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 288 THE DECLINE AND FALL and almost superstitious, reverence of the nations for the majesty of the Roman name. His troops, animated by the hopes of spoil, followed the course of the Flaminian way, occupied the unguarded passes of the Apennine,^ descended into the rich plains of Umbria ; and, as they lay encamped on the banks of the Clitumnus, might wantonly slaughter and devour the milk-white oxen, which had been so long reserved for the use of Roman triumphs.^ A lofty situation and a seasonable tempest of thunder and lightning preserved the little city of Nanii ; but the king of the Goths, despising the ignoble prey, still advanced with unabated vigour ; and, after he had passed through the stately arches, adorned with the spoils of Barbaric victories, he pitched his camp under the walls of Rome." Hannibal at During a period of six hundred and nineteen years, the Kome seat of empire had never been violated by the presence of a foreign enemy. The unsuccessful expedition of Hannibal ^ served only to display the character of the senate and people ; of a senate degraded, rather than ennobled, by the comparison of an assembly of kings ; and of a people to whom the ambassador of Pyrrhus ascribed the inexhaustible resources of the Hydra. ^ Each of the senators, in the time of the Punic war, had accomplished his term of military service, either in a subordinate or a superior station ; and the decree which in- vested with temporary command all those who had been consuls or censors or dictators gave the republic the immediate assistance of many brave and experienced generals. In the beginning of the war, the Roman people consisted of two 5 Addison (see his Works, vol. ii. p. 54, edit. Baskerville) has given a very picturesque description of the road through the Apennine. The Goths were not at leisure to observe the beauties of the prospect ; but they were pleased to find that the Saxa Intercisa, a narrow passage which Vespasian had cut through the rock (Cluver. Italia Antiq. torn. i. p. 618), was totally neglected. 6 Hinc albi, Clitumne, greges, et maxima laurus Victima, ssepe tuo perfusi tlumine sacro Romanos ad tenipla Deum duxere tnumphos. Besides Virgil, most of the Latin poets, Propertius, Lucan, Silius, Italicus, Claudian, &c. , whose passages may be found in Cluverius and Addison, have celebrated the triumphal victims of the Clitumnus. ■J Some ideas of the march of Alaric are borrowed from the journey of Honorius over the same ground (see Claudian in vi. Cons. Hon. 494-522). The measured distance between Ravenna and Rome was 234 Roman miles. Itinerar. Wesseling, p. 126. 8 The march and retreat of Hannibal are described by Li%7, 1. xxvi. c. 7, 8, 9, 10, II ; and the reader is made a spectator of the interesting ^cene. 9 These comparisons were used by Cineas, the counsellor of Pyrrhus, after his return from his embassy, in which he had diligently studied the discipline and manners of Rome. See Plutarch, in Pyrrho, torn. ii. p. 459 [c. 19].