries has tinged the stern annals of the Eastern empire with an unwonted colouring of pathos. Lord Mahon has so fairly stated his case, that we believe his candour has laid criticism to sleep, and his readers have generally adopted his opinions.

The truth is, the Belisarius of history, the bold and splendid general of Justinian, is a hero of the Roman empire, of the Eastern or Byzantine empire, if you please, but still historically a Roman hero. Now, on the other hand, the Belisarius of romance, the vision of a noble victim of imperial ingratitude, is a creation of Greek genius, of modern Greek genius, if you prefer adding the depreciating epithet, but still of Greek genius placed in its undying opposition to Roman power.

We must now introduce to our readers the Belisarius of history as he really lived, acted, and suffered. It is not necessary for this purpose to recite his military exploits. They are described in the immortal pages of Gibbon, and minutely detailed in the accurate biography by Lord Mahon. It will suffice for our purpose to collect a few authentic sketches of his personal conduct and character, and some anecdotes of his style of living, from the works of his secretary Procopius, the last classic Greek writer, and an historian of no mean merit.

Belisarius was born in the city of Germania, a metropolitan see on the frontiers of the Thracian and Illyrian nations.⁹ Thus, though strictly speaking he was neither a Roman nor a Greek, he considered himself, and was considered by his contemporaries, a Roman. The dialect of the inhabitants of Thrace and Illyria is supposed still to possess a representative in the modern Albanian; but in the time of Justinian, the language of the higher classes in the cities was Latin, and there can be no doubt that Belisarius spoke both Latin and Greek with equal fluency. As far as race was concerned, it seems, however, tolerably certain, that he was more closely allied in blood to Scanderberg and Miaoulis than to Scipio or Epaminondas. As he was a man of rank and family, he became an officer of the imperial guard at an early age.¹⁰ His tall and vigorous frame, smooth and handsome face, joined to a smoother tongue, a calm and equable disposition, and a stout heart, made him the very man to rise rapidly in the Roman service. Accordingly, as early as the year 526, he appears in a high military command.¹¹ Like Marlborough, to whom he bears some resemblance in personal character, he strengthened his position at court by marrying the Lady Antonina, the beautiful favourite of the Empress Theodora, though she was as fierce a shrew as the Duchess Sarah, and wherewithal not so modest, if we give credit to her husband's secretary.

It was the fashion at the Horse-guards of Constantinople during the reign of Justinian, to encourage barbarian usages in military affairs. Hussars from the country of the Gepids, cuirassiers from Armenia and the ancient seats of the Goths, and light cavalry from the regions occupied by the Huns, were the favourite bodies of troops. The young nobles of the Roman empire adopted the uniforms of these regiments; wore long hair, inlaid armour, and tight nether garments, and never condescended to invest their persons in the modest equipments of the old Roman dragoons, or of the modern legionaries whose ranks were officered by mere provincials.

The reasons which compelled the imperial government to prefer foreign mercenaries to native troops were based at first on principles of internal policy, and at last on absolute necessity. Augustus feared the Roman senators and knights; Constantine had not the means of paying for good Roman soldiers; and Justinian could not have found a sufficient number of suitable recruits among the citizens of his wide-extended empire. The pivot of the administration of Imperial Rome, as of Imperial Britain, was the treasury, not the Horse-guards. The taxes paid by the citizens filled that treasury: but a soldier was exempt from taxation; consequently, it became a measure of unavoidable necessity on the part of the Roman government to prevent citizens escaping their financial burdens by becoming soldiers. Had the citizens got possession of arms, Rome could not have remained a despotism.

