origin. Attila exhibits the general deformity of a modern Calmuck; a large head, a swarthy complexion, small deep-seated eyes, a flat nose, few hairs in the place of a beard, broad shoulders, and a short square body of nervous strength, though of a disproportioned form. The haughty step and demeanour of the king of the Huns, expressed the consciousness of his superiority over the rest of mankind; and he had a custom of fiercely rolling his eyes, as if he wished to enjoy the terror which he inspired.

"The religious arts of Attilla were not less skilfully adapted to the character of his age and country. It was natural enough that the Scythians should adore with peculiar devotion the god of war: but as they were incapable of forming either an abstract idea, or a corporeal representation, they worshipped their tutelar deity under the symbol of an iron scimetar. One of the shepherds of the Huns who perceived that a heifer who was grazing had wounded herself in the foot, curiously followed the track of blood, till he discovered among the long grass the point of an ancient sword, which he dug out of the ground and presented to Attila. That magnanimous, or rather that artful prince accepted with pious gratitude this celestial favour, and, as the rightful possessor of the sword of Mars, asserted his divine and indefeasible claim to the dominion of the earth. If the rites of Scythia were practised on this solemn occasion, a lofty altar, or rather pile of faggots, three hundred yards in length and in breadth, was raised in a spacious plain; and the sword of Mars was placed erect on the summit of this rustic altar, which was annually consecrated by the blood of sheep, horses, and of the hundreth captive. Whether human sacrifices formed any part of the worship of Attila, or whether he propitiated the god of war with the victims which he continually offered on the field of battle, the favourite of Mars soon acquired a sacred character, which rendered his conquests more easy and more permanent; and the barbarian princes confessed, in the language of devotion and flattery, that they could not presume to gaze with a steady eye on the divine majesty of the king of the Huns. His brother Bleda, who reigned over a considerable part of the nation, was compelled to resign his sceptre and his life. Yet even this cruel act was attributed to a supernatural impulse; and the vigour with which Attila wielded the sword of Mars convinced the world that it had been reserved alone for his invincible arm."*

"Total extirpation and erasure" are terms which best denote the calamities he inflicted.

"One of his lieutenants chastised and almost exterminated the Burgundians of the Rhine. The Thuringians served in the army of Attila; they traversed, both in their march and in their return, the territories of the Franks; and they massacred their hostages as well as their captives. Two hundred young maidens were

* Gibbon's Hist. vol. vi. pp. 43, 44.

tortured with exquisite and unrelenting rage; their bodies were torn asunder by wild horses, or their bodies were crushed under the weight of rolling waggons; and their unburied limbs were abandoned on public roads, as a prey to dogs and vultures."*

It was the boast of Attila, that the grass never grew on the spot which his horse had trod. "The Scourge of God" was a name that he appropriated to himself, and inserted among his royal titles. He was "the scourge of his enemies, and the terror of the world." The western emperor, with the senate and people of Rome, humbly and fearfully deprecated the wrath of Attila. And the concluding paragraph of the chapters which record his history, is entitled, "Symptoms of the decay and ruin of the Roman government." The name of the star is called wormwood.

And the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter. After a duration of nearly twelve centuries from the days of Romulus, scarcely the fourth part of one elapsed from the time of the invasion of Italy by Attila, till Rome was no longer the seat of an emperor or the head of an empire. Like a falling star, scorching wherever it fell, and then itself extinguished, Attila ravaged the rich plains of Lombardy, which are divided by the Po. But the sound of the trumpet ceased not with the fall of the great star. The name by which it was called was also given to the region where it fell. As it had been wormwood, the waters which it tainted also became wormwood to Rome; and from thence new calamities arose, which accelerated and caused the subversion of the empire.

After the death of Attila, the emperors both of Rome and Constantinople vainly attempted to "recover" from Genseric the province of Africa and

* Gibbon's Hist. vol. vi. pp. 121, 122.

the empire of the sea. He had invaded Africa, and gathered its swarthy sons around his standard, when the name of Attila was unknown in Europe, and the maritime territory over which he ruled was no longer the refuge but the terror of the Romans. The sea they could not touch; and on the north the waters were made bitter that encompassed them. Italy, so long the terror of the world, was a trouble to itself. From the foot of the Alps, the bulwarks which nature had set for its defence, and from the midst of the waters which fertilized its richest plains, the troubles arose that inflicted on Rome the bitterness of death, in the last dying struggles of the empire. Although Genseric, even in old age, and in the full execution of the remnant of his charge, destroyed its ships, and lived to see imperial Rome smitten, till extinct, by another hand than his ;although, like a great mountain burning with fire that was cast into the sea, he survived as well as preceded the sudden blasting of a part of Italy by Attila, who burned as it were a lamp, and fell like a star;-yet, after the last naval wars of the Vandals had ceased, the embittered waters were as wormwood to the empire of Rome; new enemies arose from the very region of Italy which Attila had ravaged, or where the great star fell; when none died any longer in the sea, many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter; and, from the first sound of the Gothic trumpet to the extinction of the western empire, the connexion is closely established to the last between each succeeding trumpet.

