Page:Historic Girls.djvu/77

 Rh genius and courage of Theodosius the Great, governing the empires of the east and west, and being proclaimed on the death of her brother, Augusta, Imperatrix, and mistress of the world!"

This last event—the death of Theodosius the Younger—occurred in the year 449, and Pulcheria ascended the golden throne of Constantinople—the first woman that ever ruled as sole empress of the Roman world.

She died July 18, 453. That same year saw the death of her youthful acquaintance, Attila the Hun, that fierce barbarian whom men had called the "Scourge of God." His mighty empire stretched from the great wall of China to the Western Alps; but, though he ravaged the lands of both eastern and western Rome, he seems to have been so managed or controlled by the wise and peaceful measures of the girl regent, that his destroying hordes never troubled the splendid city by the Golden Horn which offered so rare and tempting a booty.

It is not given to the girls of to-day to have any thing like the magnificent opportunities of the young Pulcheria. But duty in many a form faces them again and again, while not unfrequently the occasion comes for sacrifice of comfort or for devotion to a trust. To all such the example of this fair young princess of old Constantinople, who, fifteen centuries ago, saw her duty plainly and