On the other hand, the system of Roman tactics rendered it necessary to procure military recruits of a degree of physical strength far above the average standard of mankind. When the population of the empire had been divided into two widely separated social classes of wealthy citizens and poor cultivators, serfs, or slaves, the supply of recruits furnished by the richest portions of the empire became very small. The danger of employing foreign barbarians, who remained isolated amidst an innumerable population, and surrounded by hundreds of walled towns, manned by their own municipal guards, was evidently less than that of entrusting legions of slaves with arms, and teaching them habits of combination and discipline. The servile wars, which inflicted a mortal wound on the Republic, would have been renewed, and would probably have soon destroyed the Empire.¹²

It is customary with historians to discourse on the impolicy of the Roman emperors in employing barbarian mercenaries; but the fact is, that their finances did not admit of their purchasing the thews and sinews required for the service any where but among the barbarians. The system certainly answered admirably for the imperial government. It upheld the tyranny of the Cæsars and the terror of the Roman arms for more than a thousand years; and it might have rendered Rome immortal had she not committed suicide.

If the system really be so bad as it is often represented, it seems strange that it should have been adopted with all its imperfections in British India. But the truth is this; the mercenaries of the Roman armies were more faithful to their contract than the emperors. It is by sovereigns and ministers of state, not by generals of mercenaries, that empires are prepared for destruction. Our Indian empire is always in greater danger from a conceited Foreign secretary or a foolish Governor-general than from a rebellion of the native troops. If our administration be only as wise as that of Imperial Rome, somewhat more just, and a great deal less avaricious, there seems no reason why a British government should rule at Calcutta for a shorter period than a Roman one at Constantinople. The laws of Rome still survive in the courts of justice of the greater part of Europe; the spirit of the Roman Republic breathes, at the present hour, in full energy in the Papal councils; and are we to suppose that the institutions of a more Catholic philanthropy, in the progress of development under the British constitution, are less capable of acquiring an inherent vitality?

The age of Belisarius was deeply imbued with the military spirit of the middle ages; and Belisarius was himself as proud of his accomplishments as a daring horseman, a good lance, and a stout bowman, as of his military science. Cavalry was the favourite portion of the army in his day, and he shared in the general contempt felt for infantry. The horsemen were sheathed in complete steel; and their helmets, breast-plates and shields, were impenetrable even to the shafts of the Persians, who drew their bow-strings to the right ear, and threw discredit on the prowess of the Homeric archers.¹³ The Roman officers, as must always be the case where cavalry is the principal arm, were remarkable for personal courage and impetuous daring; and perhaps in the whole annals of Rome there cannot be found another period in which headlong rashness was so universally the characteristic of the generals of the Roman armies.

"How concise—how just—how beautiful is the whole picture! I see the attitudes of the archer—I hear the twanging of the bow." The figures of the archers in the Æginetan marbles at Munich, admirably illustrate the genius of Homer and the taste of Gibbon.]

The favourite position of Belisarius on the field of battle was to figure like Richard Cœur-de-Lion as a colonel of cuirassiers, not like Marlborough, to perform the duties of a commander-in-chief. Procopius prefaces an account of one of his rashest combats by declaring that he was not in the habit of exposing himself unnecessarily, but on the occasion in question, he owns that Belisarius fought too much like a mere soldier in the front rank.

The whole Gothic army advancing to besiege Rome had passed the Tiber before Belisarius was aware that his troops, stationed to defend the Milvian bridge, had abandoned their post. On going out to reconnoitre, he fell in with the enemy. Instead of retreating, he led on the cavalry that attended him to the charge. He was mounted on his favourite charger; the Greeks called it Phalion, the barbarians Balan, from its colour: it was a bay with a white face. Balan was perfectly broken to his hand, and his armour, wrought by the skill of Byzantine artists, was too light to incommode his powerful frame, yet tempered to resist the best-directed arrow or javelin. The person of Belisarius was soon recognised in the Gothic army, and the shout spread far and wide to the javelin-men and the archers, "At the bay horse! At the bay horse!" The bravest of the Gothic chiefs placed their lances in rest, and rushed forward to bear down the Roman general. The guards of Belisarius, in that trying hour, showed themselves worthy of their own and, their general's fame. They closed up by his side, so well as to leave him only a single enemy. It is ridiculous to attempt describing a personal encounter thirteen centuries after the event. The duties of Procopius did not place him at the elbow of Belisarius at such an hour, and even if he had been there he could have seen but little of what others were about.