"The emperor Majorian, like the weakest of his predecessors, was reduced to the disgraceful expedient of substituting barbarian auxiliaries in the place of his unwarlike subjects: and his superior abilities could only be displayed in the vigour and dexterity with which he wielded a dangerous instrument, so apt to recoil on the hand that used it. Many thousands of the bravest subjects of Attila-the Gepidæ, the Ostrogoths, the Rugians, the Bur

gundians, the Suevi, the Alani-assembled in the plain of Liguria (PIEDMONT), and their formidable strength was balanced by their mutual animosities.*

66

Majorian, after the destruction of his fleet by Genseric, returned to Italy, to prosecute his labours for the public happiness; and, as he was conscious of his own integrity, he might long remain ignorant of the dark conspiracy that threatened his throne and his life. The recent misfortune of Carthagena sullied the glory which had dazzled the eyes of the multitude; almost every description of civil and military officers were exasperated against the reformer, since they all derived some advantages from the abuses which he endeavoured to suppress; and the patrician Ricimer impelled the inconstant passions of the barbarians against a prince whom he esteemed and hated. The virtues of Majorian could not protect him from the IMPETUOUS SEDITION WHICH BROKE OUT IN THE CAMP NEAR TORTONA, AT THE FOOT OF THE Alps. He was compelled to abdicate the imperial purple. Ricimer reigned under the name of Severus.†

"The peaceful and prosperous reign which Anthemius had promised to the west (A.D. 471) was soon clouded by misfortune and discord. Ricimer, apprehensive or impatient of a superior, retired from Rome, and fixed his residence at Milan" (the palace of which had before been possessed by Attila). 'Italy was gradually divided into two independent and hostile kingdoms; and the nobles of LIGURIA, who trembled at the near approach of a civil war, fell prostrate at the feet of the patrician, and conjured him to spare their unhappy country. Ricimer suspended his ambitious designs till he had secretly prepared the engines with which he resolved to subvert the throne of Anthemius. The mask of peace and moderation was then thrown aside. The army of Ricimer was fortified by a numerous reinforcement of Burgundians and oriental Suevi; he disclaimed all allegiance to a Greek emperor, marched from Milan to the gates of Rome, and, fixing his camp on the banks of the Anio, impatiently expected the arrival of Olybrius, his imperial candidate.

"The patrician who had extended his posts from the Anio to the Milvian bridge, already possessed two quarters of Rome, the Vatican and the Janiculum, which are separated by the Tiber from the rest of the city; and it may be conjectured that an assembly of seceding senators, imitated, in their choice of Olybrius, the forms of a legal election. But the body of the senate and people firmly adhered to the cause of Anthemius; and the more effectual support of a Gothic army enabled him to prolong his reign, and the public distress, by a resistance of three months, which produced the concomitant evils of famine and pestilence. At length Ricimer made a furious assault on the bridge of Hadrian,

* Gibbon's Hist. vol. vi. p. 178, c. 36.

† Ibid, pp. 182, 183, c. 36.

or St. Angelo; and the narrow pass was defended with almost equal valour by the Goths, till the death of Gilimer their leader. The victorious troops, breaking down every barrier,_rushed with irresistible violence into the heart of the city, and Rome (if we may use the language of a contemporary pope) was subverted by the civil fury of Anthemius and Ricimer. The unfortunate Anthemius was dragged from his concealment, and inhumanly massacred by the command of his son-in-law (Ricimer), who thus added a third, or perhaps a fourth, emperor to the number of his victims. The soldiers who united the rage of factious citizens with the savage manners of barbarians, were indulged, without control, in the license of rapine and murder. In the same year all the principal actors in this great revolution were removed from the stage; and the whole reign of Olybrius, whose death does not betray any symptoms of violence, is included within the space of seven months. The stern Ricimer, who trampled on the ruins of Italy, had exercised the power, without assuming the title of a king; and the patient Romans were insensibly prepared to acknowledge the royalty of Odoacer and his barbaric successors."*

The third part of the waters became wormwood. Italy was divided against itself; and Milan contended with Rome. Thousands of the soldiers of Attila combined with the other confederates of Italy, at the foot of the Alps and on the banks of the Po; and from the territory watered by the multitude of its tributary streams, hordes of relentless enemies and oppressors issued against Rome, and prepared the way for its final subversion. From thence its last perils arose; and by the same 'confederates of Italy' the empire was overthrown.

And many died of the waters because they were made bitter.

"Since the age of Tiberius, the decay of agriculture had been felt in Italy; and it was a just subject of complaint, that the life of the Roman people depended on the accidents of winds and waves. In the division and decline of the empire, the tributary harvests of Egypt and Africa were withdrawn; the numbers of the inhabitants continually diminished with the means of subsistence; and the country was exhausted by the irretrievable losses of war, famine, and pestilence. St. Ambrose has deplored the ruin of a populous district, which had been once adorned with the flourishing cities of Bologna, Modena, Regium, and Placentia" (which were either situated on its banks, or yielded their waters to the Po). "Pope Gelasius was a subject of Odoacer, and he affirms with strong exaggeration, that in Æmilia, Tuscany,