Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/360

 contest with Magnentius was of a more serious and bloody kind. The tyrant advanced by rapid marches to encounter Constantius, at the head of a numerous army, composed of Gauls and Spaniards, of Franks and Saxons ; of those provincials who supplied the strength of the legions, and of those barbarians who were dreaded as the most formidable enemies of the republic. The fertile plains of the Lower Pannonia, between the Drave, the Save, and the Danube, pre- sented a spacious theatre ; and the operations of the civil war were protracted during the summer months by the skill or timidity of the combatants. Con- stantius had declared his intention of deciding the quarrel in the fields of Cibalis, a name that would animate his troops by the remembrance of the victory which, on the same auspicious ground, had been ob- tained by the arms of his father Constantine. Yet, by the impregnable fortifications with which the emperor encompassed his camp, he appeared to decline, rather than to invite, a general engagement. It was the ob- ject of Magnentius to tempt or to compel his adversary to relinquish this advantageous position; and he em- ployed, with that view, the various marches, evolutions, and stratagems, which the knowledge of the art of war could suggest to an experienced officer. He carried by assault the important town of Siscia; made an at- tack on the city of Sirmium, which lay in the rear of the imperial camp ; attempted to force a passage over the Save into the eastern provinces of Illyricum ; and