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 Chap, xli] OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 325 the cruel jealousy of Theodora, who dreaded the presence and superior charms of a rival : he prompted with artful and ambiguous hints the execution of a crime so useful to the Romans;' 4 received the intelligence of her death with grief and indignation, and denounced, in his master's name, im- mortal war against the perfidious assassin. In Italy, as well as in Africa, the guilt of an usurper appeared to justify the arms of Justinian ; but the forces which he prepared were insufficient for the subversion of a mighty kingdom, if their feeble numbers had not been multiplied by the name, the spirit, and the conduct of an hero. A chosen troop of guards, who served on horseback and were armed with lances and bucklers, attended the person of Belisarius ; his cavalry was composed of two hundred Huns, three hundred Moors, and four thousand confederates, and the infantry consisted only of three thousand Isaurians. Steering the same course as in his former expedition, the Roman consul cast anchor before Catana in Sicily, to survey the strength of the island, and to decide whether he should attempt the con- quest or peaceably pursue his voyage for the African coast. He found a fruitful land and a friendly people. Notwithstand- ing the decay of agriculture, Sicily still supplied the granaries of Rome ; the farmers were graciously exempted from the oppression of military quarters, and the Goths, who trusted the defence of the island to the inhabitants, had some reason to complain that their confidence was ungratefully betrayed. In- stead of soliciting and expecting the aid of the king of Italy, they yielded to the first summons a cheerful obedience ; and this province, the first fruits of the Punic wars, was again, after 6i Yet Proeopius discredits his own evidence (Anecdot. c. 16), by confessing that in his public history he had not spoken the truth. [He could not speak it " from fear of Theodora " (5<=e< tt}s £a<riAi5os), who was still alive.] See the Epistles from queen Gundelina [Gudeliva] to the empress Theodora (Var. x. 20, 21, 23), and observe a suspicious word (de ilia persona, &o.) with the elaborate commentary of Buat (torn. x. p. 177-185). [Some mysterious passages in the letters of Theodahad and Gudeliva to Theodora may be allusions to this affair, and may make us hesitate to say that the charge of Proeopius against Theodora was unfounded. In Theo- dahad's letter (x. 20, 4) — written after the arrival of Peter who is stated to have procured the murder — we find this sentence : de ilia persona, de qua ad nos aliquid verbo titillante pervenit, hoc ordinatum esse cognoscite, quod vestris credidimus animis convenire. It is difficult not to suspect that ilia persona refers to Amala- suntha. And in Gudeliva's letter (x. 21, 2), does aualitas rei mean complicity in the plot against the queen? Cp. Bury, English Historical Beview, 22, p. 771 (1907). The same explanation of these passages has been since suggested independently (1908) by H. Leuthold, Untersuchungen zur ostgotischen Geschichte, pp. 25-6. He also refers to the last sentence of x. 24.1