The result of the encounter is matter of history. A thousand Goths fell in the skirmish, and the bravest of the veteran guards of Belisarius perished by his side. The barbarians were driven back to their camp; but when Belisarius imprudently followed them, he was repulsed by the Gothic infantry forming before the lines, and the Romans were compelled to make a precipitate retreat. They galloped back to the gates of Rome closely pursued by fresh squadrons of Gothic cavalry. But as they reached the walls in disorder, the garrison refused to open the gates, fearing lest the Goths might force their way into the city with the fugitives, and believing that Belisarius had perished in the battle. There was now nothing left for the commander-in-chief but to form a small squadron of his faithful guards, and make a desperate and sudden charge on the advancing Goths. The manœuvre was executed with consummate skill, and the leading ranks of the enemy were broken, thrown into confusion, and forced back on the succeeding squadrons by the impetuous charge. The cry spread that the garrison had made a sally; the obscurity of evening was commencing, the Goths commenced their retreat; and Belisarius and his wearied troops were at last allowed to enter Rome. In this desperate encounter, their respective enemies allowed that Belisarius was the bravest of the Romans, and Wisand of the Goths. The Roman general escaped without a wound, but the valiant Goth, borne down in the combat around the person of Belisarius, was left for dead on the field, where he remained all the next day, and it was only on the third morning, in taking up his body for interment, that he was discovered to be still alive. He recovered from his wounds and lived long afterwards.¹⁴

Belisarius, unlike the noble barons of more modern days, who were all pride and presumption in their iron shells, mounted on their dray horses, but useless when dismounted, did not disdain to add to his knightly accomplishments that of a most skilful archer. This skill saved Rome in a dangerous attack. When the Goths advanced their movable towers against the walls, drawn forward by innumerable yokes of oxen, Belisarius, placing himself on the ramparts, ordered the garrison to allow the towers to advance unmolested by the machines to within bow-shot. Then taking up a long bow, which might have graced the hand of Robin Hood, and choosing two shafts of a yard in length, he drew the bowstring to his ear, and shot his shaft at the tower. The Gothic captain, who was directing its movements from the summit, had trusted too much to the workmanship of his Milan armour. The fabric was not equal to that of Byzantium. The shaft pierced him to the heart; he tottered a moment on the edge of the tower, and then fell headlong forward. The second shaft brought down another Goth. Belisarius then ordered his archers to shoot at the oxen, which soon fell, pierced by a thousand arrows; and the towers that the Gothic army counted on to enable them to make a general assault, remained immovable until the Romans could burn them.¹⁵

Belisarius, fond of cavalry, seems to have overlooked, nay, even to have neglected, the discipline of the Roman infantry. While besieged in Rome, he defended the place by a series of cavalry skirmishes, and allowed all the officers of the infantry who could mount themselves to serve on horse-back. Some of the native officers of the legionaries, jealous of their reputation, offered to lead their troops on foot. Belisarius would hardly allow them to quit the walls, and plainly expressed his want of confidence in the Roman infantry on the field of battle, while he showed his utter contempt for the city militia, by keeping it carefully shut up within the walls. The battle in which the infantry took part proved unsuccessful; but the officers who led it died bravely, sustaining the combat after the cavalry had fled.¹⁶

Yet Belisarius knew well how to appreciate the tactics of the old Roman legion; and he made use of a singular method of obtaining the great military advantages to be derived from the possession of a body of the best infantry. At the battle of Kallinikon, when his cavalry was broken by the iron-cased horsemen of Persia—the renowned kataphraktoi, or original steel lobsters—the Roman general, with the genius of a Scipio or a Cæsar, saw that the steadiness of a body of infantry could alone save his army. He immediately ordered the heavy lancers of his own guard to dismount, and form square before the feebler and less perfectly equipped soldiers of the legions of the line. With this phalanx, presenting its closely serried shields and long lances to the repeated charges of the kataphraktoi, he foiled every attack of the victorious Persians, and saved his army.¹⁷

Belisarius, however, acquired more favour at the court of Justinian, and secured the personal affection of the Emperor more, by slaughtering the people of Constantinople in a city rebellion, originating out of the factions of the Circus, than by his exploits against the distant enemies of the empire. The affair was called the Day of Victory. The scene was repeated on the 4th of October 1795, in the city of Paris, and was called the Day of the Sections. The part of the Thracian Belisarius was then performed by the Corsican Bonaparte. In the tragedy of old, three thousand citizens were massacred by the mild Belisarius, in that of Paris, hardly three hundred perished by the inexorable Napoleon.

