Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/408

 390 THE DECLINE AND FALL CliAl'. the Rhine then- mihtarv powers. The fierce Chno- XIX. . " domar, shaking the ponderous javelin which he had victoriously wielded against the brother of Magnentius, led the van of the barbarians, and moderated by his experience the martial ardour which his example in- spired ''. lie was followed by six other kings, by ten princes of regal extraction, by a long train of high- spirited nobles, and by thirty-five thousand of the bravest warriors of the tribes of Germany. The con- fidence derived from a view of their own .strength, was increased by the intelligence which they received from a deserter, that the Caesar, with a feeble army of thir- teen thousand men, occupied a post about one and twenty miles from their camp of Strasburgh. With this inadequate force, Julian resolved to seek and to encounter the barbarian host; and the chance of a general action was preferred to the tedious and un- certain operation of separately engaging the dispersed parties of the Alemanni. The Romans marched in close order, and in two columns, the cavalry on the right, the infantry on the left ; and the day was so far spent when they appeared in sight of the enemy, that Julian was desirous of deferring the battle till the next morning, and of allowing his troops to recruit their exhausted strength by the necessary refreshments of sleep and food. Yielding, however, with some re- luctance, to the clamours of the soldiers, and even to the opinion of his council, he exhorted them to justify by their valour the eager impatience which, in case of a defeat, would be universally branded with the epi- thets of rashness and presumption. The trumpets sounded, the military shout was heard through the field, and the two armies rushed with equal fury to the charge. The Cassar, who conducted in person his and character of Chnodomar. Audax et fidens ingenti roboie lacertorum, nbi ardor proelii sperabatur immanis, equo spumante, sublimior, erectus in jaculum formidandae vastitatis, armorumque nitore conspicuus : antea strenuus et miles, et utiiis praeter ca^teros ductor Uecentium Caesarem superavit aequo marte congressus.
 * Ammianus (xvi. 12.) describes, with his inflated eloquence, the figure