Page:1909historyofdec04gibbuoft.djvu/405

 Chap.xli] OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 351 Roman garrison. Datius, the orthodox bishop, who had seduced his countrymen to rebellion 1U and ruin, escaped to the luxury and honours of the Byzantine court ; 116 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; 116 the female sex, and the more precious spoil, was resigned to the Burgundians ; and the houses, or at least the walls, of Milan were levelled with the ground. The Goths, in their last moments, were revenged by the destruction of a city, second only to Rome in size andDestruc- opulence, in the splendour of its buildings, or the number of its Milan inhabitants ; and Belisarius sympathized alone in the fate of his deserted and devoted friends. Encouraged by this success- ful inroad, Theodebert himself, in the ensuing spring, invaded the plains of Italy with an army of one hundred thousand Bar- [a.d. 539] barians. 117 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 114 Baronius applauds his treason, and justifies the Catholic bishops— qui ne sub heretico principe degant oninem lapidern movent — an useful caution. The more rational Muratori (Annali d'ltalia, torn. v. p. 54) hints at the guilt of perjury and blames at least the imprudence of Datius. 116 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). 116 MvpiaSes rpi&KovTa (compare Procopius, Goth. 1. ii. c. 7, 21). Yet suoh popu- lation 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). 117 Besides Procopius, perhaps too Boman, seethe Chronicles of Marius and Marcellinus, Jornandes (in Success. Regn. in Muratori, torn. i. p. 241), and Gregory of Tours (1. iii. c. 32, in torn. ii. of the Historians of France). Gregory supposes a defeat of Belisarius, who, in Aimoin (de Gestis Franc. 1. ii. c. 23, in torn. iii. p. 59), is slain by the Franks.