The personal conduct of Belisarius is presented to us under two totally different points of view, in the works of his Secretary Procopius. In the authentic history of the Persian, Vandal, and Gothic wars, he appears as the commander-in-chief of the Roman armies, his actions are narrated by a Roman historian, and his conduct is held up to the admiration of Roman society. In the secret history, on the contrary, we have, it is true, the same man described by the same author, but the work is addressed to the Greek race, and not to their Roman rulers, and it presents Belisarius as the instrument of a corrupt and tyrannical court, engaged in plundering the people, while crouching under the oppression of which he was the minister. The history of Procopius was written for the libraries of the Byzantine nobles; the anecdotes for the clubs of the Greek people. Though composed in the same language, they belong not only to two different classes of literature, but even to the literature of two different races of men.¹⁸

Belisarius was a fortunate, as well as a great general. His victories over the Vandals and the Goths prove his military talents; but the spectacle of their kings, Gelimer and Witiges, the representatives of the dreaded Genseric and the mighty Theoderic, walking as captives through the streets of Constantinople, made a deeper impression on men's minds than the slaughter of the bloodiest battle. Nor was the restoration of the sacred plate of the Temple of the Jews to the city of Jerusalem, an event of less importance, in a superstitious age, than the destruction of a barbarian monarchy. Among the spoils of the Vandals at Carthage, Belisarius had found in the treasury those sacred vessels which Titus, nearly five centuries before, had carried away to Rome from the ruins of Jerusalem. Genseric had transported these relics to Africa, when he plundered Rome in the year 455. Justinian was generous enough to revive the long forgotten ceremony of a Roman triumph in order to augment the glory of Belisarius; and the sacred plate of the Jews was exhibited to the people of Constantinople amidst the pomp of the gorgeous pageant. The emperor then commanded them to be removed to Jerusalem, to be preserved in a Christian church.¹⁹

The restoration of the sacred spoils of Jerusalem rendered the name of Belisarius renowned in the eastern world, far beyond the bounds of the Roman empire; the glory of refusing the throne of the Cæsars of the west, amazed the barbarians of Europe as far as the filiation of the Gothic and Germanic races extended. The glory of being deemed worthy of the empire, was eclipsed by the singular display of personal dignity which could refuse the honour. When Belisarius was on the eve of putting an end to the Gothic monarchy by the conquest of Ravenna and the capture of Witiges, the Goths, reflecting on their national position in the days of Alaric and Theoderic, when they were only the soldiers of the empire, offered their submission to Belisarius, and invited him to assume the dignity of Emperor of the West. Belisarius refused the offer. He had seen in his Italian campaigns, that the Gothic nobles of Italy were no longer the same soldiers as the Gothic mercenaries of the imperial armies.²⁰ The merit of refusing the empire must have been deeply felt by Justinian; but the jealousy excited by the renown, which conferred the option of accepting such power, gradually effaced the impression of that merit in the breasts both of the feeble emperor, and of his energetic and ambitious consort, Theodora. Though Belisarius loved money and splendour, and had more of Pompey than Cæsar in his character, still the boldest cabinet minister must have felt that lie could no longer safely be entrusted with the whole military power of the empire. Though his fidelity remained inviolable, a seditious army could compel him, even if unwilling, to become its instrument. From the day, therefore, that Belisarius refused the Empire of the West, a cloud fell over his military career. It was determined by the imperial administration never again to entrust him with a force sufficient to proceed in a career of conquest.